Vincent Bach Corporation

Vincent Schrottenbach was born in Baden near Vienna in 1890. As a child he received training on violin, trumpet and bugle. By age 12 he had concentrated on the trumpet. After he graduated from Maschinenbauschule (Mechanical Engineering School, Ansbach) with an engineering degree, he entered into compulsory military service in the Imperial Navy, worked as an elevator operator, and then was re-conscripted during which time he served as a military musician in the Austrian Marine Band. When he left the military the second time, Vincent decided to defy his family's wishes and pursued a career as a solo cornetist touring Europe. At the outbreak of World War I, he was in England and was forced to flee to the United States in order to escape detention as an enemy alien. While Bach was on tour in Pittsburgh in 1918, a repairman destroyed his mouthpiece, and Bach began experimenting with mouthpiece repair and fabrication. ==Vincent Bach Corporation==

New York Period Beginnings • Time frame: 1916 - 1928 • Products: Mouthpieces • Brand names: Vincent Bach • Location: • Serial Numbers: N/A The Vincent Bach Corporation began when Vincent purchased a $300 foot-operated lathe and began producing mouthpieces in the back of the Selmer music store in New York. He established his shop across the street from the musicians' union. He ran an advertisement that read "How to become a wizard on cornet without practicing" and accumulated $500 in orders in a short time and began his career as a manufacturer. • Serial Numbers: N/A Start-up continued • Time frame: 1919 - 1922 • Products: Mouthpieces • Brand names: Vincent Bach • Location: 204 East 85th street, New York, New York In 1928, tenor and bass trombones were added to the product line as the company expanded and relocated. • Products: Mouthpieces, Cornets, Trumpets, Flugelhorns, Trombones • Brand names: Stradivarius, Apollo, Mercury, After WWII, Bach was similarly creative in the first years with manpower and material shortages. The wrap height increased slightly during these years, and the tuning slide while still a "D" shape, became correspondingly flatter. Mount Vernon Period Mount Vernon manufactured trumpet (#26XXX) in an Elkhart case circa late 60s Early Mt. Vernon • Time frame: ca. 1 August 1953–1964 • Products: Mouthpieces, Brass Instruments • Brand names: Stradivarius • Location: 50 South MacQuesten Parkway, Mount Vernon, New York becoming a "wholly owned subsidiary" on 25 September. Bach stayed on as a consultant and continued to work until at least 1974. Bach accepted the bid from Selmer even though some others of the 13 which he received were higher. The bulk of tooling, along with many parts and assembled horns, were relocated to a former Buescher plant on Main Street in Elkhart Indiana where production started in January 1965. Horns of this period featured an increase in the thickness of bell-making stock to 0.025" from the 0.020" New York standard that was reclassified in Elkhart as lightweight, and denoted by a star on the bell. The wire inside the rim bead changed to being steel and can be detected using a magnet. Selmer's "Signet" line of trumpets, cornets, and trombones debuted in 1968, and was advertised as "designed by Vincent Bach." Likewise, the "Mercedes" and "Mercedes II" models of 1969. Elkhart • Time frame: ca. 1974 - 2010 • Products: Mouthpieces, Brass Instruments • Brand names: Stradivarius, Bundy(brand retired mid-80s), Bach, Prelude (imported stencil product introduced after 2000) • Location: 600 Industrial Parkway, Elkhart, Indiana Design changes that followed included transitioning from the 2-piece valve casings Bach had always used to a more cost-effective, but lighter, single tube casing. At some point the rim wire was also changed back to brass. Sales of Bach instruments remained strong, as did market reputation through the 1970s and 1980s, but in the 1990s both the size of the workforce and the warranty costs began to increase dramatically. Sales decreased at the same time. A strike in 2006 (see below) then led to significant changes in staffing and work rules, many of which had been transplants from automotive repetitive manufacturing that were applied to the job-shop format of an instrument maker. Modern • Time frame: ca. 2010–Present • Products: Mouthpieces, Brass Instruments • Brand names: Stradivarius, Bach, Prelude (imported stencil product), Aristocrat (imported stencil product) • Location: 600 Industrial Parkway, Elkhart, Indiana The main issues were the union's desire to preserve employee compensation and company's goals to increase product quality. Production was interrupted until the company hired replacement workers, and roughly a third of the strikers returned to work. The strike ended when workers voted to dissolve the relationship between the company and the United Auto Workers union. ==References==