Klarinet Archive - Posting 000005.txt from 2004/11

From: "Lelia Loban" <lelialoban@-----.net>
Subj: [kl] confidence in the band program
Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 09:37:36 -0500


Kurt Heisig wrote,

>There is little if any reward on average or poor
>equipment. There is HUGE reward with equipment
>that works VERY well!

While I agree that in general, students learn better on good equipment than
on mediocre or bad equipment, I was disconcerted, not for the first time,
to see Mr. Heisig follow with a long list of specific products.

My initial impulse was to agree with Kevin Fay, who wrote,
>>Respectfully - this is intensely wrongheaded, on a
>>couple of different levels.
>>
>>It's hard to get any results out of a leaky clarinet,
>>or a piece of junk with inherently bad design.
>>OTOH, you can get a good sound out of most any
>>student horn from a respected manufacturer - Bundy,
>>Vito, Buffet, Selmer, Yamaha, Conn, Normandy,
>>whatever. I steer students away from the cheap
>>Chinese stuff sold at Wal-Mart, but would never tell
>>a kid that their horn isn't good enough because it
>>wasn't my preferred brand. It hurts the kid, plus it's
>>just wrong. The Conn 8D is a fine horn, but surely
>>you jest - the "only" choice?. Phillip Farkas and Ethyl
>>Merker seem to have done just fine with That Other
>>Brand. Please.
>>
>>Your talisman mouthpieces probably work fine for some
>>kids. They can't possibly work for all kids, unless you have
>>them all fitted with identical teeth.

But then I thought about things a little more, and -- why not have all the
little monsters' teeth extracted, then? Yes, fit them with identical
teeth, perfectly aligned for a Conn 8D. Also, anyone should agree that
purple is the best color. The kids should all wear purple for inspiration.
Then, too, everything starts with the feet. Without the feet firmly
planted in a good pair of shoes, the whole body goes out of alignment,
right up to the embouchure. Yes, send home any kid who shows up wearing
any shoes except Nikes. And the socks! Gold Toe, definitely. Make the
kids show you their underwear. Everybody knows that nobody can sit
properly in any underwear except Jockey. If everything else conforms, it
will look startling and just plain wrong if the kids have a mongrel
assortment of hair colors. Black goes well with purple. They must all dye
their hair black. And the eyes! Oh, how could a band leader look into a
confusing blinkage of brown, blue, green and even -- horrors! -- hazel!
Contact lenses for all. Brown.

Naturally the friendly salespeople at the music store can sell all of this
equipment, including the sleep learning tapes to program the students'
thoughts. No nonconformity there, either, because it might spill over into
the music and wreck the perfection of the ensemble. I mean, there are more
than 2000 religions in the USA alone! Just think about the potential for
musical chaos, if you've got Methodists and Jews and Catholics and Hindus
and Baptists and Mormons and Buddhists and atheists and Presbyterians and
Episcopalians and Wiccans and Pentecostals and Moslems and agnostics and
more, all in the same band! No, pick one faith and make sure the whole
band follows it.

>;-)

Okay, Kurt, reductio ad absurdum is a snarky little debate tactic, and I
apologise for it -- aaaah, no, I don't, but anyway, seriously now: Go
ahead, pimp the products you believe in. They're good products -- although
I must say that high pressure sales tactics invariably divert my attention
from music and make me start wondering what the store's profit margin is on
various brands. But my main point is that your hard-sell resonates
strangely on an e-list that's full of independent-minded adults who play
all sorts of different brands (including some that are a century or more
"obsolete") and who enjoy listening to musicians who play even more brands.
Your enthusiasm is obvious and, face to face, you're probably a very
efficient salesman, in the style of the sidewalk barker at a hooch house,
but if I had to buy a kid a horn, I'd avoid any store where I knew the
sales staff would put such pressure on me *and* on the child to make the
one, the only, the "right" choice -- by the store's standards. That kind
of come-on makes me duck for the crosswalk.

Lelia Loban
Regime change begins at home: Kerry and Edwards in 2004!

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