Klarinet Archive - Posting 000171.txt from 1995/06

From: SCOTT MCCHESNEY <scmcchesney@-----.NET>
Subj: Re: Old vs. New Clarinets
Date: Sun, 11 Jun 1995 03:00:04 -0400

>I have an interesting story about old clarinets. When my
>daughter played in a clarinet quartet at the Solo and Ensemble
>festival in Junior High school, believe it or not, one of the
>members showed up without her clarinet! She had left it at
>school and the school was locked. I ran home and got my
>30 year old Noblet to let her use. About ten measures into
>their piece, the judge stopped them and had them tune up!
>After a short time of tuning he asked the group if one of them
>had an older clarinet. He then gave a lecture about how the
>drilling patterns of clarinets seem to change about every
>20 years or so and it is difficult for someone with an older
>clarinet to play in tune with newer ones.
>Any comments? (Please tell me this is true. I could use
>this info to talk my wife into letting me get a new clarinet!)

Well, heck - I started this thread, so I guess I'll put my two cents'
worth in.
My old Buffet does have a problem of being sharp to "the rest of the
world", but with two thin barrel rings I pull it down with no problem, and the
instrument tunes up fine. My throat tones are a bit sharp, but the A- and Ab-
holes were drilled out to be larger than normal by the previous owner, so
there's nothing I can effectively do about that except to use vent holes.
Although, now that I think about it, a teacher I had who had a Buffet
almost the same age as mine (mine's in the 61,000 range; his was in the 62 or
63,000 range) had to vent his throat tones as well to keep them in tune, and he
did nothing to the throat-key holes. He used all four fingers to vent his
throat Bb, but I ended up dropping the pinkie Eb-Ab vent. Maybe it's just a
characteristic of the instrument...
Anyway, sounds like I answered your question the wrong way for you -
unless you think barrel rings are the wrong way to go. Without them, I am
quite sharp.

-- Scott