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Re: I think I found a rare mouthpiece? H. O'Brien, Indpls, Ind

Author: seabreeze
Date: 2017-11-04 19:45

Eddice,

Great job for tracking down that patent. O'Brien also held patents on the design and manufacture of crystal mouthpieces--which were his main claim to fame. But even with the patent, O'Brien surely was not the first to line the inside of a wood or rubber mouthpiece with metal. Albert Rice in "The Clarinet in the Classical Period" p. 218 says that in the 1800's, the famous clarinetist Hermstedt had a mouthpiece that "may have been black wood or ebony with [silver or other metal] side rails, tip, or table similar to modern inlaid mouthpieces." Before the development of rubber, wood was the preferred material for clarinet mouthpieces, especially in Germany, and metal inlays were used to give the lay and baffle of the mouthpiece some stability and protection from warping.

In the 20th century, the demand for inlaid mouthpieces does not ever seem to have been very high in the US. Frank Kaspar made a few; I believe David Glazer in New York played one of his. O'Brien advertised crystals, sold large numbers of them, which were widely available in retail music stores throughout the US, was contracted by many other companies to make crystal mouthpiece for them, and was also sought out as a mouthpiece tech who could do extensive refacing improvements on any mouthpiece and especially glass ones. He would even cater to unusual requests for custom made pieces. In an issue of The Clarinet from the 1950s, I believe, he wrote about catering to a player who wanted a glass mouthpiece that produced a "veiled" sound even though that made the piece hard to blow. Perhaps the metal inlay model was also produced to order for a small number of customers who wanted that feature.

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