Klarinet Archive - Posting 000244.txt from 1996/10

From: Roger Shilcock
Subj: Re: bass doubling (fwd)
Date: Thu, 10 Oct 1996 03:53:24 -0400

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 9 Oct 1996 11:15:47 -0500
From: Neil Leupold <nleupold%post.cis.smu.edu@-----.UK>
Subject: Re: bass doubling

On Wed, 9 Oct 1996, Roger Shilcock wrote:

> Comment: Having water on the *inside* of a reed is not a good idea! How
> does the "dipper" stop this happening?
> The answer is he /she can't - so "inhaling" on the mouthpiece may not be
> sufficient.

By "inside" of the reed, do you mean inside the actual cane fibers? Or
just on the flat backside of the reed which faces the interior of the
mouthpiece? I should think a hearty inhale/suck would draw enough water
off the backside of the reed to prevent it from becoming saturated, as
long as this was done immediately following a dipping of the mouthpiece
in water. If, by "inside" the the reed you mean inside the fibers, that
is tantamount to being waterlogged, over-saturated, in which case there
is little hope of reviving the reed in that session. That would happen
if the player simply dipped the mouthpiece/reed in water, but made no
effort to draw off the excess moisture.

I still like the sponge-in-the-mouthpiece-cap idea best so far, as long
as the sponge isn't so wet as to saturate the reed. All we're looking
for here is mild moisture, no real contact with water.

Neil
The sponge doesn't look too bad, provided there's enough time to remove
it. By "inside", I meant the backside of the reed. With a bass, there is
the additional possibility that some of the water will run down into the
bocal, and, if your instrument is like mine (it probably isn't), it can
flow *back* at just the wrong time unless you attend to that possibility
before using the instrument. I'm still talking about "dipping", by the
way - a merely damp sponge is clearly an improvement
Roger Shilcock