Klarinet Archive - Posting 000354.txt from 2006/04

From: kurtheisig@-----.net
Subj: Re: [kl] Arnold Brilhart
Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2006 07:41:59 -0400

Wayne,

That is a wonderful story!

We all need to learn all we can from the older guys, and gals before they are gone!

I met Arnold and another Brilhart in San Jose in the spring of 1965. I had come down to San Jose State to audition for a full scholarship, and stopped at Ferguson's Music on E San Fernando. Remember that shop? In those days it was San Jose's best music store. They were having a mouthpiece festival jointly sponsored by the Brilhart's and Fergusons. It was exciting to meet Brilhart for the second time. I had met him before at Charlie Bean Music in Quincy Mass. I was 17 and too excited meeting him to remember anything he said!

Ferguson's had a raffle and were raffling off Brilhart Mouthpieces and $400 credit towards a Selmer instrument.

It was quite a day! As I put the ticket into the box I realized that I had won. I DID! I got a Selmer 9* clarinet. I used that clarinet through college. Still have it and it is one of the two that I use for gigs. I won a scholarship too, so it was - quite a day.

Kurt

-----Original Message-----
>From: Wayne Thompson <wthompson222@-----.net>
>Sent: Apr 24, 2006 5:02 PM
>To: klarinet@-----.org
>Subject: [kl] Arnold Brilhart
>
>The discussion about setups reminded me of the time I
>met Arnold Brilhart. It was probably about 94 or 95,
>and I wasn't actively playing. I'm one these people
>that put my clarinet away for about 25 years as I
>raised a family. One Sunday I was the 'greeter' at a
>little Unitarian Fellowship in Vista, California.
>This very old, very tall visitor came up and signed
>the guest book. I didn't know anything then about who
>Arnold Brilhart was, but I recognized the name as a
>line of mouthpieces. I asked him about it, and for
>about 5 minutes he talked about being in New York and
>making mouthpieces for Benny Goodman and others in
>those earliest days. The service started and the chat
>ended. The regretful end of this is that I kicked
>around the idea of calling him up and asking for more
>stories. He seemed like someone who would have liked
>that. But I didn't, and sometime after I heard that
>he had died.
>
>Wayne Thompson
>
>Here's a cute article he wrote: <http://www.dornpub.com/SaxjPDF/arnold.pdf>.
>
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