Klarinet Archive - Posting 000763.txt from 1999/05
From: reedman@-----.com
Subj: [kl] Moennig Adjusted Clarinets
Date: Sun, 16 May 1999 18:08:09 -0400
I was extremely interested in Alvin Swiney's detailed account of the work
that Mr Moennig performed on A Buffet clarinets. I have never played an A
clarinet that had been worked on in this fashion by Mr Moennig, but some of
the "solutions" that Mr Swiney described I found a little troublesome.
There is no question that Mr Moennig was the pre-eminant craftsman of his
time and was very innovative, however, I would hate to see someone read Mr
Swiney's post and take his/her clarinet to a local crafstman and have this
type of work repeated as if it were a "recipe" for a better A clarinet.
One of the problems with Mr. Moennig's work (as reported by Mr Swiney) is
that the intoduction of 2mm of tube at the top end of the clarinet
represents a larger percentage of change to short tube notes (closest to
the mouthpiece) than to long tube notes. This localized lengthening has a
great affect on the tones closest to the mouthpiece and much less affect on
the bell tones. Most Buffet A clarinets are flat on throat Bb. With a
properly pitched mouthpiece a 67mm barrel will cause the throat Bb to be
very low. The pitch may be raised by shortening the register vent tube, but
my experience proves that a reduction of length beyond .020" causes
instability in the altissimo and an unfocused quality on the bell tones.
Also, a 67mm barrel causes the pitch of throat tones E-G to become quite
low.
Mr Swiney also asserts that essentially moving the tones holes by 2mm
allows for the use of larger tone holes for improved resonance. This may be
true for some pitches, but when one enlarges the diameter of the tone hole
the fundamental pitch can become quite sharp in the pp.
I may be incorrect, but I seem to remember reading that Mr. Moennig also
reamed a portion of the upper joint of the A clarinet and that the
"Moennig" style barrel (reduced bore with a reverse taper) was intended as
a correction for the enlarged upper bore.
Further, extensive undercutting of tone holes to raise pitch causes
instability and the sense that the "target area" for centering the pitch is
quite large.
Another point that may have been overlooked in Mr Swiney's dicussion is
that for many years Buffet did not offer a clarinet pitched for American
orchestras. I suspect that the introduction of the R-13 in the 1950's may
have been the beginning of the designation "F" in the serial number which
indicates "French pitch" (A@-----. My
only point is that the type of radical reworking of buffet A clarinets is
not required for more modern instruments.
I do agree that the Buffet R-13 A clarinet is the most flawed instrument
that Buffet makes. I brought this point up at the factory in 1993 and the
response was "buy a Festival!" A little glib perhaps. I would like to see
Buffet make an effort to improve the R-13 A clarinet. Perhaps they could
offer two versions of the R-13, original and improved.
Clark W Fobes
Clark W Fobes
Web Page http://www.sneezy.org/clark_fobes
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