Klarinet Archive - Posting 000208.txt from 2004/01

From: "Mark Charette" <charette@-----.org>
Subj: RE: [kl] American move to the Boehm system
Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2004 22:07:20 -0500

> From: Rick Campbell [mailto:ricksax@-----.net]

> First, it important to inderstand that the Boehm system is a French
> development first manufactured by Buffet.

Well, not quite right. Theobald Freidrich Boehm (1794-1881) was German. Born
& died in Munchen (Munich).
August Buffet jeune manufactured the 1838 clarinet with the Boehm system,
not Buffet-Crampon, started somewhere between 1839 and 1844 by Jean Louis
Crampon. August was his uncle, and Jean Louis named his company
Buffet-Crampon to distinguish it from his uncle's company.

(The New Langwill Index, William Waterhouse, pp 36-37, 49-50)

> Some guesses about the cause for the change to Boehm:
...
> 3. Perhaps, too, there was an element of planned obsolescence?
> Everyone had to buy a new clarinet, which must have been great for
> sales.

The explosion of the Boehm system in America happened 100 years after the
introduction of the system. I don't think "planned obsolescence" had a lot
to do with it.

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