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Doublereed Archive - Posting 000021.txt from 2003/10
From: Mike Benthin <benthin@-----.net>
Subj: [DR-L] Re: glasses for music (single vision vs progressive)
Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 23:41:40 -0400
To comment on music reading glasses, and for Miriam, using MUTS (or any
suppport) with glasses:
If you use a support that limits your head up/down position or must
share a stand, get single vision glasses set to the distance you
typically would use; for me that is my arm's length, fingers cupped
upwards. Note that this is farther than the typical reading glasses,
usually set for reading in your lap. This presumes like me, that one is
farsighted (can see up close better with no glasses on). I took a piece
of music to the optomotrist and held it at myh stand height, and he
tried various lenses added to reduce my prescription (I think it ended
at +1.5 diopters). These I wear around the house also for work on
computers, reading, and sometimes jump in the car with them and realize
only when I focus on trees that I forgot the progressives!
Progressive glasses are what I normally use when not playing, which
have a continuously variable prescription from infinity (about -6 for
me) to usually reading distance, but can be whatever you ask the
optomotrist for- in my case, I wanted to be able to see reeds without
taking my glasses off, so there is no correction at the bottom, taking
advantage of my nearsightedness. If these are used to read music, you
must lift the head (and oboe) up higher and higher to see the music in
focus when read from top line to bottom. This is difficult with a
support like MUTS, where all you can do is raise the support or change
the embrechure as you angle your head back, or put the stand way down
and angled more horizontal. Not advised if you share your stand! Also,
progressives have poor focus as your eyes go left or right of focal
center, so sharing a stand is a problem as your body must be directly in
line to the music.
Some other things to consider with progressives: You should be able
to see infinity while looking straight ahead, so most standard
progressives start to reduce below this. You can have them especially
made so infinity is with the head slightly down, and then be in a more
useful range for music reading. Given that most people have a
preferential stand hight dependent on their oboe height, I'd take your
single vision glasses and look at the center of music on a stand set to
your height- and then make a marker spot on your line of sight (so you
must look through the spot at the ideal playing angle. Your
progressives must be ground so this spot has the needed diopter for the
distance you view music. If you can, use a stand light to increase the
depth of field as your pupils shut more.
"MUTS" = Michael's Ultimate Thumb Saver - Oboe/English Horn Support
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