 The Clarinet BBoard
|
Author: bmcgar ★2017
Date: 2009-03-09 13:57
Re. Reeds Australia "Passion" reeds
I picked up two boxes of these for soprano clarinet a few years ago, and liked them very much, but checking the usual gang of retailers now, I see them selling for about fifty bucks for a box of 5 reeds! (The next highest price I found were for Rue de Lepics at about $30 per box of 10.)
I'm curious, first, if anyone here likes these reeds enough to pay nearly ten bucks a reed for them.
Second, I'm curious as to what you all think the reason for this pricing is:
- Is R. A. thinking that there's a customer base for their Passion reeds large enough that they can sell the reeds at this price?
- Has R. A. made some really bad assumptions about what the market will bear in the U.S.?
- Is R. A. trying to ride the wave of (to me) ridiculously high prices for "prestige" instruments and accessories?
B.
P. S. Yes, five Passion reeds per box. In my incredulity, I wrote to one of the retailers to make sure.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2009-03-09 14:26
It would be worth it if all five were professional concert quality but that's very very difficult to believe. No one can guarantee the consistent quality of a natural grown product like reed cane. I can't believe there is a market for these worth producing. My mother once offered to take out a loan, when I was in school, to buy me "The Reed". It brought tears to my eyes but I had to explain to her that it simply didn't work that way. If only it did. ESP www.peabody.jhu.edu/457
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2009-03-09 15:28
If retail prices for reeds are too high, check eBay. Specifically, check listings by "mpmusic" -- he's in Poland and sells a variety of good brands for cheap. I am not in any way affiliated with him, just a satisfied customer.
As one of our local diamond merchants has been advertising on the radio for years, "nobody pays retail any more, why should you?"
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Old Geezer
Date: 2009-03-09 16:35
Weiner Music has them @33.00 for a box of ten.
The price seems OK, the quality is unknown to me though I've tried some of their vintage reeds wihich were all unsatisfactory to me.
Clarinet Redux
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: rsholmes
Date: 2009-03-09 18:58
I went looking on the web and couldn't find any retailers claiming there are 5 in a box. Several didn't say at all, but in addition to Weiner, Howarth also says 10 per box (and they charge 20.43 pounds + VAT).
Oh, and Razzco, the makers, also don't bother to say how many in a box on their web site.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: bmcgar ★2017
Date: 2009-03-09 19:46
The company that responded to my query about the number of reed in a box said 5. This was one of the biggies.
Of course, the customer service person might have made a mistake.
Yes, I see that Weiner has a much better price and does state that the boxes contain ten reeds. At $33/box, this makes much more sense.
Still about ten bucks more than the R Lepics, though.
B.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: bmcgar ★2017
Date: 2009-03-09 19:57
True, Ed. All true.
Yet we both are "of an age" that we can remember when Vandoren was nearly the only reed in town, if we didn't make our own.
Those days, the percentage of workable reeds wasn't nearly as good as it is now; sometimes the cane was really awful and the shaping very sloppy. So there's been considerable improvement, I think.
About fifty cents per reed then (1960s), but with the higher percentage of workable reeds now, the price for the good ones has actually gone down.
B.
(Resisting a trip down memory lane.)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2009-03-09 23:47
Hey B. when I was a student in the late 50s early 60s I used to buy a box of Vandorens, 25 reeds in a box, that was 25, and it was only about $3 a box. The problem was we still couldn't find more then a few that were any good. Of course my father probably made a hundred bucks a week driving a bread truck. It's all relative I guess. ESP
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2009-03-10 00:04
The issue is, if I were a reed maker and came from Yehudistan, and my reeds had the brand of eg. "Billy Goat", everyone would laugh at me and my reeds would, if at all, sell at 1 cents a piece.
Now I sell the very same reeds to [insert your pet peeve company], and they sell them for 10$ a box (of five, now don't overdo it), everybody is ahhh and oooh for the same piece of cane ah's been selling my *ss of for.
Don't believe brand names. Do try them, find yours.
--
Ben
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: EEBaum
Date: 2009-03-10 00:14
Reed pricing seems to be on the more extreme end of bizarro-retail-markup. Stuff is marked with a very high retail price, then severely marked down to make it look like the customer is getting a great deal. This seems especially popular at music stores. I've seen boxes of V12s marked in the $50s, after which the shop gives you a spectacular student-senior-going-out-of-business-grand-opening 40% discount. Wow!
Why this practice seems more popular in music stores than elsewhere, I don't know.
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: bill28099
Date: 2009-03-10 01:07
Ed, I've still got one of those late 1950s boxes of 25 that used to sell for
$3. If I break the seal will it still contain ~4 good reeds?
A great teacher gives you answers to questions
you don't even know you should ask.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: KV
Date: 2009-03-10 03:38
Do you remember the "Thrill of a New Reed." Stick it in your mouth and get that ahhhh
bamboo taste. Since we didn't have much money in the stone age-(25 cents per reed) we used to trim them with nail scissors until we couldn't get any sound ouut of them at all!
I am a little scared to test the waters and buy something other than the ones that the local band director sells out of a shoe box. I have enough reeds still in their little cases.
What is a decent reed other than Rico reeds that I can try? Any ideas? My skill level is a "starting over adult."
Ten dollars a reed scares me to death but $3 is a cup of latte, a cheeseburger, frys and no drink so I am ready to splurge. It is all relative.
kimvawter72@cox.net
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Bob Phillips
Date: 2009-03-10 05:49
Every time i put a new reed in my mouth, I'm hoping for that "new bamboo" taste. Few to none of these new fangled sticks have that great taste.
A couple years ago, I had a VD that tasted like a '50s Rico, and I shared the flavor with friends. (None understood, sigh)
Bob Phillips
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2009-03-10 13:45
>>Since we didn't have much money in the stone age-(25 cents per reed) we used to trim them with nail scissors until we couldn't get any sound ouut of them at all!
>>
Indeed -- Remember that 1951-52 flea market Boosey & Hawkes "Special" Bb clarinet I asked about here a few weeks ago? The case contained several types of old reeds (some very old, including a "Vibrator"), most of them in played-to-death condition. The worst were crudely trimmed down, no doubt to keep these reeds going after the tips frayed.
One reed was only about an inch and a half long, with an extremely lopsided cut. I can't see how it would play at all, since the previous owner had whacked it down well into the thicker end, near the bark. Somehow the owner had played it that way, though, because the latest tip had begun to fray, the same as any other played-to-wreckage reed. I'll bet the only reason this person didn't keep right on going was that the only ligature in the case, a standard two-screw type, would barely hold the bottom eighth-inch of this reed.
I didn't try any of these dirty old reeds, but someday I'm going to take an old dead reed of my own and trim it down that far, just to see what it sounds like. I can guess it probably won't become my favorite reed!
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: bmcgar ★2017
Date: 2009-03-10 21:17
Ah, the Vibrator reeds!
If I remember correctly, they had grooves through the bark on the long axis (?).
Never figured out what that was supposed to accomplish other than maybe allowing a warped reed to be crunched down flatter by the ligature.
B.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: KV
Date: 2009-03-11 03:09
Lelia,
I laughed my head off.
The Reed Stories were great.
I wonder what kind of guy would or could play with those babies---Ha!!!
Great lungs and lips like deer salami.
kimvawter72@cox.net
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2009-03-11 03:11
Yes, back then Vibrator reeds had the grooves, and Charpens had that awful hole routed out of the heart of the reed. Of these two forms of Arundo Mutilation, the Vibrator version was by far the less harmful.
I think the grooves were there to allow rainwater to drain off the reed in case you happened to be playing outside, upside-down, in inclement weather. For sax players, of course, they made you more Groovy.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
The Clarinet Pages
|
 |
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
