Klarinet Archive - Posting 000895.txt from 1997/09

From: "Edwin V. Lacy" <el2@-----.edu>
Subj: Re: Human Decency (was: Tabuteau)
Date: Fri, 19 Sep 1997 01:26:30 -0400

> << "Productive" because, in Tabuteau's mind, it robbed the student of his
> "good" reed, meaning that if he hoped to play his 'best' during that lesson,
> he would have to learn to adapt his breathing and muscular technique in
> order to circumvent the idiosyncrasies of a less accomomodating reed.

This has been a very interesting thread to me, as I am primarily a double
reed player. I never met Tabuteau, but have known several people who
studied with him. I have heard lots of stories about him, and most of
them are positive and complimentary of him as a teacher and player,
although almost without exception, his former students describe him as
demanding to the extreme. That is one of the things that they appreciate
about him. The number of outstanding oboists in major orchestras in the
US who studied with him is testimony to his effectiveness as a teacher.
That being the case, most people were willing to put up with a certain
amount of eccentricity, perhaps even harshness. I don't doubt that he
would "borrow" a student's reed, but I rather imagine that the story about
smashing the reed is apochryphal. If it were true, I think it would have
been mentioned by some one of his students at master classes and seminars
I have attended, or at lectures given at conferences of the International
Double Reed Society.

So, I can't disprove the story, but offer only the absence of
corroborating evidence along with my suggestion to take the story with
several grains of salt.

Still, there is something to be said for encouraging students to learn to
deal with reeds that are less than ideal. It has been my observation that
some musicians are much better than others at playing on bad reeds, and
that is a valuable skill. If we always have to have a nearly ideal reed
in order to play our best, we are going to be frustrated much of our
lives, because, as we all know, most of the time our reeds fall far short
of excellence.

Parenthetically, there are also musicians who, while they may not be very
excellent solo performers, have a certain knack for ensemble playing.
And, conversely, others may be great soloists, but be quite ineffective as
ensemble performers.

I had such a student - a bassoonist who never gave outstanding recital
performances, but could make almost any reed work, and who sounded great
in an orchestra. She played second bassoon in a couple of orchestras in
which I was the principal, and it was a pleasure to have such a player in
that spot. She had a highly developed sense of rhythmic detail, a good
ear for intonation, and could, as we might say, "tuck her sound into the
section."

However, such a player in today's world would have a very hard time of it
as a performer, because they probably could never win an audition of the
type commonly run by most orchestras, and that's a pity.

Ed Lacy
el2@-----.edu