Klarinet Archive - Posting 000798.txt from 2003/09

From: Dan Leeson <leeson0@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Clarinet Overhaul Hell: Thomas Ohme - The Woodwind Shop
Date: Tue, 30 Sep 2003 09:40:43 -0400

Michael Bryant wrote:

> Many thanks for this update.
> There was some trouble (wasn't there) importing
> Stephen Fox's clarinets from Canada into the USA?
> Others may have some input on the qualities (or otherwise)
> of Uebel basset horns. So, my basset horn is now extinct!
> Several people have asked my if I would like to sell my Uebel
> bass clarinet (no swastika) , but I am really attached to it.
> MB
>

On the initial shipment of my basset horn from Fox to me in California,
there was no difficulty, though the shipper simply put the box
containing the instrument on my front porch and went away. I came back
an hour later and found it there. Fortunately, no basset horn theif
found it before I did.

However, on sending it back to Fox for some warranty repairs, I got
stuck for a $25 import fee when it was returned to me. There was also a
request for a fee from Canadian customs but I was able to talk them out
of that when I explained the situation. The U.S. customs could not be
talked out of anything. In fact they couldn't be talked to. So I paid
the $25. The problem is FEDEX. The government charges them for the
import fees and they charge me. When one complains to them, they say,
"talk to the government." Yea.

But beyond this (which is, in the final analysis, a minor thing), there
were no difficulties.

I should also mention that Keith's basset horn and mine are brothers.
They were made with cocobola wood taken from the same tree. No joke. I
have a picture of the two of us dueling with our two instruments, both
gold plated.

I have owned or played almost every brand of basset horn made. Except
for the Fox instrument (and which I still have and play), few of them
are free of serious intonation problems. Some of them have key
arrangements of the low notes that prevent the literature from being
played. The Selmer basset horn, of which I owned two, was very
problematic in this respect. One of the two was owned by Mazzeo who
sold it to me, and he had to mount another 3 or 4 keys for pinky work to
circumvent the fingering difficulties inherent in the key design of the
instrument. I played both for 30 years but there were pieces in the
repertoire that I could never play accurately because of the key design.

The German basset horns made in the French system were problematic in
that they all had wide bores, and I was not satisfied with the character
of sound produced. It was invariable stuffy and hard to play, what with
that alto clarinet mouthpiece, which I hated.

The Leblanc was spotty. Sometimes one found a good one, but it was also
a wide bore with a sound character of an alto clarinet. Good key
arrangement though.

The Buffet basset horns were among the worst, at least when they made
the narrow bore instrument. I don't know what they are like now that
they make wide bored instruments.

The Hammerschmidt basset horn was like a Cadillac. I wanted to drive
it, so beautiful was the engineering. But it played like a stuffed
sofa, it was wide bored, and had an alto clarinet outpiece.
--
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**Dan Leeson **
**leeson0@-----.net **
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