Klarinet Archive - Posting 000102.txt from 2010/01

From: Gary Van Cott <gary@-----.com>
Subj: [kl] Low C Bass Clarinets at the NAMM show
Date: Sun, 17 Jan 2010 19:39:58 -0500

I tried all 5 of the low C bass clarinets I found at the NAMM show. Two
of these were the Buffet wood and greenline models. The greenline was
not nearly as good as the wood one. Buffet should fix this instrument or
bring a better one to the show.

I finally had a chance to try the Selmer. I liked it the best. While I
don't think the mechanism for the extended notes is as good as the
Buffet I thought the sound was a little better, especially in the lower
clarion. I friend of mine had complained that she didn't like the Selmer
as well as the Buffet because she has small hands. I also have small
hands but didn't find this to be a problem (but I didn't play it for
very long either) I also liked the fact the that mouthpiece sits
slightly lower than the Buffet. There were two other guy there who were
trying out the low C instruments and at least one of them likes the
Buffet better (he said he owned one) and said he had problems with this
Selmer instrument (I had none)..

I also tried 2 Chinese low C bass clarinets. One of them had the keys
for the extended notes arranged in a triangle pattern (two above and one
centered below) and appeared to be exactly the same design as the
instrument I tried at Kessler's a year ago. It played about the same
which is reasonably well. This was the only instrument I tried a tuner
on, and the intonation seemed to be worse than the Kessler instrument,
although I probably did not play it long enough to get it warmed up.
This was in a booth that was a joint venture between companies from
Venezuela and China. I spent all my time talking to the guy from
Venezuela who spoke excellent English. They said the retail price for
this instrument was $3200 which seems very high to me.

The other Chinese instrument had a different arrangement of the keys for
the low notes. The keys were vertical rectangles with two on the left
and one that was twice as long on the right. This instrument was
stuffy. I walked the Chinese lady who was in the booth down to see both
the Buffet and Selmer instruments. The wholesale price for this
instrument was about $675.

I tried to encourage both of the Chinese groups to spend some time
studying the Buffet and Selmer instruments and to consider hiring a
clarinet designer to help them.

Gary
--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------
| Gary Van Cott - Van Cott Information Services, Inc.
| Woodwind and Brass: Books, Music, CDs and More
| http://www.vcisinc.com/ --> VISA MasterCard Discover AmExp <--
| P.O. Box 9569, Las Vegas, NV 89191, USA
| Phone: 702-438-2102 Fax: 801-650-1719 Email: Gary@-----.com
| Become a VCIS Inc Facebook fan: http://tinyurl.com/vcisinc-facebook
+---------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------