page_title: E. A. Couturier
section_title: E.A. Couturier Co., Ltd.
hierarchical_section_title: E. A. Couturier / E.A. Couturier Co., Ltd.
caption_attribution_description: English: Enhanced scan of Couturier 1913 patent artwork from US Pat Ofc
context_page_description: Ernst Albert Couturier was best known as a cornet player who toured as a "virtuoso" performer on the concert programs of bands of the day. He promoted the Holton Band Instrument Company for a decade in that capacity before applying his own unique inventions to the production of his own line of brass band instruments between 1918 and 1923.
context_section_description: After resigning from Holton in 1913, achieving his first patent, and seeing that patent built by the J.W. York company as the Couturier Wizard Model, Ernst Albert Couturier bought the derelict William Seidel Band Instrument Company and renamed it. He did so with two partners, Melvin G. Lathrop and William N. Barlow. His company built a full line of brass band instruments in the conical bore style as well as a saxophone. In 1918 the firm moved from New York City to La Porte, Indiana where the bulk of the instruments bearing the company name were made. In 1923 Couturier's eyesight failed and shortly after the company went into receivership and was sold to Lyon & Healy. In 1928 Lyon & Healy sold the band instruments division to the Frank Holton Company which halted production of Couturier instruments in 1929. Instruments built under Couturier's control between 1918 and 1923 can be identified by serial numbers ranging from 1000 to 9500.
  Couturier was known to say, "After training for breath control and technical perfection, why must we remain at the mercy of inferior instruments?” Couturier turned to instrument design to address that problem, as did Vincent Bach, Elden Benge, Renold Schilke and Jerome Callet.
  The continuous conical bore construction patented by Couturier was a core principle in his designs. E.A. Couturier company was known for the unique shape of the valve tubing, which, in its original and purest form did not support any tuning slide for fine pitch adjustment. This design was to support the most continuously conical bore possible and also offered less resistance to air flow through the horn. Slides, when present, continued a conical progression by varying the wall thickness in order to achieve a movable cylindrical exterior. Those instruments built without valve slides tasked the players to bend some notes using their lips and also to rotate the horn to free the instrument of condensation during rests. The Couturier cornet was typically available in a Bb/A model with a rotary valve for selecting the key of the horn while other makers of the era such as H.N. White used interchangeable tuning slides. Couturier and the company received numerous patents for conical bore instruments, a phonograph, the A/B-flat "quick change valve", and a mute design.
caption: 1913 patent referenced on #3939.
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