Klarinet Archive - Posting 000116.txt from 1999/06

From: GrabnerWG@-----.com
Subj: Re: [kl] What is refacing, was - Kaspar Mouthpieces
Date: Wed, 2 Jun 1999 12:44:31 -0400

In a message dated 6/1/99 10:09:37 AM Central Daylight Time, pollyg@-----.com
writes:

<< Reply-to: klarinet@-----.org
To: klarinet@-----.org

Please explain what is meant by "refacing" a mouthpiece. Roger, Walter,
Clark, whoever else is out there...???
How often can a mouthpiece BE refaced? >>

Paulette,

Put a reed on your mouthpiece and hold it up to the light. looking between
the reed and the mouthpiece. Do you see how the mouthpiece CURVES AWAY from
the flat plane of the reed.

This is how the clarinet sound is created, by the reed vibrating within that
space.

Refacing means adjusting that curve. You can make it longer....meaning that
the curve starts farther down on the mouthpiece/reed, or shorter. You can
make it more "open" by creating a wider gap between the reed and the tip of
the mouthpiece, or more "closed" by doing the opposite.

Theoretically, there is an infinite number of possible facings, but most
people play within a set of limits which in average become very similar.

When refacing, you also try to make the table, the flat area that the butt of
the reed lies along, extremely flat. although a few mouthpiece techs ike to
make a slight concavity.

When refacing, you "rub" or "scrape" the facing of the mouthpiece on
sandpaper supported n a flat plate of glass. You have to ruin quite a few
mouthpieces before you can get good at this. I'm just learning.

After, you adjust, there are feeler gauges and a tip opening gauge that you
can use to assess what (damage) you have done. The real test is in how the
mouthpiece plays.

This gets VERY touchy. One tiny little scrape can radically affect, for bad
or good, the playing qualities of a mouthpiece.

I could go on for hours, days, with information, lore etc.

If you wan t more information, I can refer you to some texts.

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