 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Chris P
Date: 2011-01-12 09:38
Just wondering how many on here prefer to buy brand new clarinets, or how many prefer to buy old ones and restore them to as good a condition as is possible - probably exceeding the quality seen on an equivalent new one.
Having bought and restored several older model Selmers for my own use, I can only say I'm definitely one for buying old and restoring them. My reasons being they don't make clarinets like these older models (talking large bore Selmers here), they don't make them with 19/7 or 20/7 keywork unless you pay a premium to have one specially made for you (and then you may not like it) and the fact that the cost of buying used and restoring isn't half as prohibitive as buying a brand new clarinet.
Add to the fact there are plenty of older model clarinets that still have plenty of life in them that are put away and collecting dust somewhere, and it's such a shame for them to fall into a state of neglect when they were made at a time the workers took far more pride in their workmanship which you don't see much of nowadays and offer something more than some new clarinets can.
Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2011-01-12 09:58
I only just bought my 2nd new clarinet ever.
The rest of my many instruments has fallen off society's tables, so to speak. The investment is small, and restoring is, for an IT nerd with too little manual labour, a welcome distraction.
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Ben
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Author: PrincessJ
Date: 2011-01-12 10:25
Chris, I agree 100% with your post.
I love vintage horns, I only own one new clarinet.
I'm one of those people who enjoys the work of restoring them, there's something magical about bringing an old horn with tremendous potential back to life, and not to mention the character and history the vintage ones have.
I continue to be impressed with the craftsmanship of the older ones, one of my main horns (the noblet listed in my signature) was found at an old antique shop collecting dust on a bench, and when I brought the poor little thing home, it turned out to be in pretty nice condition, it could play every note in all three registers, the pads weren't terribly leaky although old. The only things that were all-the-way-gone were the tenon corks.
I could tell it hadn't been played or touched at all for that matter in a long time, but it held itself together better than your shiny new whatnot horn could.
-Jenn
Circa 1940s Zebra Pan Am
1972 Noblet Paris 27
Leblanc Bliss 210
1928 Selmer Full Boehm in A
Amateur tech, amateur clarinetist, looking to learn!
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2011-01-12 12:05
David Spiegelthal wrote:
> Old. Like me.
Would that be "old" as in
- "Chronologically Advanced"
- "Vintage"
- "Antique"
- "Worn" ?
![[tongue]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie6.gif)
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Ben
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Author: Tony F
Date: 2011-01-12 12:40
I've only ever bought 1 new clarinet, my first one. It was a B & H Edgware and served me well. Now I look out for good old horns and rebuild them to probably better condition than when they were new. I find that young student players want new, or at least current ones, but I sell a few horns to mainly jazz players, who appreciate the old horns and prefer their sound.
Tony F.
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Author: weberfan
Date: 2011-01-12 14:27
One question, for all of you: Have you been satisfied with a restored clarinet's intonation in most cases?
I ask because in my one restoration experience, with a 50-year-old Evette & Schaeffer. I paid dearly to have it adjusted and I learned that 1) the keys continue to shift a bit; they'll never hold their position, and 2) no barrel or mouthpiece or reed or any amount of lipping will get the thing to play well enough in tune to be suitable for ensemble work.
It happens that I relied on two very fine restorers, but to no avail. Working on that E&S was like trying to adjust a table with one short leg. The more they did, the more needed to be done and, well.....
It strikes me now that someone should have been savvy enough to advise me to abandon the quest before I started. But intonation is a tricky thing, and the clarinet still has a very nice ring to it.
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2011-01-12 14:31
To Ben: Ja!
The best Bb soprano and bass clarinets I have are both old Kohlerts; the former from about the late 1920s (as best I can determine), and the latter is even older, perhaps 1910-1920. The quality of wood and general workmanship, in my opinion, are better than what I've seen in new professional-grade clarinets. And I don't worry much about them cracking; if they've gone 80-100 years without cracks so far, they'll probably outlast me (I'm already cracked).
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Author: PrincessJ
Date: 2011-01-12 17:42
The intonation on my '72 Noblet is close to flawless apart from the throat register (many new horns have issues there as well), and required little tweaking (however, it's not that old). Every other vintage horn I've encountered has been the same, and very rarely do I hear stories like weberfan's. That E&S sounds like a real stinker. :^|
Perhaps 80+ year old clarinets are simply "attracted to my aura"?
David, don't forget, you're only as old as you feel. (Really though, for folks like me, that's bad news...)
-Jenn
Circa 1940s Zebra Pan Am
1972 Noblet Paris 27
Leblanc Bliss 210
1928 Selmer Full Boehm in A
Amateur tech, amateur clarinetist, looking to learn!
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2011-01-12 18:38
Nothing against new clarinets, except that I'd lose my Cheapskate Credential if I bought one. Losing the Cheapskate Credential would mean serious loss of flea market karma -- any flea market flogger could claim a crummy modern anything is a valuable vintage something and charge me triple its value and I'd never know the difference. Besides, like Jenn, I enjoy restoring old clarinets. There's something uncommonly satisfying about rescuing the abandoned whether they're cats or clarinets.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: Bob Phillips
Date: 2011-01-12 18:46
I had a really, really bad + expensive experience trying to even the scale on a Full Boehm Buffet
I guess I'm now paranoid enough to not take a gamble and want to audition a new horn in superb condition so I'd be sure what I was "investing" in.
Bob Phillips
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2011-01-12 19:35
What Lelia said.
I also have an abandoned cat (from the county shelter, and he's blind) to go along with my 'abandoned' old clarinets. I may have nearly as much Cheapskate Credential as Lelia (you should see the cars I drive....)
And Jenn, thanks for cheering me up -- don't worry, I have a 12-year-old brain inside my 53-year-old body. I don't consider an instrument to be 'vintage' or 'old' unless it was made before I was born; so your 1972 Noblet is a 'modern' instrument by my standards.
Back on topic, though --- we musicians tend to be obsessive about our equipment, but honestly, unless we are top-notch professional players (as are a small minority of the people who contribute to this BB), or are beginning players who don't have the experience or 'muscle memory' to make unconscious adjustments the way we 'old hands' do routinely, the majority of us can do just fine with a wide variety of gear --- new, used, cheap, expensive, whatever. As long as our clarinets are in a good state of repair and our mouthpieces and reeds are not too horrible, we'll adjust and make tolerable music on what we've got.
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Author: John Peacock
Date: 2011-01-12 19:39
I think weberfan identifies the critical point: tuning. I have a modest collection of vintage instruments, and have had great fun restoring them. As Chris P said at the start, the craftsmanship of these old instruments is wonderful: the wood quality is frequently beyond the best you can buy today, and the hand-sculpted keys are a delight. And yet most of these instruments are just for private practice, rather than performing, because they are way out of tune by modern standards. That's not because they are badly built, but because it used to be that no-one knew how to design clarinets that played in tune: almost always the low register LH notes (CDE) are terribly sharp relative to GAB in the clarion register, for example. But the Buffet polycylindrical design in the 1950s changed everything. I recently got a 1959 R13, and this plays better in tune even than my usual 1982 R13 (and with a nicer tone). Why think about selling your house to buy a Tosca when a 50-year old R13 is better in every respect for a small fraction of the price? (OK, the keys aren't silver plated, but the old pure nickel silver keys have a beauty of their own. I've seen instruments of this age where the original keys have had modern plating applied, and I think that's an act of vandalism).
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2011-01-12 19:49
John, I must respectfully disagree with you about the intonation of vintage clarinets. In my own experience the better vintage clarinets, after proper servicing, play just as well in tune as modern ones, though admittedly sometimes I've had to perform minor modifications to achieve this (the most common being the drilling of a vent hole in the bell to bring up flat low-chalumeau E/F, along with some tonehole undercutting on originally straight-walled tonehole instruments).
And besides, as GBK and others have pointed out, it isn't the INSTRUMENT that plays in tune, it's the PLAYER. A good instrument does facilitate the task of playing in tune, but ultimately the player has to be listening all the time, and constantly adjusting to the other players around him/her.
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Author: BartHx
Date: 2011-01-12 20:39
David:
I am definitely an old Kohlert fan (both me and the horns). Prior to WWII, Kohlert was one of the top woodwind makers (especially well known for their bassoons). Unfortunately, in an effort to contribute to the Nazi coffers, they got moved from Graslitz, Bohemia (later Czecho-Slovakia -- but still pre-WWII) to central Germany. Due to careless German planning, a large portion of their tools were left in Graslitz. The result was that Kohlerts from the 1940s are relatively poorly made. At the end of the war, many of the workers moved throughout Europe and a few to the United States. A number of them wished to continue manufacturing instruments and continued to use the Kohlert name, although they did not maintain any connection with each other. The result has been that a Kohlert manufactured after the mid-1940s is going to be difficult to accurately trace a history and is likely to be of questionable quality.
On the other hand, a Kohlert manufactured prior to the late 1930s is likely to be a fine instrument. I have a Bb soprano that I have used since junior high school (late 1950s). I inherited it from my older brother when he switched to a Selmer Centered Tone (he has since switched to the dark side for his A and primary Bb while keeping his Selmer and adding a variety of old instruments back to a twelve key boxwood). Meanwhile, I have acquired and restored a Selmer Centered Tone, Series 9, and Series 10. All three are fine, free blowing, sweet sounding horns, but there is no way I would ever consider parting with my Kohlert. Its tone, intonation, and ease of playing is easily on a par with the Selmers.
Of the twelve instruments my brother and I have between us, only his Buffet A and Bb and a red plastic instrument (he uses only for forth of July parades) were purchase new.
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Author: Bob Bernardo
Date: 2011-01-12 22:06
Didn't read the other posts, but I will. I didn't want to be persuaded. I have an R-13 from 1975, a Bb Buffet. About 2 months ago I played some new Bb horns and a mess of A clarinets. Both of the new horns had a really nice sound. The upper registers played with ease and playing softly to FF the pitch for the most part on both horns was fine. Added to this the 12th's were also very good, with most of the notes dead on.
The 1975 horn is top of the line, but I did like the new Bb Buffet a bit better, so I will buy one in a month or 2. Comparing the A clarinets, by far the new version is less resistant and a has very rounded sound.
Bring your tuner. I feel I have a very good ear. When a clarinetist plays a note I know which note it is, however my good ears are no match with a tuner. Therefore bring a tuner.
Also look for eveness in scales, watch out for notes that pop out when playing scales and 3rd's softly.
Conclusion for me is there are minor differences in good used Bb Buffets to the point that you and people around you in an orchestra or band setting wouldn't be able to tell the difference in your playing, although you yourself will feel some differences.
I liked this one A clarinet so much I bought it. The upper register was easy to play, such as from the last few lines on the Copland Concerto. I'm also very pleased with the barrel that came with the A R-13. I don't think I will change it.
Hope this helps. I'm sure you will get a mess of different opinions on your questions.
Designer of - Vintage 1940 Cicero Mouthpieces and the La Vecchia mouthpieces
Yamaha Artist 2015
Post Edited (2011-01-12 22:21)
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Author: John Peacock
Date: 2011-01-12 22:25
To David Spiegelthal: I'm interested that you don't find poorer tuning on older instruments. I can only testify that this is my consistent experience with pre-1950s Buffets (and big-bore Selmers, based on a smaller sample): many notes in the lower register are painfully sharp, assuming one tunes the instrument so that the clarion register is at the desired pitch (i.e. the 12ths are too narrow). I'm pretty sure I've read in many places that the polycylindrical revolution was designed to solve this problem of getting the 12ths right, and that certainly matches what I experience.
And while of course you are 100% right to say
"...it isn't the INSTRUMENT that plays in tune, it's the PLAYER. A good instrument does facilitate the task of playing in tune, but ultimately the player has to belistening all the time, and constantly adjusting to the other players around him/her."
nevertheless, if those adjustments are large, they stop you concentrating on the music (or conversely, you can get distracted thinking about phrasing and play out of tune). This is undoubtedly why B+H 1010s fell out of favour: players just got fed up having to work so hard at monitoring the tuning. Fair enough if it's what you can cope with by lips alone, but when you have to shade toneholes or half-hole, this isn't practical. I tried to learn to play 1010s, but gave them up because of those problems; pre-1950s Buffets seem about as bad. If that's not your experience, I envy you.
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2011-01-13 03:35
I understand what you're saying, John, I was just remarking that with the particular vintage clarinets I'm most familiar playing (old Kohlerts, the "mid-bore" Booseys, NOT the 1010), I've been fortunate to experience generally decent intonation. I've only played one pre-R13 Buffet (a customer's clarinet, not mine), and a couple of pre-WWII Selmers (again these were customer instruments but as I recall they tuned OK).
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