Klarinet Archive - Posting 000323.txt from 1995/08

From: Lou Polcari <polcari@-----.COM>
Subj: Re: Buffet vs Leblanc
Date: Thu, 24 Aug 1995 12:18:00 -0400

Hi Mitch;

On Thu, 24 Aug. 1995, Mitch Bassman <mbassman@-----.COM> wrote:
>Regarding the "policy" of Buffet to deliver "unfinished" clarinets, how
>long has this been a policy? I can understand the desire of *experienced*
>players to have a new instrument adjusted to suit individual preferences,
>but an unfinished-instrument policy would seem to be a very poor one --
>one that would discourage less experienced people from buying new
>instruments.
>
>In the summer of 1967 or 1968, as a college student on vacation, I visited
>a music store in New York City with the intent of buying a Buffet Bb to
>replace the (professional model whose designation I cannot remember)
>Leblanc that I had been playing. (The Leblanc was an excellent instrument,
>but it just "wasn't right" for me, and I had liked the feel of a friend's
>Buffet.) Nobody told me to expect new clarinets to be unplayable, so I
>was expecting to have a positive experience.

Finding a new professional clarinet is a positive experience. You may
find a clarinet "right out of the sack" that meets your needs. But I think one
needs to look at the clarinet's end potential to make a good choice. I look
past the key tension and how the throat tones voice, if the clarinet has good
scale and a free dark sound.

>When I asked to play several new Buffets, the man in the shop pulled a
>large box off a shelf and told me he had just received a new shipment from
>the factory. Inside the box were sections of clarinets wrapped in brown
>paper; I seem to recall that entire instruments were kept together with
>outer wraps of more brown paper. They were clearly "from the factory"
>and had not been adjusted. I tried about seven or eight new Buffet
>clarinets that day. I don't remember having any trouble assembling any of
>them. Also, as I recall (and it *was* 27 or 28 years ago), they were all
>playable. I selected the one that I liked the best, for whatever reason
>at that time, and bought it.

I never said that they were unplayable, I said they were a bit rough.
If you by an r 13 or any other professional horn most players are going to have
their repair guy make the horn play as they feel it should play. Balance and
voicing of the throat tones are the basic things to tweak. The intonation is a
more major adjustment. I think Buffet are very good right out of the bag. I
just pointed out that Buffet expects players to have the clarinets "done" by
their own repair guy.

>I still use that instrument -- as a clarinetist in a university/community
>symphony orchestra, as a frequent Reed I player in pit orchestras for
>several community theatres, and for an occasional double in a swing band
>where I play lead alto -- and I still like it.
>
>The real point is that I played that Buffet Bb clarinet for several years
>in its just-from-the-factory state before I ever had any work done on
>it. A couple of professionals, who tried it when it was new, told me it
>was a good one. Is the "policy" real? It doesn't seem reasonable that all
>new clarinets would be unplayable.

As far of if it is real policy or not, I don't know. But I was told
this by three different people. One was a Buffet rep.

Lou Polcari