 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2025-11-14 18:27
Do stiff reeds inherently require more air capacity? If one wanted to work up to using a stiffer reed, what changes to technique should one expect to develop?
Recently, I was using an extra-stiff reed for practice (all I do is practice.) It allowed me to produce excellent fortes and louder tones, and it let me noodle reliably up to B7. But! I kept running out of air during normal play. On reflection it appeared that some air was escaping through my nose(!); if I focused on not allowing that I could block it, and presumably those muscles could be trained and strengthened over time. Ok.
However, it also seemed like air was blowing past the reed into the instrument without it adding any sound. The air wasn't escaping out around the mouthpiece, it was going past the reed and being lost, pretty much at any dynamic. If I (over)tightened my embouchure with my jaw muscles, I could lessen that problem, but doing so was counterproductive in other ways.
I've switched back to a less stiff reed now, and those problems went away, but so did the magnificent full-bodied fortissimos and high-end altississimo.
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Author: Alexey
Date: 2025-11-14 19:47
Life's too short to play stiff reeds. You need to bite more and blow more.
I have several questions, though.
First one is "why?"
The second one is what is your stiff setup (mouthpiece and reed)?
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2025-11-14 22:40
Hi Alexey. I'm currently playing a BD5 and Vandoren V12 reeds. The reed in question was from a box of 3.5+ strength, but it was an outlier well on the high side - the other reeds from that box have been in the expectable stiffness range.
There's no pressing need for me to move to stiffer reeds, but I'm interested in the different qualities that seem inherent in them. Not "better" necessarily, but different enough to at least experiment with.
Bite more: it seems so, but it's not clear to me why that is. Normal jaw pressure on that reed seemed associated with lost, or ineffectual, air. Is the resistance of the reed proportional to some degree of, what, "startup air" that's ineffectual, with additional air actually vibrating the reed? What does jaw pressure change?
Life's too short . . . I have nothing better to do.
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2025-11-15 18:22
Biting, jaw pressure, brings the reed closer to the mouthpiece. I was once told by Brad Behn that I could use a more closed mouthpiece and bite less arriving at the same end WITHOUT the physicality of biting.
Just some thoughts
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Achieving an appropriate sound is ALWAYS a combination of the amount of air you use (per note at a specific dynamic) versus the amount of "support" (or "squeeze") you use in your embouchure. If you have to put too much effort into either end of the equation, you are in for a losing battle.
I would humbly suggest that finding the right combination of air and embouchure WILL produce robust dynamics and the full spectrum of notes without tearing up your lip or feeling like you're blowing up an air mattress.
............Paul Aviles
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2025-11-16 17:17
Hi Paul. You're right about being able to get a wide and good dynamic range without a stiffer setup. Yet there seems to be something qualitatively different with the stiffer reeds. It's hard to fit into words, but maybe "solidity" is indicative. Of course, my perception while playing is likely different and more striking than that of a listener while listening.
There's a Steve Williamson video wherein he mentions playing Vandoren box-strength 5 reeds, and over time his having moved from a closed mouthpiece (5RV-Lyre) to progressively more open mouthpieces. His sound is fairly distinctive.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4teoC3OnEg
With my usual setup I can perform the exercise he demonstrates pretty well, but it doesn't seem tiring . . . maybe he works harder to play his stiff setup. Or maybe he just works harder to play so consistently well in general. (I'm no Steve Williamson!)
I still don't "get" what embouchure squeeze does, though obviously it's necessary. Usually I think I apply very little pressure, but maybe years of playing have rendered whatever it is too automatic to notice.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2025-11-16 19:53
Philip Caron wrote:
> There's a Steve Williamson video wherein he mentions playing
> Vandoren box-strength 5 reeds, and over time his having moved
> from a closed mouthpiece (5RV-Lyre) to progressively more open
> mouthpieces. His sound is fairly distinctive.
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4teoC3OnEg
>
> With my usual setup I can perform the exercise he demonstrates
> pretty well, but it doesn't seem tiring . . . maybe he works
> harder to play his stiff setup. Or maybe he just works harder
> to play so consistently well in general. (I'm no Steve
> Williamson!)
I'd need to watch it again to be sure I didn't miss anything, but it does seem as if he doesn't breathe very often, which can make the exercise tiring.
One thing I hear in his video, and which I notice in other players who use (or are reputed to use) stiffer setups, is that the sound of the response of each note is often different. He says controlling that is the point of the exercise. Yet, he doesn't always. Obviously, it's an exercise and more demanding than any realistic musical context would be. But I always feel as if I hear those differences, which compromise legato, more in real context with players who use stiff reeds.
I've always felt the same way whenever I've experimented with stiffer reeds. It's easier, I always feel, to get smoothly from note to note with a less resistant setup. It needs to push back a little, or the sound gets reedy, and real pianissimo is more difficult or impossible.
> I still don't "get" what embouchure squeeze does, though
> obviously it's necessary. Usually I think I apply very little
> pressure, but maybe years of playing have rendered whatever it
> is too automatic to notice.
It controls the reed vibration. For some players, it evidently also closes the tip opening a little, eliminating some of the resistance of an open facing. With experience you don't notice the control your embouchure is exerting so much, but give your setup to a 10 year trying to play for the first time and (you can probably already imagine) see what comes out when they try to blow.
Karl
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Author: Alexey
Date: 2025-11-16 21:17
Steve Williamson is a great clarinetist. But there are several things to consider:
1. Do we know the mouthpiece he is playing right now and how it's open?
2. I watched one master class with him. His break-in process includes sanding/polishing the reed on all sides (bottom, top, left, right), which makes it softer.
2. The exercise he is demonstrating is a good example of his embouchure. I mean, some teachers (for example, Reiner Wehle) advocate against playing pp too much, as it causes "biting", aka makes the reed vibrate less freely than it can. I have nothing against it, we need to bite to some degree to play with good sound. Steve Williamson has great sound. Though we see how much he should work, and there are air leaks that sometimes could bother the audience.
3. Not everyone is Steve Williamson and can get good sound with a hard reed. More common tendency among "stiff reed" players is sounding "mellow and thick" at close distance in the middle register and nuance and sounding airy when playing pp, and sounding thin and harsh at distance.
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2025-11-17 03:29
Let me preface by saying that Mr. Williamson freely (and braggadociously perhaps) states that he uses a set up that is quite physical. You can actually notice just how hard he's working while watching him live in concert. It works for him, but many MANY great players can use a MUCH easier set-up that sounds equally (and arguably) better. I'd rather leave his technique out of the equation.
So there are two distinct and important elements to controlling the reed. One is air. But that works in concert with the other element which is SUPPORT of the reed, or rather WHERE and HOW the reed is dampened.
If you take in more and more mouthpiece into your mouth as you play, eventually the sound will be just a squeal because the reed just vibrates wildly and out of control. So you need to have a damper just past the point where the reed and mouthpiece meet. How much "damping" you do is based on the size of the opening, the strength of the reed...........and what note you are playing, and at what dynamic you are playing.
The more physicality that you put into the damping of the reed can be called squeezing or biting (doesn't matter). What it does is bring the reed CLOSER to the mouthpiece. I awkwardly alluded to this in the above. You are only making the aperture (formed by reed and mouthpiece) smaller. Now as we play in various registers at varying dynamics this all changes along with air speed. I doubt the most detail oriented amongst you guys could come up with a meaningful comprehensive chart for this. We really just HEAR what to do and FEEL what to do naturally through (for lack of a better term) PRACTICE.
In closing my recommendation is to avoid set-ups that require excessive physicality. You can even sound that way if you want to sound like that with much less effort. FOR EXAMPLE: play your easy set-up and just gradually keep loosening your embouchure. Eventually the sound will disappear and all you'll have is AIR......voila, a HARD REED.
................Paul Aviles
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Author: SecondTry
Date: 2025-11-17 03:41
Well, there's Cialis, but some men prefer Sidenafil (Viagra) or some combination of the two.
Unfortunately neither addresses why you might want access to these medications but Apomorphine's (Rugiet) becoming popular in that regard so....
....oh, sorry, stiff reed. ![[grin]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie5.gif)
Embarassed 
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