Klarinet Archive - Posting 000954.txt from 2000/01

From: GrabnerWG@-----.com
Subj: [kl] Mouthpiece FAQ was... Re: [kl] Greg Smith mouthpieces
Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2000 16:42:10 -0500

Dan Leeson writes:

<< What I am trying to say (and probably not very well), is that there doesn't seem to be much real value in such postings. They may make the one who posts them happy and they may make the mouthpiece maker very happy, but if I were looking for a mouthpiece (which I am not), there is not enough meat here to point me in that direction.

Somehow, I come out of this feeling guitly and I have no idea why.>>

Dan, I believe the problem here is that the "answer" is NOT quantifiable. There simply is no one given set of numbers that produces the "best" mouthpiece.

The the number of variables in mouthpiece construction is truely amazing, and they are in most cases interdependent.

Facings vary: Long, short, medium
Tip openings vary: Open, medium, close
You can have straight wall windway of angled wall
Different lengths of windway
Different depths of widway
Mouthpiece length can vary 10 mm or more
You can have a flat baffle, concave, or even convex
The internal bore can be long and narrow
or shorter and wider
The internal bore can be more or less conical...

Now match this up with different barrel shapes and types. Cylindrical, reverse taper, degree of taper...

For example, last summer spring, I tried out 17 different Moennig barrels, hoping to "concentrate" my tone, which I believed had become to diffuse, and to help control intonation on throat tones and upper clarion. I found one I really liked, and have been using it ever since.

I've been working with a specific blank (reputed to be very similar to that used by a legendary mp maker). I worked with several of these for a week or more, and never really got the results I wanted. Many good points, but always a bit "cold" or brittle.

Well, I was measuring various barrels the other day to compare amount of taper (checking out a statement from the old Stubbins book) when, for no specific reason, I tried my old Buffet cylindrical barrel with this "promising" but "cold" mouthpiece. BINGO! Something happened....

Getting back to your main point.....The measurements said that the mouthpiece should work. The measurements said that it should work well with the Moennig type barrel. Then...poof......all my logic went out the window.

Another problem is that the basic thing we evaluate our mouthpieces on - tone - can vary from location to location. In a previous post, I described how I loved a particular mouthpiece in my studio/workshop, had a great experience with it in a chamber setting (reading the Mozart Quintet with some talented local players), ....and, in the hall in which I often play...had a very negative experience......

Now we come to different models of clarinet, different bore sizes (whether on purpose or by wear or by poor quality control).....

We come to level of player........5th grade Johnny Jones playing is REMARKABLY improved, by switching to a mouthpiece which his music major brother is discarding...

To the different uses to which a clarinet is put.....Chamber, Dixieland, Marching Band, Polka Band, Symphony orchestra...

We come to a range of acceptable products...either very narrowly focused for a specific use.....or having a certain amout of internal conflict or ambiguity.......for more general use...

Compound this with the fact that most clarinetists haven't a clue as to what really hapens within their mouthpiece, for good or bad, and don't even have a vocabulary to discuss it.

(See Clark Fobes' excellent info page on Sneezy.....a big part of it is just explaining parts/areas of the mouthpiece and agreeing on specific terminology.)

As, I mentioned before, I will be studying acoustics and clarinet design to begin to understand some of these issues.

I have Benade's two books arriving from Amazon, as well as Lee Gibson's text "clarinet Acoustics"

Maybe after I read these and absorb some of the information, I can give more coherent answers to some of these questions...until then.....

Let's not feel guilty. We are all born ignorant....but, we can do something about it.

Walter Grabner......pant, pant

P.S. No Neil...this was not an advertisement

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