Klarinet Archive - Posting 000033.txt from 2001/11

From: Tony@-----.uk (Tony Pay)
Subj: [kl] Leaving the reed on.
Date: Thu, 1 Nov 2001 13:30:07 -0500

Tony Wakefield said:

> Tony Pay has brought to our attention the oboists' idea of dipping the
> reed (clarinet reed) into a little water as opposed to wetting it with
> our own saliva. He also lets us know that one or two American(?)
> clarinettists have been known to leave the reed on the mouthpiece for
> the life duration(?) of the reed.

Just the first bit. What I said was:

> I've always found that keeping my current reed on the mouthpiece works
> best for me, though of course I have 'hopeful' replacements in various
> storage cases (and sometimes those even work:-) This on the fly
> 'dunking' technique seems to go very well with on-the-mouthpiece
> storage, though I don't quite know why.

Somebody else talked about some player having been reported to keep his
reed on the mouthpiece and never move it, but that wasn't me.

I do sometimes take my current reed off; and I move it around too, as I
think I've described more than once here, in various posts. It was just
that I was finding less need to interfere with it at all if I rinsed it
with plain water more frequently, *on the mouthpiece*. (I'd never done
that before.) The reed seemed to be more stable, and to last longer.
But of course, like all of these things, I might just have been lucky
with the few reeds that I tried it on.

Quite apart from that, I have always tended to store my current reed on
the mouthpiece between playing sessions, though I know other people
don't; and I've sometimes gone through patches of trying glass,
humidified ridged plastic, and all the other guff. But with this
system, if I take the mouthpiece/reed out of the case at the beginning
of a session, dump it in water for a little bit, shake it out and then
play on it, it seems to go very well within a few seconds.

> I have noticed positive and immediate response using this method, but
> would ask this: if the reed is left on, it must surely create some
> kind of dilemma in how to blow in brand new reeds for playing on the
> mouthpiece already in use.

Yes. So when I want to try new reeds, I take the current one off.

> Unless one has an identical mouthpiece, and even with this way, then
> leaving the reed on, can surely only cause a <faster> degeneration of
> the reed, due to digested food particles building up on the inside
> surface of reed, and will also surely shorten the useful life of the
> M/P as deposits build up, and harden, without cleaning.

If I eat biscuits in the break, I always leave some of my tea or coffee
till the end:-)

Seriously though, you'll have to ask the guy who *never* took his reed
off what he did about that. It wasn't me.

> I have mentioned before that taking the reed off (to clean) and
> replacing it correctly and accurately to within a couple of
> thousandths of an inch should not interfere at all in the continuing
> good performance of the reed, (experienced players will be able to do
> this to within 1000th of an inch). Indeed it should, with positive
> results enhance the life and performance of the reed, as it is being
> cared for, as opposed to neglected if left on.
>
> There are of course the obvious health hazards too, if one leaves the
> reed on all the time.

Response as above.

You can of course run the whole thing under the tap, and clean it out
that way, and I've done that too. I feel that such treatment counts as
TLC for a reed even though it hasn't been taken off the mouthpiece.

Tony
--
_________ Tony Pay
|ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
| |ay Oxford OX2 6RE GMN artist: http://www.gmn.com
tel/fax 01865 553339

... Insanity is just a state of mind.

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