Couturier Conical Bore Cornet  c.1920

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This beautiful gold plated cornet has a rotary valve and extra tuning crooks to play in high Bb,  Bb and A. The bell is extensively decorated and is inscribed:

CONICAL BORE PATD
E.A. COUTURIER & CO.
LAPORTE  IND
PAT'D SEPT 23, 13
OTHER PPD JUL23, 18

Couturier was known as one of the top cornetists in the US at the end of the 19th century.  He also composed music and ultimately designed a new tubing system for brass instruments. In 1916, he formed a company to make a complete line of his "Conical Bore" Instruments. "Couturier Model" cornets were also made by Conn, Holton and York. Please also see my Couturier Tuba and Couturier Baritone. Click here for a detailed biography of E.A Couturier.

This specific instrument was first purchased from a travelling salesman by my Grandfather, Gordon Holcomb Senior in Canandaigua New York in 1920, and was eventually played by Gordon L. Holcomb Jr. (my father) until it was handed down to me in 1950.  I played it in the grade school band until the band teacher decided I should be a tuba player only because I was the biggest kid in the band!

The conical valve crooks are fixed on this model - making a complete cleaning very difficult, so the cornet tended to blow rather hard when I was a kid - probably due to decades of  grunge collecting in the curved bits!!  In 1987-when I was serving on a UN Posting in the Sultanate of Oman. the cornet was replated with 24K gold.  The people doing the plating were doing the gold plating of all the interior trim of the Sultan's new 747-SP - so this was a small job for them!  The acid wash before re-plating cleaned it all out and now it plays beautifully!    The cornet in the bottom photo is a later model in which Couturier has adapted the conical crooks to be removeable and interchangeable - an excellent improvement!

See also my set of Couturier Conical Bore instruments including a Trumpet,  a Baritone, a Slide Trombone a Mellophone and a Tuba!