Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Give or take a few bucks. I picked mine up almost 2 years ago. I won't say I play it often. I've been playing trumpet on and off for over 20 years. My normal horns are a '92 Bach Strat 25 for classical and a '56 Olds Super for jazz. Why'd I buy this? Because it was $120 (when I bought it). TOTALLY worth it. Okay, the bad, first. 1. Feels like it's made out of tinfoil. 2. The stock valve action is 'adequate'. Lap them, or give them a few slides through some 1000 grit sandpaper, then oil them up. Swap in some better springs, and you get much better response. 3. Slide action is decent. I had to take the 1000 grit to the 3rd valve slide, though, to get it more agile. A few twists in the 1000 grit, oil and grease, and it's great. 4. The black lacquer is uneven at the welds and starts flaking off from protrusions almost immediately. 5. Spit valve springs are cheap, and are just mashed against the tubing with no reinforcement. Get yourself some real springs off Ebay, then cushion them with some rubber or plastic. The rubber spit valve pads seem fine. Now the good! 1. With a few mods, you have a horn with decent mechanical action. 2. Comes with the typical 'beginner' mouthpiece, Bach-style 7c, but do yourself a favor and get a 3c. 3. It sounds DECENT. Yes, it actually does. 4. It's tiny and fun. Look at it. IT'S SO ADORABLE! And the case it comes in is pretty good. Nice and padded, but still only about the size of a shoebox. Totally portable. 5. It was $120. Take it to the desert and play in a sandstorm. Dive in a pool and bubble out some Buble under the water. Stick it out the window on the highway doing 105 and see if you can outrun Flight of the Bumblebee. Strip the lacquer off and spray paint it pink with gold glitter sparkles. Who cares! 6. Prop it upright and use it as a kitschy flower pot, a statement to the elasticity of today's high-precision, off-shore brass manufacturing! A lone moth orchid would look especially shway with the flaking, black lacquer. I love this horn. It's fun. I stick my custom mouthpiece in this thing and wail. The bell is so close to your face you hear nothing but sound, and it's not a bad one. The slotting is a little bit weird at first, but it's not impossible with a little practice. I love taking this horn with me wherever I go; you never know when you might come up on a lonely drummer in need of a horn player!