Klarinet Archive - Posting 000664.txt from 1999/05

From: "Edwin V. Lacy" <el2@-----.edu>
Subj: RE: [kl] re: Contrabassoon - don't get much use
Date: Sat, 15 May 1999 03:34:30 -0400

On Fri, 14 May 1999, Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.edu wrote:

> Possible David, but I had a C clarinet made in the late 1800s and
> David Niethamer owns it now. I played it for 30 years, and whoever
> owned it before me played it for a long while, etc. It is not blown
> out.

If a person plays an instrument for 30 years, and if it were blown out,
the player wouldn't necessarily be aware of it. Any changes which would
take place would be so gradual that the player would adjust to the
changes. In the meantime, there would be accompanying changes in the
player's physiognomy - changes in musculature of the embouchure and the
breathing mechanism, etc. - which would tend to obscure any changes that
might be occuring in the instrument itself, not even taking into account
changes in reeds and mouthpieces over a period of 30 years.

In answer to a previous question about bassoons, contrabassoons, etc., in
fact they too would be subject to the phenomenon of depolymerization,
although the changes occur at different rates in different materials. The
soft maple wood of the bassoon would have a different kind of molecular
structure than a dense wood such as grenadilla, and other rigid materials
such as phenolic plastics would have still another type of composition and
therefore still different rates of change. In fact, it is likely that far
more people play on 50 to 75 year old bassoons than clarinets of the same
age, but even this has its limitations.

One of my bassoons is a Heckel made in 1923, and many people including
myself think it is a great one. But, there are factors other than
molecular changes in the wood which tend to obscure the effect of
blow-out, if it exists. Those factors include advancements in instrument
design, engineering and manufacture.

There is an expectation in some quarters that even the violins of the
great masters of Cremona may not have an infinite useful life span. We
may not be very far from the time that even these instruments may begin to
be considered less than the optimum instrument.

But, even if one owns an instrument in which depolymerization is taking
place, at no point in the lifetime of any of us on this list is it likely
to fall apart in our hands while we are playing, nor is it likely to
simply stop playing. Any changes that might occur would be far more
slight and gradual than that, and we would tend to adjust to them, just as
we might to a tiny leak in a pad, for example.

Ed Lacy
el2@-----.edu

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