Klarinet Archive - Posting 000124.txt from 2006/02

From: "danyel" <rab@-----.de>
Subj: Re: [kl] Value of Good Equipment (long)
Date: Thu, 09 Feb 2006 20:11:51 -0500

Hi,
sorry but I can't seem to find the thread you replied to. It's an
interesting subject indeed! When was the first mail posted?

Best wishes and thanks for your posting,
danyel

www.echoton.de/clar.html

----- Original Message -----
From: <kurtheisig@-----.net>
To: <klarinet@-----.org>
Sent: Thursday, February 09, 2006 4:09 PM
Subject: Re: [kl] Value of Good Equipment (long)

--
>Subject: [kl] Value of Good Equipment ----(long)

Tom

The "unfriendly buyout period" was 1975-6. (wholesale dropped from $375 to
$210!--I remember one day I sold 18. Another day I sold several to Leon
Russianoff. I brought a number into New England Conservatory and the
students and prof [Peter Hadcock] were shocked that all 14 I brought were
really superior after "set-up". They were confused as to which ones to get
since they were ALL above expectation and Peter Hadcock just pointed to some
under a window and said "Take those 3". Hadcock had told me he had wanted me
to bring "a lot to try from" not believing me that "any 3 I set-up will be
fine." He admitted that ANY of the 14 were exceptional and acceptable after
set-up. "Did you hand pick them? They're ALL good!" he said.)

Does anybody know what happened to Marty Tolchin, owner of Buffet, after
those creeps tried (and succeeded ) in breaking him?

During that period I purchased 270 first line Buffet instruments in a 14
month period. I sold clarinets from that lot to members of the Boston and
San Francisco Symphonies, top professors etc. This "green wood" produced
some of the finest clarinets I have ever played or worked on. I just
re-built an A from that batch and it makes me jealous! I have never figured
out whether the one I kept or that one is the best I have ever played.

My Eb, C, 150th Anniv Model--given to me by Buffet, S1, Bb R13's, E13, &
R13A are all still wonderful clarinets in great shape. (The S1 I sold to a
student and he reports it is still quite nice--I will re-build that this
summer for him).

Serial numbers from that period run about 149,000-156,+++---the E13 is
K5591.

Tom, you and I have discussed reeds and instruments some. Your point about
equipment is right---more than you think. We will get an occassional
customer that will "get-it" and after the good mouthpiece, or over-haul
he/she will start handing me their other instruments and say " do this one",
and just keep them coming. A comment I hear all of the time is: "I just
DIDN'T KNOW!!!" We also show students and customers simple things about
playing that make them feel like a whole new player- a la your first
experience playing an R13. Doublers especially will bring in horn after
horn, mouthpiece after mouthpiece, sometimes DOZENS until their equipment
"stable" is awesome. The freedom to grow after your equipment works well
REALLY SHOCKS players. Once the equipment is working well concepts of
"tongue level", which is understood well by students of the late Dr Claude
Gordon, allow one to learn so much faster and better.

Tongue level understanding, that I got from Claude, Lennie Pickett, and
Lennie's old teacher Bert Wilson, Ray Pizzi, my clarinet prof Clement
Hutchinson, was not always CALLED that, but is a huge secret of playing.
(see Ridenauers book) In designing our current lines of saxophones, I have
taken tongue level into consideration and it is producing instruments that
do things even the finest Mark VI's in our Large Selmer collection don't do.

Physiological understanding --- the interaction between the player and
equipment, is usually pooh-poohed by players. This, unfortunately, is only
an expression of ignorance, for there is a HUGE interaction, and this is
what you have been coming to realize.

I have been teaching 42 years and have become frustrated many times by
limitations my students, and customers, have had in their equipment. I must
THANK my students for the many times they have come to me expressing
frustration with equipment, and DEMANDING that I design something better for
them. From piccolo on down to the low brasses we have shown time and again
how a little tiny adjustment here or there can FREEEEEEEE a player up to
learn or perform MUCH BETTER!!! It is so much fun to watch "the light come
on" as they can suddenly do things they never dreamed of doing.

In the last few weeks I have heard students of mine on the radio or on CD's
that LISTENED, and those that did not listen, about equipment. My current
students get to listen to the recordings and I point out "This one
listened-what do you think? This other one did not! Stinks, doesn't he?" or
"This guy sounds so good when he plays his good horns, but listen to him
here when he plays the horn given him by BIG company---pretty bad
sound -no?"

Tom, these last few months I have spent a lot of time reflecting on the last
42 years of teaching and, Lord willing, the EXCITING 30 to come. Now that I
am so much more convinced that equipment ---and REED ADJUSTING---counts, I
can say a few words, or gesture with my hand, and students grow. It is like
magic, but it is equipment and an understanding of tongue-level, and
blowing. My students have always excelled and taken honors, from my first
student in 1963, but now it is different. With the mouthpieces and horns and
over-hauls, it is much faster and more thorough.

Now that we have the HEISIG SAX on the market, I have several students
playing them. IT IS A PARADIGM SHIFT. My students have always done well, and
several are very exciting pro players today, but TOM, what I was getting to
the other day, when I was interrupted by a customer, is that it is so
different now!!!! I don't even KNOW yet where it is going! With the new
horns that I designed with tongue-level understanding (I worked for 25 years
with the great brass teacher Claude Gordon), I can do so much more---and so
can the students! It is a whole new game to disign with tongue-level in mind
and have the tongue-level come back and make the horn work better! A
DELIGHTFUL vicious circle! Before, even my students on Mark VI Selmers had
problems getting some concepts quickly. Even when I rebuilt the horn to MY
critical standards, and made them a mouthpiece of rigid standards, it got
better, much better, but it wasn't LIKE THIS. Now my students get it so
RIGHT! They not only learn quickly, but the gain is STABLE. Over the next
couple of years my teaching is going to change. This equipment is so MUCH
better that I will be able to teach better and faster. The improvement in
the last few months with the new horns in learning speed and quality is
really amazing. You are RIGHT! Equipment makes a difference!

We saw this so dramatically about 1983 when Dr Gordon brought out the Claude
Gordon Selmer Trumpet and some time after 1985 when he FINALLY found someone
that could make Clarkes mouthpiece again. It is so EASY to teach trumpet to
someone on this good equipment, since they learn so much faster and better.

Larry Souza has made mouthpieces for Flugelhorn and Kuhlo horn players that
have done similar dramatic things.

Steve Adelstein (great oboist and reed designer that worked with Kalman
Opperman designing the reed tools Kal made for oboists), has shown us in
clinics in our stores for years how reed adjusting can literally CHANGE a
player. He has also helped many of us play more correctly. 2 five minute
sessions with Steve changed my playing completely, but it could NOT have
worked if he had not first shown me how to improve my reeds!

In getting to know you I have sensed a reluctance in you to say how much you
realize equipment is important, but you ARE right. Sure there are plenty of
naysayers out there that will jump down your throat when you say something
like that. My town is FULL of them, and few of them can play. What I have
found as I have grown into my youthful late 50's, is that most people, even
world-class pros, have opinions based mostly on emotion or their experience,
but if we can have an opportunity to put something BETTER in their hands,
the LIGHT DOES GO ON!

Tom, you are RIGHT! Keep saying it. Don't worry about the often
well-intended that have HUGE opinions about things they haven't experienced
yet. When you can, send the rare one that listens by the shop, we will
change his thinking and playing. At least we will TRY to get his light to
come on!

I think you will find that the bulk of the people will blow off or even
belittle your polemics, but speak on ---YOU ARE RIGHT!

Kurt

Kurt Heisig Music
1045 Water street
Santa Cruz, Ca 95062
(831) 425-5658
kurtheisig@-----.net

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