 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: paul
Date: 1999-03-17 21:20
Well folks, it's been another month or so and this is how my Legere reeds are working out. Keep in mind that I'm an adult novice attempting to practice mainly from drill books a maximum of an hour a night. I play a Buffet Festival Bb soprano with a Vandoren B45 mouthpiece and a standard metal ligature. I have three Legere reeds.
Legere reed equivalent to standard Vandoren 2.0: Still soft and squeaky. I have learned to take in a little more reed and make it step up to the altissimo, but it's not a consistent step.
Legere equivalent to Vandoren 2.75: Still my favorite. I think I'm onto something with this reed. I believe that I've found the trick to minimize spit build-up. I soak the reed in my mouth just like a natural cane reed as I'm putting the horn together. A little more air support helps, too. The resulting tone is beginning to sound better. Maybe some of the improvement is due to practicing from the Baermann III book as edited by Hite. I'm amazed at what I've learned practicing thirds, fifths, and octaves along with returning scales, and I'm only on page 16 of the book.
Legere equivalent to Vandoren 3.0: I continue to believe this reed plays like it's harder than it should be. This reed requires much more air support.
I still believe that the Legere reed is a great utility reed, taking the abuse of everyday scales and drills, allowing players to save their cane reeds for performances.
I've heard of folks buying a bunch of Legere reeds at a time and using them much more than me. Please let me know what you think of your Legere reeds.
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Author: paul
Date: 1999-03-17 21:21
Oops. My first Legere reed is equal to Vandoren 2.5. Sorry for the mistake.
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Author: Ginny
Date: 1999-03-17 23:30
I sent Legere a check well over a week ago, but I guess they haven't cashed it yet. Still no reeds. But I'll post when I've had a chance to try them.
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Author: Rick2
Date: 1999-03-18 03:57
Legere is not the fastest in response time.
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Author: Bonnie
Date: 1999-03-18 13:05
I sent Legere a check on February 12 and received my reeds on February 24. This is at least as fast as some of the mail orders I've received when I called in the order with a credit card.
As to the reeds, I love the consistency. I bought a 2.75 and a 3.0, and I use the 3.0 the most. I will probably order a 3.25 and a 3.50 before long. Like Paul, I find that the Legere doesn't go into the altissimo easily; however, the unexpected side effect to working with this difficulty is that when using cane reeds, the altissimo is coming more easily. (Until late December I had not played regularly in over 35 years, and hadn't touched a clarinet in nearly 25 years, so I'm still working to get those high notes back.)
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Author: Ginny
Date: 1999-03-20 00:02
I just got my Legere Reeds. One is better than any of my current cane reeds. The g is a little furry, but the rest of the range is GREAT, even altissimo.
The harder of the pair is stiffer than I am used to, but still sounds pretty good. I get a few sqeaks with it, but its probably my lack of experience.
I think the better one is as good as the best or second best reed in a box of Vandoren's, certainly its way better than than 75-90% of the reeds. I only have a half an hour to an hour to practice per day, reed hunting is not very fun. I'm impressed, so was my teacher. She wants the address.
Ginny
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Author: Jim
Date: 1999-04-24 04:03
I've been using Legere's for about 3 months now and am really impressed with the tone I'm getting. Personally I think that the numbering system they use is not equivalent to that used by cane reed manufacturers. I was using a 2.5 cane reed and am still trying to find just the right stiffness in the Legere. I started with a 2.75 Legere and that was too "buzzy". So I traded that in for a 3.0 and also bought a 3.25 just to be on the safe side. Well the 3.0 was still too soft. The 3.25 is pretty close but I've found that I'm mounting the reed with it's tip about 1/32" beyond the tip of my mouthpiece just to cut down on the "buzzy" sound. I've sent for a 3.50 and hopefully that will be just right for me. As I've said, it really does have a good tone to it.
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