 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Steve B.
Date: 2006-02-22 17:05
I have been experimenting with various barrel types and lengths for my Buffet Festival and have a couple questions. My current setup is a
Hite D Facing mouthpiece with V12 #3 reeds.
1. I noticed that stock 66mm Festival barrel seems to tune flat for me
especially the high C. Is it typical that a 65mm barrel plays closer to
A440 with the Festival.
2. I 've experimented with a Chadash 66mm barrel and notice that it narrows the left hand 12'ths almost too much. I'm wondering if the reverse taper design of the Chadash type barrels is somewhat redundant on a Festival since I believe that Festival already has corrected 12'ths by raising the position of the register key. For those of you who have both R13's and Festivals, I'm interested in your experience, with Chadash/Moenig designs.
Thanks,
Steve
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Author: kenb
Date: 2006-02-22 18:50
Steve,
I've played R13s and Festivals ; I also played a Hite D mp for a while.
Everything you've mentioned matched my experiences with these set-ups.
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Author: Brenda Siewert
Date: 2006-02-22 18:53
Steve, I've owned a couple of Festivals and I agree that the 65mm barrel seems to play best in tune. I've had several players tell me the same about it. So, go with what works. I played mine with a Greg Smith mouthpiece. Great combination.
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Author: Sean.Perrin
Date: 2006-02-22 22:36
I find the 65 makes mine sharp overall, but the high C on mine is also incredibly flat. perhaps I should experiment with the 65 a little more? Either way i'm going to send mine a away just to make sure nothing is wrong, it seems to have become mroe flat in the past year or so.
Founder and host of the Clarineat Podcast: http://www.clarineat.com
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Author: ginny
Date: 2006-02-23 15:57
I have the impression that the Festival (I have one) is tuned A442 and find that my 650 barrel plays sharp and that the longer barrel brings it to 440 genreally.
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Author: Brenda Siewert
Date: 2006-02-23 16:08
Sean, it sounds like you really do need to send it off. If just for the peace of mind it'll bring you to have it looked at, you shoud go ahead. It should be more in tune than you describe.
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Author: Sean.Perrin
Date: 2006-02-24 06:17
Ya, iv'e had my teacher look at it and he can't figure it out either... i'm fine on his (although it's not a festival) so it's not an embochure thing.
Thanks!
Founder and host of the Clarineat Podcast: http://www.clarineat.com
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Author: clarnibass
Date: 2006-02-24 06:48
From my experience different mouthpieces will change tuning so much that it is almost impossible to know what barrel would fit better based on other people's opinions who used a different mouthpiece.
For example, a mouthpiece that worked great with Buffets just can't work at all with my clarinet and is always much flatter than 440 even with the shorter barrel.
The stock mouthpiece (which is my main) has overall the best tuning although the throat notes are slightly sharp. Another mouthpiece has very good tuning the same as my main mouthpiece except the throat notes are flat.
This is all with the same barrel.
Did you try your Festival with a differnt mouthpiece?
This might have nothing to do with yoru problem but at least worth trying.
Here is a quote from clarinet maker Peter Eaton: "The suggestion from some makers that mouthpieces or clarinets have a fixed absolute pitch is unrealistic. A clarinet/mouthpiece/reed combination does not have a precise pitch until a player combines with them, and the pitch resulting from a particular set-up can vary by a surprisingly large degree, depending on who is playing it. Read Jack Brymer's wise words on the subject in his book "Clarinet" (Yehudi Menuhin Music Guides) pages 131-2. The two players he mentions are himself and Roy Jowitt who were the two London Symphony principals at the time of writing."
Good luck.
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Author: Iceland clarinet
Date: 2006-12-12 20:50
I play Festival Bb clarinet with Grabner AW-personal mouthpiece and Gonzalez FOF #3.25 reeds and when I use 660mm barrel I find it tunes close to 442 but still to high so I have to pull out about 0.5mm but when I play in my concert windband were the clarinets are too low and we use about 440-441 pitch I have to pull out 2-3mm
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Author: Gregory Smith ★2017
Date: 2006-12-12 21:39
The Festival deviates from all other models Buffet makes - particularly in the case of intonation.
Be sure that it is tried with a tuner and that there is a good mthpc/barrel/clarinet combination to play the upper 2nd register in tune above the staff.
With some mthpcs the A, B, and C above the staff are impossibly flat - with other mouthpieces like the regular B40 (non 13 bore), they're fine. That's because the Festival was purposely designed with the register vent 2mm's higher up to compensate for those that naturally play the upper 2nd register sharp with B40's and heavy-styled #4.5 reeds (the bite and blow method).
The Festival is capable of allowing one to make a beautiful sound on the clarinet but it is not capable of playing in tune with some A=440 mouthpieces made today. I always advise those that play the Festival and who want to try my mouthpieces to try a 65mm Chadash along with it. Seems to work fine in those cases.
Some have even taken their Festivals to Guy Chadash and had the register vent relocated back down to the R-13 or RC position so that they could play my mouthpiece.
Gregory Smith
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