Klarinet Archive - Posting 000755.txt from 1995/05

From: "Donald B. Kinghorn" <don@-----.EDU>
Subj: Re: Vito clarinets: good or evil?
Date: Fri, 26 May 1995 12:58:35 -0400

I have to step in here and defend Vito. I've never played one of the
plastic student models so I can't really comment on that, but, I own
a VSP model and it's great! The grenadilla wood is tight grained of
high quality, the fit and finish on the keywork is excellent, it
plays great, and most importantly the sound is terrific! It even came
with a decent mouthpiece, a Woodwind K10m. And it only cost $650 new
(list ~1200) I had it checked out by the local symphony player and he
thought it was excellent, he plays a pro Yamaha.
Now, for the plastic student model. Well what do you expect from an
instrument that only cost ~$250. At least it is a clarinet and it is
playable, so, it's better than nothing. Also, I would be willing to
bet that if you had them maintained by a good repair person they
would probably play fine, and if you put one in the hands of a decent
player they would still most likely sound great. You could give a
beginning student a $3000 clarinet and a great mouthpiece and they
probably wouldn't sound any better than on the plastic Vito.
I have a feeling that the only thing wrong with a plastic Vito is
that it is a plastic Vito i.e. it's a psychological problem, a bias.
People love to have something to hate. When I was teaching guitar I
used to hate Yamaha student guitars, they seemed to be unplayable and
sounded terrible to me. One day I decided to check out all of them in
the store out of 20 I found 2 that were actually pretty good, and
about 10 or 12 that could be setup to play fine by a good repair
tech. I finally had to admit that they weren't that bad.
Please don't take this as a flame, I just felt I had to say something
in defense of Vito. I general I agree, most student insturments are
not that great, but hey they're (usually) better than nothing.
-Don