King Altonium (1982)

This is an Altonium in F, made by King in 1982. The name Altonium sometimes is confusing, as people tend to call any Alto Horn with a forward bell and front action valves an 'Altonium'. This however is not correct, as the Altonium is only made by King. Also, the King Altonium was designed to be played with either a regular Alto Horn mouthpiece or a French Horn mouthpiece. How this was done exactly, is unclear to me, as on my instrument I have not yet discovered a way to use a regular Alto Horn mouthpiece. Maybe they abandoned this idea somewhere along the way and made them to be used with French Horn mouthpieces only after a while. The fact that this instrument does take a French Horn mouthpiece is unique to the King Altonium. As such, the Altonium is quite elusive and I did not expect to see one pop up in my country, let alone one in such good condition with case. It only has a small dent and some light scracthes in the lacquer, but otherwise it is almost as new.