 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Old Geezer
Date: 2008-11-29 16:21
I read some place that a visiter to Benny Goodman's home said Benny had about 700 reeds hanging about the place.
A quick check shows me I have about 25 boxes of reeds, mostly questionable, rebuking me for not making them all usable. So I suppose I have about 300 standing by, awaiting salvation.
How many reeds are you guys hanging on to?
Clarinet Redux
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2008-11-29 16:38
Three boxes (two Sop, one Alto) still shrinkwrapped, the rest open and being consumed, one at a time.
--
Ben
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Author: Neal Raskin
Date: 2008-11-29 16:39
I feel like i should do some catching up...
I have 4 boxes of vandorens and about 12 reeds in rotation..
www.youtube.com/nmraskin
www.musicedforall.com
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Author: Bob Phillips
Date: 2008-11-29 16:44
EEBaum is a piker with a mere 10 "deads" in his backlog.
I have about a bushel (mebbe a peck) sized pile of dead, dying and unknown reeds piled up on the living room game table that makes my spouse shake her head.
A few weeks ago, my teacher stopped by (his rare turn to make the commute to our weekly rendezvous), and I'd sorted them into two "lines." One of VD V12s and another of PLs. Best to the left and decreasing. My plan was to ask the expert to listen to samples along the quality line to see where the "acceptable" use limit occurred in the two streams. Dang, in anticipation of his visit, my spouse "straightened up" the "reed mess."
OH, and I have a drawer full of reeds that have little chance of being used my their present owner, including some 5+s from Australia (that make really loud noises on a refaced Brillhart 5* mpc, and others that add up to almost 200.
I hope some of our college professors will chime in here, as the ones I've visited all seem to have bigger piles arrayed on the horizontal surfaces near the two chairs and music stand needed for their weekly torture sessions. With EACH of their students.
Bob Phillips
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Author: clariknight
Date: 2008-11-29 19:57
I just did some cleaning. Only about 50 deads lying around and three boxes of varying strengths. I'd prefer to have more good ones, but hey, at 30 bucks a box now can't buy more than two at a time.
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Author: cfoss
Date: 2008-11-29 20:43
right now, I have less than 20 reeds all together. I have two or three good ones depending on the day of the week and about eight reeds that I don't enjoy playing on in my rotation. The other fall into two categories - a set of five new reeds with terribly soft tips, and then some stragglers that are dead or in the case with my old Vito. With any luck there will be two or three boxes of 4.5 V12's underneath the Christmas tree...
Chris Foss
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Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2008-11-29 21:55
Benny Goodman was known for being "reed crazy". He told Eric Simon, whom he studied the interpretation of the Mozart Concerto with, that the most difficult part of recording the Mozart was finding the "right' reed.
How many reeds you have lying around under the desk or in the closet really is meaningless. It's how good the reeds you have that you are presently playing and performing on that are important. It doesn't do you much good to have 700 reeds lying about if none of them are any good. I probably have hundreds in my draws, not my shorts, closets and on shelves, but I never play them, they’re just old reeds that I haven't thrown out for whatever the reason. They do me no good at all.
I encourage my students to always have several boxes on hand. I like to age my commercial reeds at least a few years so I have several dozen boxes unopened. I also began making reeds again so I'm trying to age some blanks too. The main thing I believe is to always have a minimum of 4-6 good reeds in rotation and replace them as necessary but constantly have a box you're breaking in. I believe in having concert reeds in rotation, rehearsal reeds in rotation and practice on everything else. The number really doesn't matter if the quality is there.
I've known professional players that used the same reed for weeks on end and replace it when it began to falter and I've know players that rotated two dozed reeds at a time. I'm heard of players that got to recordings sessions, opened several boxes of reeds and simply used the best one they could find. Good luck!
ESP www.peabody.jhu.edu/457 Listen to a little Mozart, live performance.
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Author: Old Geezer
Date: 2008-11-29 23:03
I've read (somewhere) a quote by Anthony Gigliotti;
"I went through maybe 1,500 reeds and found 200 with possibilities (not necessarily playable)."
Wonder what become of the other 1200?
Clarinet Redux
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Author: leonardA
Date: 2008-11-29 23:38
I have maybe 20 dead or almost dead reeds lying around and I buy only one box at a time and have maybe two broken in reeds going at any one time. I tend to just keep playing the goods ones until they die. I know that it's better to rotate them, but I don't have the patience to keep roating reeds and playing them only minues at a time whille they're breaking in.
Leonard
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Author: Iceland clarinet
Date: 2008-11-30 01:47
Leonard if you have broken in reeds when you start broke in a new one then you don't have that problem and you get more useful life out of your reeds.
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Author: C2thew
Date: 2008-11-30 02:24
"Wonder what become of the other 1200?"
I'm sure they were added to a bon fire, making it one of the fondest memories to have savored.
Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. they are but improved means to an unimproved end, an end which was already but too easy to arrive as railroads lead to Boston to New York
-Walden; Henry Thoreau
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2008-11-30 02:24
The bad reeds hit the trash can. Tony G didn't keep bad reeds. If it (vandoren) didn't have a good sound, the cane was deemed to be not suitable for playing.
Comfort wasn't a factor, sound was, and then adjust it to have good responce.
I don't have any bad reeds lying around as if they aren't good, I trash em.
http://www.SkypeClarinetLessons.com
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Author: William
Date: 2008-11-30 15:51
For my clarinets and saxophones, probably enough cane to raise the Titanic. But for my Buffet Prestige 1193-2 bass, only two--both Legere #3 that I have been using for three years now.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2008-11-30 15:59
About 150 boxes (Vandoren, Gonzalez, Morre) of Bb and Eb clarinet reeds carefully stored and dated.
I like to keep about 6 to 10 concert reeds in rotation, replacing the dying out ones with newly broken in ones as needed.
I also have about 50 boxes of alto sax reeds on hand as well.
I recently downsized by switching to Legere on tenor, thus I was able to dispose of all my Tenor sax reeds...GBK
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Author: clariknight
Date: 2008-11-30 16:13
tictactux wrote:
"30 bucks? Are you playing on gilded vamps or what?"
I don't understand what you mean by this. My local store sells Vandoren V12s for 28 dollars a pack plus tax, WWBW sells them for 28 plus shipping, and Muncy has them for 24.95 plus shipping, which still comes out to at or a little over 30 dollars a box. What are gilded vamps anyways?
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Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2008-11-30 16:16
Bad reeds do make a wonderful barn fire. When I taught at Eastern Music Festivals years ago we had a reed burning at the end of the summer, it was very satisfying for all of us, we go our revenge.
The wall test is a good test to determine if you should throw out a reed. If it passes, you must keep it because it must be good. Sort of like the old Witch test back in the old Salem days, if the person didn't drown when dunked they must have been a witch so they were burned at the stake. If they did drowned when dunked, they weren’t, oops, sorry about that.
When I was a student Joe Allard took me on a reed tour. Back in the early 60s the music stores in NY let you go through opened boxes and pick out what you wanted. Back then there were at least a dozen stores on 48th street. He helped me pick out 50 “good” reeds. They all looked so good, color, balance and grain. I thought I was in reed heaven, having good reeds for years to come. Back then Vandorens came in boxes of 25 to a box, for about $3 a box, sorry about that. For $6, (probably $600 today) I got two full boxes of “good” reeds, NOT. I got about as many good reeds as I usually did when I opened a box of 25 and broke them in. It made little, or no difference, that the 50 Joe choose for me “looked” so good. Some of my best reeds have been those that looked like they won’t play good. You got to try them, not just look at them and if they pass the wall test you know you have a great reed. ESP
www.peabody.jhu.edu/457 Listen to a little Mozart, live performance.
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Author: Danny Boy
Date: 2008-11-30 16:17
I am staggered by the numbers on this thread. As has already been suggested, to me the only important reeds are the ones in current use. I tried aging cane by having boxes stored for extended periods of time, and found they played no better than those that where worked on straight after purchase.
I buy in batches of 5 boxes and will open a box at a time and try all ten. Usually, with a little work that gives 8 or so reeds that will usually make practice reeds, and maybe half of those can go on to actually be used in concert. In my opinion there's no way a reed that hasn't been practised on should be used in a concert or other high pressure playing situation. This to me is enough breaking in as is necessary, what better way to break in a reed than to practise producing your best sound on it?
There's been lots of discussion lately on working on reeds, which I'm all for, but I still think the best reeds are those that play well straight out of the box with no work at all. With that in mind, it makes no difference to me whether I keep 2000 reeds on tap or keep my small stash regularly topped up.
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Author: Johnny Galaga
Date: 2008-11-30 19:44
Two weeks ago I pulled out about 5-10 old regular Vandoren #3's that I played the crap out of in high school 15 years ago, and tried 'em on my B45. Most of them are good enough to practice on and 2 of 'em play beautifully! Go figure.
Over all, I only keep a few dozen reeds (new and used) on hand normally.
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Author: beavertoof
Date: 2008-12-01 15:30
i do have some real reeds lying about, but do not really count them anymore. I have 3 Legere.
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Author: Old Geezer
Date: 2008-12-01 22:05
I've never played a plastic reed I didn't hate. I have severel Legere's laying about and one green $30,00 wonder from Japan, which I'm preserving for reasons known only to a disordered psyche.
I's a bit odd that Computer Aided Design etc. can't produce a perfect plastic reed. If it had some durability who wont' spring $100.00 a pop.
The puffery about the Japanese reed bedazzled me and my wishful thinking...if only they were that good!
Wishful thinking or not, I am steadfastly holding out against the $650,00 mouthpiece!
Clarinet Redux
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Author: mamashep
Date: 2008-12-02 08:45
My teacher in college never threw out a reed. She just tossed them into a GIANT black trash bag in the closet. After doing that for 30 years, she had 4 or 5 trash bags full of reeds. Who knows how many were in there. She would go back through and try out old reeds once in awhile as practice reeds, but never really used them again.
Every once in a while, if a student played the "I haven't practiced this week because I can't afford to buy reeds" card, she would get out this old mug, scoop a bunch of old reeds out of the trash bag, pour the reeds into the student's lap, and tell the student to get back to work.
I wish I'd gotten my hands on those reeds after she passed away. It would have been great to build something out of them.
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