# Tuba Thefts **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 8, 2018, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239 "2018-03-08T15:22:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/1 "2018-03-08T15:22:20Z")
Today’s Wall Street Journal has an article about a crime wave. The wave in question is the theft of tubas. Apparently, stealing them is quite in vogue at the moment. So I ask our dear **TubaDiva** , have _you_ ever had a problem with a runaway horn??? 😕 PS: I would link to the article, but sadly it is behind the WSJ paywall. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/2 "2018-03-08T16:02:03Z")
I expect that they’re probably stolen just for their scrap value. I can’t imagine there’s a big black market for hot tubas, but there’s always a market for a few dozen pounds of brass. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/3 "2018-03-08T16:12:04Z")
A similar crime was described some decades ago by [Flanders and Swann](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jc_BFM_wJMU), although involving a French horn rather than a tuba. In that case, the motive appears to have been a critical reaction to the owner’s playing. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/4 "2018-03-08T16:22:53Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I expect that they’re probably stolen just for their scrap value. I can’t imagine there’s a big black market for hot tubas, but there’s always a market for a few dozen pounds of brass. Looks like scrap price around 50 buck, give or take. ([Tuba weight 25 to 35 lb](https://www.reference.com/hobbies-games/much-tuba-weigh-38f025a3468f1629), [scrap brass around $1.60 to $1.85 per ellb](http://www.877ironmike.com/metal-prices).) ---
**Author:** ![DCnDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dcndc/32/2842_2.png) [@DCnDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DCnDC)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/5 "2018-03-08T16:25:22Z")
I read about this 5 years ago and it was in California. In those cases, the apparent culprit was a form of Mexican music known as “banda” which prominently features the tuba, which is a significant chunk of brass costing anywhere between $2000-7000. > [@](#): > > Raul Campos, a D.J. at the local public radio station KCRW, said that when he was growing up in Southern California, young Latinos did not want live 12-person bandas at their parties. > > “But banda has really grown,” Mr. Campos said. “It’s like a new, cool trend with young people. It’s now cool to have a live band with a tuba, or to be a tuba player.” > > As a result, sousaphones have made work in bandas more lucrative. A banda can make at least $3,000 for a night’s work at a wedding or quinceañera, said J. D. Salas, who teaches tuba at Stephen F. Austin State University in Texas. > > And the tuba player, who is often the leader of the group, usually gets the largest share. > **[‘Tuba Raids’ Plague Schools in California (Published 2012)](https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/10/education/tuba-thefts-plague-california-schools.html)** > > The popularity of banda music, in which the tuba plays a dominant role, is seen by some as the cause of a recent rash of thefts. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/6 "2018-03-08T16:36:29Z")
> [@DCnDC](#): > > I read about this 5 years ago and it was in California. In those cases, the apparent culprit was a form of Mexican music known as “banda” Damn those thieving genres. I was once mugged by scat. ---
**Author:** ![Jumpbass](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jumpbass/32/147_2.png) [@Jumpbass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jumpbass)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/7 "2018-03-08T16:39:55Z")
Tuba player here. I managed to get to the WSJ story through Google News. Tubas are expensive. Very. I imagine that there actually is a black market for them, especially if they’re moved out of the area. The big theft in LA in 2012 has been theorized to provide for the banda crowd. Here’s why I agree with that. I have a friend that operated one of the largest instrument repair shops in the SF Bay Area. He told me several years ago that he had a Mexican gentleman come in once a year to buy as many used sousaphones as he could to resell in Mexico. There seems to be a big demand for them. BTW- Banda music has some utterly insane tuba players. Fast, agile and LOUD! Side note- to avoid the inevitable confusion, sousaphones are a kind of tuba. Same instrument, different shape. Sousaphones are the ones mostly being stolen. Another side note- the player in the article that plays with the drum and bugle corps would be playing a contra bass bugle. shaped like a standard tuba, they’re usually pitched in G, not the Bb or C most tuba players are used to and is held like a bazooka on the shoulder. It’s a specialty instrument and wouldn’t be much use outside a bugle corps, so not a surprise it got found quickly. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/8 "2018-03-08T20:42:03Z")
Perhaps someone wants to be sure that he wins the tuba tryout. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/9 "2018-03-08T20:44:52Z")
I dunno Frank, this city is the tuba capital of the world. We’ve tried Acme Tuba, Tuba World, Tubas R Us, Tuba or Not Tuba, Tuba Ligation. Ah, we’ve come to a dead end, Frank. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/10 "2018-03-08T23:57:49Z")
Can tubas be marked without affecting the sound so that they can be identified after being stolen? Something like a hallmark? ---
**Author:** ![JohnGalt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johngalt/32/184_2.png) [@JohnGalt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnGalt)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/11 "2018-03-09T00:46:16Z")
> [@jz78817](#): > > I dunno Frank, this city is the tuba capital of the world. We’ve tried Acme Tuba, Tuba World, Tubas R Us, Tuba or Not Tuba, Tuba Ligation. Ah, we’ve come to a dead end, Frank. Surely you’re joking. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/12 "2018-03-09T01:10:30Z")
It wouldn’t be too hard to engrave a serial number or something in them. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s already done at the factory, though it’s been a while since I’ve taken a good look up close. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/13 "2018-03-09T01:29:12Z")
Some people are calling this a hoax. Well, it’s not a big trick. It’s a series of tubas! ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/14 "2018-03-09T02:17:49Z")
> [@DSYoungEsq](#): > > Today’s Wall Street Journal has an article about a crime wave. The wave in question is the theft of tubas. Apparently, stealing them is quite in vogue at the moment. > > So I ask our dear **TubaDiva** , have _you_ ever had a problem with a runaway horn??? 😕 > PS: I would link to the article, but sadly it is behind the WSJ paywall. ☹ Just set the link. We can open it in “incognito” or “private” mode. > [@Chronos](#): > > It wouldn’t be too hard to engrave a serial number or something in them. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s already done at the factory, though it’s been a while since I’ve taken a good look up close. My Dad used to have his trumpets and cornets engraved. ---
**Author:** ![x-ray\_vision](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/x-ray_vision/32/351_2.png) [@x-ray\_vision](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/x-ray_vision)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/15 "2018-03-09T02:30:33Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > Just set the link. We can open it in “incognito” or “private” mode. I’m not having a problem reading it in regular mode. [https://www.wsj.com/articles/people-are-stealing-tubasno-one-knows-why-1520439297](https://www.wsj.com/articles/people-are-stealing-tubasno-one-knows-why-1520439297) ---
**Author:** ![Sicks\_Ate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Sicks\_Ate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sicks_Ate)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/16 "2018-03-09T02:34:23Z")
> [@Jumpbass](#): > > Tuba player here. I managed to get to the WSJ story through Google News. > > Tubas are expensive. Very. I imagine that there actually is a black market for them, especially if they’re moved out of the area. The big theft in LA in 2012 has been theorized to provide for the banda crowd. Here’s why I agree with that. > > I have a friend that operated one of the largest instrument repair shops in the SF Bay Area. He told me several years ago that he had a Mexican gentleman come in once a year to buy as many used sousaphones as he could to resell in Mexico. There seems to be a big demand for them. > > BTW- Banda music has some utterly insane tuba players. Fast, agile and LOUD! > > Side note- to avoid the inevitable confusion, sousaphones are a kind of tuba. Same instrument, different shape. Sousaphones are the ones mostly being stolen. > > Another side note- the player in the article that plays with the drum and bugle corps would be playing a contra bass bugle. shaped like a standard tuba, they’re usually pitched in G, not the Bb or C most tuba players are used to and is held like a bazooka on the shoulder. It’s a specialty instrument and wouldn’t be much use outside a bugle corps, so not a surprise it got found quickly. Unless that particular instrument isn’t keeping up with some changes in DCI rules, they’re probably actually pitched in B flat. I’m not sure any corps use G bugles any more now that they’re not required. But then again, I’ve been out of the loop a while and only gather information from the periphery. I’m also a drummer, so WTF do I know ---
**Author:** ![carlb](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carlb/32/5930_2.png) [@carlb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carlb)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/17 "2018-03-09T04:25:09Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > It wouldn’t be too hard to engrave a serial number or something in them. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s already done at the factory, though it’s been a while since I’ve taken a good look up close. Every brass instrument I’ve ever seen has a serial number from the factory; usually on one of the valves or near the mouthpiece. Filing them off would be pretty obvious. I suppose it would be possible to alter them without it looking too blatant. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/18 "2018-03-09T04:55:09Z")
The serial number doesn’t do much good unless there’s some central registry where it can be checked _and_ the buyer of the discount tuba is motivated to do that. ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/19 "2018-03-09T05:22:04Z")
> [@Jumpbass](#): > > Tuba player here. I managed to get to the WSJ story through Google News. > > Tubas are expensive. Very. I imagine that there actually is a black market for them, especially if they’re moved out of the area. The big theft in LA in 2012 has been theorized to provide for the banda crowd. Here’s why I agree with that. > > I have a friend that operated one of the largest instrument repair shops in the SF Bay Area. He told me several years ago that he had a Mexican gentleman come in once a year to buy as many used sousaphones as he could to resell in Mexico. There seems to be a big demand for them. > > BTW- Banda music has some utterly insane tuba players. Fast, agile and LOUD! > > Side note- to avoid the inevitable confusion, sousaphones are a kind of tuba. Same instrument, different shape. Sousaphones are the ones mostly being stolen. > > Another side note- the player in the article that plays with the drum and bugle corps would be playing a contra bass bugle. shaped like a standard tuba, they’re usually pitched in G, not the Bb or C most tuba players are used to and is held like a bazooka on the shoulder. It’s a specialty instrument and wouldn’t be much use outside a bugle corps, so not a surprise it got found quickly. Hey man, how you doing? We haven’t talked in ages! Thanks, you said mostly everything I would have. For those who didn’t see the article, the “hook” it hangs on is the missing sousaphone of Preservation Hall Jazz Band bassist/sousaphonist Ben Jaffe. They were packing up from a gig the other night and someone stole it right out of the car. The horn is VERY distinctive and unmistakable. Ben is really attached to it and wants it back, he’s hopeful for a reunion. > **[Missing: Preservation Hall's iconic tuba](https://www.nola.com/news/crime_police/missing-preservation-halls-iconic-tuba/article_21ece8fa-83c9-550c-8742-356e3e5abd30.html)** > > An iconic New Orleans instrument is missing. This has been a problem for a while. These days Banda is probably the main cause of it, though the increasing popularity of Honk!-style street bands and Tuba Gooding Jr. may have something to do with it as well. Worthwhile tubas and sousaphones are expensive instruments. You can easily drop thousands of dollars on a pro level horn. But this is by no means a new thing. Like crews that steal cars to put them in shipping containers and take them to other parts of the world, this is often what happens to tubas that go missing. Tuba great Don Butterfield told me once he knew someone that had a tuba stolen from them on the East Coast and it wound up in Rio. Boston Brass pro Sam Pilafian once had a horn stolen from him at LaGuardia Airport when a gang hijacked an entire truckload of luggage. None of it ever surfaced anywhere again. In the 60s Walter Sear would import boatloads – literally – of horns from the Mahillon factory in Belgium; many of those shipments were hijacked off the docks. As for me, yes, I have been a victim of crime. There used to be a music store in NYC that was notorious for selling stolen instruments. My practice room on West 53rd St. was burglarized on a Saturday night; on Monday morning, before I could even file a police report, the horn was sold out of that shop on West 48th. The horn surfaced about two years later; the guy that originally sold it to me walked into a rehearsal and sat next to this guy and Ray said to himself, “That looks … familiar.” The police lost my report and I was not successful in getting it back. Yes, most all horns have serial numbers, though I have seen the occasional ancient horn that had no numbers at all. Because the world is now a smaller place and people are more proactive and talking about this kind of thing, the odds of retrieving a stolen instrument are probably better than they’ve ever been. We are not the exception; you can read any number of listservs and message boards where people talk about stolen instruments, especially those axes owned by famous people. Google “Beano” sometime. 😃 If you see Ben’s horn, let him know, woudja? And you have my express permission to beat the brakes off the guy what took it. Your humble TubaDiva ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2018, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239/20 "2018-03-09T05:40:17Z")
> [@Lord\_Feldon](#): > > The serial number doesn’t do much good unless there’s some central registry where it can be checked _and_ the buyer of the discount tuba is motivated to do that. 2nd Amenders and NRA may come out to oppose any database as a slippery slope for a firearm registry. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tuba-thefts/810239.md?page=2)