Author: Max S-D
Date: 2022-11-06 23:41
My B series Model 33 bass clarinet was made in 1981. The serial number lists I've found for Selmer clarinets mostly seem to cut off around there, but the charts seem to indicate leading up to that point that a letter designation corresponded to about two or three years. Ebonite's D-series mentioned above is from 1986, which mostly fits the pattern. If we assume that was the case going forward then maybe your F series would have been from 1989, give or take a year or so on either end.
There's a pretty big assumption that I'm making in there, but in the absence of better information that might be as good as we'll do. Hopefully someone else has more to contribute here!
Any time between the '70s and 1995, Selmer would have designated that horn a Model 31/33 (low Eb/C, respectively). A passage attributed to Clark Fobes in 1995 elsewhere on this site (linked at the bottom) seems to indicate that the 33 (and presumably the 31 as well) were redesigned in 1983 to be very different instruments from the years prior but the 31/33 model name was preserved, rather confusingly. Clark mentions that some changes were made in 1993 that greatly improved the 33, which was discontinued with the introduction of the 35/37 in 1995.
I think that would make your clarinet a Model 33 of the post-1983 vintage, regardless of whether it was made in 1988, 89, 90 or 91.
Clark Fobes states his distaste for the 1983 revision in the aforementioned passage, though I've known a few people with Selmers from that time period who love them. Clark knows his stuff probably as well as anyone anywhere, but taste is subjective, of course.
All of the above is what I was able to glean from various online resources (mostly on the BBoard) when I was in the market for an older Selmer. Apologies if I am wrong about anything there. Perhaps someone who was playing, repairing, selling and/or handling these instruments at the time will be able to chime in with more information.
Source: http://www.woodwind.org/clarinet/Equipment/BassClarinets.html
Post Edited (2022-11-06 23:42)
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The Clarinet BBoard
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