 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: cgarza
Date: 2018-09-10 18:25
I’ve owned a Behn Epic bass clarinet mouthpiece now for about a month, and I wanted to share my experience with it so far.
First of all, definitely take the time to visit Brad to pick out a mouthpiece if you can. I’m fortunate enough to live just about twenty minutes from him (that’s the only time I’ll say it’s fortunate that I live in Oklahoma now), and spent some good time with him trying mouthpieces and finding what was just right for me. I also had the pleasure of some wonderful conversation, and Brad’s help with refining my setup to work with the mouthpiece I chose.
A few thoughts about the Epic mouthpiece:
It is extremely resonant, especially at the bottom notes of my bass clarinet. It is also extremely flexible and lends a little extra homogeneity to the different registers.
I played my first concert with the mouthpiece last night, and it sounds just as good in the hall as it does at home (if not better). I’m working a lot less to be heard, and even at the softest pianissimo I can be heard easily. It also responds very easily in all registers, for which I was grateful while playing an all-Bernstein concert.
It did require a major change to my reed choices - while I’ve been using 3.5 V12’s on my old mouthpiece (Redwine), I have moved to V12 2-2.5 reeds at Brad’s suggestion. It was a bit uncomfortable for me at first since I’m used to more resistance, but I made for a major improvement in my sound. I went back and listened to old recording and found that my sound was somewhat covered before, and now it is full and free and resonant.
Cris
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Author: HANGARDUDE
Date: 2018-10-23 14:12
Hi Cris,
Thanks for the in-depth review. I'm curious of what facing you ended up choosing? The standard medium one he usually offers, or something else?
I got a SONO bass mouthpiece from Brad when I was at Clarinetfest 2018 in Belgium this past July, and it has a prototype facing that is similar to the Selmer F/ Vandoren B50(Very open!!). At the first blow I was blown away by its incredible resonance and beautiful tone. It also projects better than anything else I've tried, and it is really agile. I was shredding on my bass clarinet like never before, and dozen people turned around! Yep it is really THAT good.
I initially used Blue Box 3 reeds with this extra-open SONO, but later switched to V12 3 reeds which are slightly softer. I also use V12 3s on my backup B50 mpc(while many, including Michael Lowenstern, use V12 2.5s). Somehow I feel the most comfy using reeds that are 1/2 strength harder many others use on bass!
Josh
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Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2018-10-23 18:55
Every single mouthpiece, no matter who makes them, are slightly different. One should always try as many as possible, even of the same facing, to pick the one that fits you.
ESP eddiesclarinet.com
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