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My setup is coming along VERY nicely

Author: sfalexi
Date: 2013-03-26 02:42

Heres the journey if you dont mind some light reading into my happiness.

So I've messed with a few things over the years, but over the past ... Oh.... I guess 10ish years I've slowly pieced together my clarinet into an amazing player.

I have an Evette and schaeffer k-series clarinet which was one of my first posts to this board in 2003. Through this board I made contact with a Graham Golden who was an amati dealer and woodwind repairer here in the US. I sent my horn to him and asked him to make it as amazing as possible. To my knowledge, he voiced and tuned it, worked with undercutting, and in general, worked the hell out of it to leave it ..., well, heavenly would be the only choice left!

It went into a closet as I tried and went through a variety of other clarinets. An Amati 604, a set of leblanc opus clarinets, a selmer 10g, a ridenour Bb, a leblanc bliss wooden and composite models, and another ridenour Bb. In the army I've been through many R13 prestiges, r13 greenlines, a festival greenline, festival wood, tosca wood, and a few Yamaha 650s. All the while with my Evette and schaeffer in the closet. Great clarinet, plays better than the money I would have gotten selling it so I never did.

Mouthpieces? Dear god ..... Well, the ones I stuck with for at least a year.... b45, Greg smith, gigliotti p, grabner k11*, Richard Hawkins b, ridenour zinner, M15, and most recently, Rico reserve.

Well, after trying all sorts of stuff, I was blown away today by the sound and response I got.

Clarinet: Evette and Schaeffer overhauled by John Butler
Barrel: Taplin-Weir AM ringed, taper M3 65 mm
Mouthpiece: Rico Reserve, and I've gone back to cane reeds instead of Legere (will be getting it touched up by Richard Hawkins in the near future)
Ligature: Rovner Versa (used to use an Eddie Daniels, but this one works just as well and is a little simpler)

The only thing left that I haven't tried are bells. Not sure about the hype, but one day I'll try them out and see if it adds anything to my sound.

Felt great today, read through some pieces with a piano player for some sight reading together, and it just felt and sounded so right.

One of the longest days I've had in the army, had to work from 9 am till 10 pm, but that one hour of reading through some music with this clarinet setup just really made my day.