Klarinet Archive - Posting 000038.txt from 2006/03

From: Joseph Wakeling <joseph.wakeling@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Buffet R-13 Played and Failed
Date: Fri, 03 Mar 2006 22:38:56 -0500

Rommel John Miller wrote:
> Let's here it for Buffet Crampon and the wonderful caring and
> concerned folks at WWBW who say they pre-test every instrument before
> they ship it. Sure they do.

Well, I don't know about WWBW because I've never had to deal with them.
But my experience is that simply---unless you're buying from a custom
handmade creator with up to a 2 year waiting list, like Johanna
Kronthaler or Schwenk und Seggelke or Stephen Fox or so on---if, like
most people, you go with a mass-produced instrument, you have to accept
that when most of these instruments ship from the factory, they are in
serviceable condition. That is, they need a decent service. ;-)

The only way I know to buy a clarinet is to go to a shop with a really
good repair team who set up all the instruments properly and do the
fine-tuning work on them that they need. I've been lucky enough to find
those sort of shops in every country I've stayed for any length of time:
Howarth's in London, Servette Musique in Geneva, Lohff & Pfeiffer in
Copenhagen. Usually shops with really good repair people also get good
stocks of instruments: these places certainly do, and I can't recommend
them enough.

On the other hand I've also been to other shops where the instruments
had obviously just had the minimum of attention to make sure there were
no serious problems. The sort of shops I'd never go back to. Probably
some of the instruments would have been good, if they'd been properly
set up, but they weren't.

Once while visiting L&P in Copenhagen I once was offered the opportunity
to play on a Buffet basset clarinet, which had just arrived from the
factory. It was horrible. It played, but you couldn't have performed
on it. I didn't get the chance to play on it after it had been properly
serviced and set up, but it probably wouldn't have been recognisable as
the same instrument. The A clarinet I bought from L&P, and the refit
they did of my Bb, were superb.

Really good repair and tech people are what make great instruments: it's
worth paying for and it's worth travelling for.

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