Klarinet Archive - Posting 000385.txt from 2009/02

From: kurtheisig@-----.net
Subj: Re: [kl] Clarinet Setup - Long
Date: Fri, 20 Feb 2009 15:11:47 -0500

THANKS TOM!!

Part A is well said and is why I ask people to CALL me rather than try to explain in a medium where I am not hearing tone of voice that tells me how well what I said was understood.

Part B was just delightful.

Kurt

-----Original Message-----
>From: Tom.Henson@-----.com
>Sent: Feb 19, 2009 7:33 PM
>To: klarinet@-----.org
>Subject: [kl] Clarinet Setup - Long
>
>Clarni Bass,
>
>I am not taking exception with you and certainly am not coming against
>you personally, so please do not take offense.
>
>While your remarks seem very clear to you, some of them are not clear to
>me. Here is what I think (my opinions) the issue is when trying to
>discuss abstract concepts using e-mail.
>
>Language is an imprecise form of communication. Written communication
>such as e-mail is even more imprecise and this is really where things
>get confused. Since I do not know you personally, I have no basis for
>how to interpret what you are saying other than to try and filter it
>through my own understanding. Since each person perceives things in a
>unique way, this is where the impreciseness occurs. I must interpret
>what you are saying based upon how I see it vs. how you see it.
>
>Many things that are discussed on this list are based upon opinions and
>this can have some heated results as we have seen. Real facts can be
>few, but opinions are plentiful.
>
>Facts vs. Opinions:
>
>Fact - Barak Obama was recently elected President of the United States
>Opinion - Any reason given as to why he was elected or why he is better
>suited to the job than someone else.
>
>Fact - Natural cork is a product of trees and thus organic in nature.
>Synthetic cork is a man-made product which is not organic in nature.
>Opinion - Synthetic cork is better than natural cork or natural cork is
>better than synthetic cork for some applications.
>
>Fact - Some persons have real reasons why they choose one product over
>another, but it may be based upon opinion and not fact.
>Opinion - These people are wrong or misinformed.
>
>My explanation about using wax on corks never claimed that it was better
>than any other method discussed, only offered as another alternative
>solution. Because you do not feel it has any valid benefit for cork
>repair is simply an opinion and you are certainly entitled to have it,
>but that does not make it fact either.
>
>By telling people that wax is used on tenon corks by some repair techs I
>was relaying a fact, not an opinion. But I recognize also that there are
>many way of repairing things and no one of them is right or wrong. Some
>may be quicker than others, yes. Some may last longer than others, yes.
>Some may seal better than others, yes.
>
>I can also explain to you why Wurlitzer, for example, uses wax on their
>corks and it is up to anyone else if they feel they want to try it or
>not to see if there is any benefit in it for them. It is my personal
>opinion that there is a reason why these people do this and there may be
>some underlying benefit. But that is simply my opinion and I say so.
>
>Why does a maker like Wurlitzer use all natural cork on their clarinets
>when there are now other good options available you may ask? Are they
>not up to date on the latest materials available to use? That is a good
>question, but the answer may surprise you.
>
>The first time I held a Wurlitzer clarinet in my hands, I had no
>knowledge of their history. I did not understand why they made something
>the way they did, that while it looked similar to my Buffet clarinets,
>it did not play similar at all.
>
>It took some time and a rather painful 2 years to come to a better
>understanding of why they do things the way they do. I may not agree
>with some of the way they make things, but at least I understand and can
>tell you why they do things the way they do.
>
>Wurlitzer has a different concept of keywork setup than any of the
>French makers that I was familiar with. In fact, most all of the
>clarinets I have owned and played on follow the French philosophy if you
>can call it that. I have owned at one time or another Buffet, Selmer,
>Leblanc, Rossi, Howarth and Eaton clarinets. Buffets I have owned start
>at 1956 up to present day made clarinets.
>
>Wurlitzer, on the other hand, believes that the way the keys perform has
>to be designed into the very way every part of the clarinet is made and
>assembled. They must fit as perfectly as humanly possible. That is why
>they make all of the keywork by hand. Nothing is mass produced. The big
>3 French makers rely on mass production for just about everything, but
>especially all of the keys, screws, springs, pads, etc..
>
>While it is true that CNC machines prepare the wooden blanks and drill
>out the tone holes, all bore work and finish work is done by hand on
>Wurlitzer clarinets. I thought at first this was simply an old fashioned
>tradition of craftsmanship that they had maintained for the last 150
>years. It certainly is something they are very proud about. But does
>this make it better was my question. Especially given the high cost.
>
>Imagine for a moment a clarinet where the keywork is so smooth and
>responsive that it feels as if they have ball bearings. Every motion is
>precise, fluid, predictable, and most of all effortless to the hands.
>The screws are fit so precisely that you can take a key off, wipe off
>all of the oil you can and insert it back into the key and there is no
>looseness, no side play, and no drag other than the hydroscopic action
>of smooth polished metal against metal. You can then hold the key by the
>end of the screw and the key retains enough wall friction that the key
>does not fall off the screw. Yet it still moves up and down
>effortlessly. I had never seen such a thing before. Take apart most any
>clarinet and try this and you will be dropping the keys all over the
>floor (kids do not try this please!).
>
>That was when I realized that I did not understand anything at all that
>I thought I had when I first held it in my hands. The only experience
>that I had to go by was with French clarinets and this type of
>comparison simply did not seem to work with the Wurlitzer. My way of
>seeing began to change the more I understood how this clarinet was made,
>and what I thought were facts became nothing more than opinions.
>
>The Wurlitzer keywork is setup up so light that I really could not play
>anything evenly anymore. In addition, there were some small air leaks
>and I just knew that this must be a manufacturing defect. So using all
>the facts that I learned from my many years of playing on French
>clarinets, I preceded to "overhaul" my Wurlitzer. I put cork pads on the
>upper joint and high quality skin pads on the lower joint. I changed out
>the obviously inferior corks on the adjustment screws for Teflon and
>then used some synthetic corks in other places. When I finished, it had
>an air seal like crazy. Now it looked just like my Buffets.
>
>There was one problem, it did not play well at all and now strangely
>sounded just like my Buffets. I did not want it to sound like Buffets
>because the sound was the main reason I bought this clarinet in the
>first place. In the end, I realized I had so messed up my clarinet that
>I had to send it back to Wurlitzer and pay to have them overhaul it
>again and put it back the way it was. When I got it back, it played
>again just the way it had before.
>
>I was so perplexed at why my overhaul made this clarinet almost
>unplayable that I spent the next 2 years not only learning to play it,
>but talking to those who have first hand knowledge about these clarinets
>and how they are made.
>
>What I learned changed my whole understanding and also changed my mind
>about what I thought were "facts". What I initially thought were
>defects, I now realize were designed into this clarinet after 150 years
>of trial and error. What I thought was simply tradition, turned out to
>be a very real reason why they still make all keywork by hand.
>
>The lightness of the springs actually is a good thing once you train
>your hands to move more evenly. It was then that I realized that the
>French way of using strong needles springs was more because of the
>looseness inherit in their keywork and the fact that with mass
>manufacturing this allows a more consistent setup feel to the average
>players. Yes, it does make for stronger hands. But how even you play the
>keywork of a clarinet is really not related that much to how strong your
>fingers are, but how evenly and precise they move. This is my opinion
>and conclusion. Now that I am accustomed to this lightness of motion, I
>now can play fast passages faster and smoother that I ever could on my
>Buffets with must less hand fatigue. Now I realize why Wurlitzer has
>made the keywork the way they do.
>
>Understanding the air leaks took me a little longer to grasp. It was
>when I was talking with Morrie Backun that he said something that was
>basically the same thing Wurlitzer told me about the small air leaks.
>Morrie said that he had worked with a well known player (Principal for
>major US orchestra) that had asked him to deliberately induce small air
>leaks into their clarinet. When I told him that Wurlitzer also does
>something similar in the pad setup, he confirmed that it can help
>balance the bore resistance and actually make the nodal transitions
>smoother. In other words, done correctly, it can smooth out the note to
>note transitions. That's when the light bulb went off in my head and I
>really began to have much more respect for something that I had not
>understood.
>
>Why does Wurlitzer use only natural cork? Natural cork, assuming that it
>is of the highest quality, has that wonderful resilience and ability to
>spring back. I agree that some good synthetic corks also has this
>ability, but what makes them favor natural cork over synthetic?
>
>The surprising answer is because of it's natural ability to compress. As
>natural cork weakens, it will compress and take on the shape of the keys
>that come in contact with it. A synthetic cork, while lasting much, much
>longer, is more consistent in the way it reacts to the key contact, over
>and over again. But it really does not break in the same way that
>natural cork does.
>
>In addition, synthetic cork can also be louder. By the time you have a
>cork durable enough for the key contact, it may be hard enough to start
>to make noise. Natural cork not only has the ability to spring back, but
>it also acts as a noise insulator at the same time. Yes, it still makes
>noise, but generally not as much as the same hardness synthetic cork.
>
>Getting back to the fact that natural cork compresses over time faster
>than synthetic cork, this is exactly the reason why Wurlitzer still uses
>it. They believe that the keywork on a clarinet should be perfectly
>balanced. All motion should feel the same, all resistance, and up down
>travel the same. The keywork should never feel that it is unbalanced or
>stressed from springs and rebound pressure that is uneven. Natural cork
>has the ability to "break in" so that the keywork settles in and the end
>result is keywork that is perfectly balanced under your hands. Wurlitzer
>also told me to never let anyone else play on my clarinet for an
>extended period of time because of this very same reason. They keywork
>actually breaks in just for your hands and will not respond the same
>when using different hands after it is broken in.
>
>This balance allows you to take all tension out of your fingers and
>hands to a very great degree and then it is simply amazing just how fast
>your fingers can go when they are not working against stiff and
>unbalanced springs.
>
>So now you know why they use all natural cork instead of using some of
>the latest high tech materials. I apologize for such a long post, but
>some things can not be explained with just a few words and sentences.
>Learning is a process after all.
>
>Tom Henson
>
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