 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: sonicbang
Date: 2014-02-24 01:36
Hi everyone,
Has anybody tried Brad Behn's new Artist or Vintage large chamber mouthpieces? I recently read about it on his website, but there's just a few details about these.
Mark
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Author: NBeaty
Date: 2014-02-24 03:06
I recently played through the entire stock of these mouthpieces that are ready to ship. They are all excellent mouthpieces that have unique voices, varying resistances and feels, and are extremely high quality in material, design, and craftsmanship.
The Artist:
This rubber is made in the way that many of Kaspar's mouthpieces utilized (post-war chedeville blanks). The mouthpieces have slightly more cover or cushion to the sound, but are incredibly rich and vibrant. I found that from the smallest tip openings to the largest (below 1mm to above 1.10mm) played very comfortably and the focus, clarity, resonance, and response were consistent regardless of facing. Facing design creates a wide possibility of resistances to to work with a variety of reeds, playing styles, and variations in each persons facial construction.
The Vintage II:
These mouthpieces are made from the Brad Behn Proprietary Rod Rubber. The quality of this rubber can be explained in many ways from the "This sounds beautiful!" to scientific comparisons with Grade A pre-war chedeville rod rubber (The good stuff!). The degree to which material matters is often misunderstood or downplayed, but the material brings so much to the table when you try it, it's very hard to come to the conclusion that it's not important to the sound and feel of a mouthpiece.
The design of the vintage II collection is unique (as well all of the Artist\Vintage\Signature collections). The short of it is there is a small chamber design and a large chamber design. The difference between the two (all other aspects being equal) is that the smaller chamber has a little bit of a tighter feel that is easily focused and brilliant, bringing an incredible resonance that carries the sound with ease and depth.
The large chamber design plays with the same quickness of response and resonance, but with a different type of resistance and shape of sound. Its voice is a bit warmer or more round in shape. There is a little bit more cushion in the feel and "creaminess" in the sound. While typically with a warmer or rounder feeling mouthpiece, the sound will tend to spread or go out of focus more easily. The unique design of characteristics as well as the incredible rod rubber material makes for great variety in resistance levels (resistance being added or subtracted in a variety of areas of the mouthpiece), size and shape of sound, tone colors and more.
These designs, materials, and craftsmanship are 100% unique and made in the good ol' USA. Each design has it's own unique voice with character and richness combined with a feel that is very comfortable and above all- efficient.
I know both the Artist line and Vintage II collections have been popular so far (they've only been out for a few months!).
It's also worth noting that the Artist line is an incredible step up from the widely used zinner based mouthpieces, which Mr. Behn also offers at a lower price point, in that they are a higher quality material (Rod Rubber instead of molded) and a design that is completely under Mr. Behn's control. I would in no way consider the Artist line to be anything other than an artist level professional mouthpiece. The zinner collection has the same attention to detail and artistry given to every mouthpiece he offers. Zinner collection mouthpieces are played around the world, and in my opinion are the best zinner based mouthpieces you can find.
Mr. Behn is a very pleasant and professional person who is passionate about his work and offers an incredible variety of products, from a $35 student mouthpiece to his signature collections and everything in between.
Disclaimer: I have nothing to gain monetarily from Mr. Behn through posting positive descriptions of his product. While I have studied with Mr. Behn, I am in no way connected to his business or product.
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2014-02-25 18:48
These are obviously something that Brad brought out since this Summer when I had the chance to try out some of his mouthpieces in Oklahoma. I must say that it is well worth finding some way to experience these mouthpieces since there is soooo much more thought and design principles put into them than any other manufacturer today.
A colleague of mine has a model that allows him to project effortlessly across an ensemble and yet has some issues with the immediate sound that rolls around in his head. I don't think he had a chance to actually sit down with Brad and go over his needs or try out a wide variety of options - THE MOST DESIRABLE WAY TO SHOP THIS MOUTHPIECE. I strongly feel that he would have met both criteria if he had the time initially to make these two needs come together.
.............Paul Aviles
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Author: seabreeze
Date: 2014-02-26 22:35
I'm confused by exactly how Behn's new Vintage II mouthpieces differ from apparently similar models in the original Vintage series. Judging from the photos, his new Vintage II small chamber (SC) model with narrow parallel chamber walls looks just like the original Vintage A model inspired by Henri Chedeville. The new Vintage II large chamber (LC) model with wide, sloping A-shaped chamber walls looks like the original Vintage C model inspired by Charles Chedeville. How are the new models different? Better rubber? Greater flexibility?
Also, I don't see anything on the Vintage II page called a small chamber "W" model. Sylvain, did you actually buy the new Vintage II small chamber model (SC) or is the "W" model a distinctly different third design??
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Author: Sylvain
Date: 2014-02-26 18:31
I'll try to send decent pictures of the mouthpiece once I get home.
--
Sylvain Bouix <sbouix@gmail.com>
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Author: Brad Behn
Date: 2014-02-26 20:06
Seabreeze, thanks for your questions. You have a keen eye - your astute observations are correct in that all new Behn Vintage II SC models (small chamber) do have very narrow throats for extraordinary tonal concentration. Their throats come in two types - slightly A-framed and nearly parallel - Models W and X. LC (large chamber) Models - Y and Z are much wider throated and made with much longer chambers as well - this combination provides a broader tonal body.
Some of the primary differences between SC and previous generation model A are in the baffle. The contour of all of our new baffles are much deeper, and we actually created a "baffle dip feature" which drops the back-baffle floor beneath the adjoining trajectory of the back bore. This added depth creates improved flexibility, deeper core tone, and a cushion to the response which enables among other things, a broader range of facings to serve the design (note the wider range of facing options which are readily available). A picture of our new Artist line of mouthpieces where I am holding the mouthpiece in hand allows the baffle dip feature to be clearly visible. Additionally SC models have much deeper baffles (the baffle radius is much smaller) and one design has a little more rollover at the upper baffle than the other. And the chamber length of SC models are shorter than model A (which we still have in inventory).
LC models (Y and Z) have much longer chambers and much wider throats than any other "French-style" clarinet mouthpiece (to my knowledge), but maintain tonal concentration, center, and ping due to Behn Proprietary Rod Rubber's resonance characteristics, upper baffle treatments, and bore nuances - in combination.
We will start uploading more photos which will more clearly show the differences in the days coming (as time allows). Thanks for your patience.
Brad Behn
http://www.clarinetmouthpiece.com
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