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Re: Lee Livengood

Author: Dan Shusta
Date: 2023-12-30 11:05

Ed wrote: "I believe Clark Fobes adjusts all of his mouthpieces, including the inexpensive Debut and the step up Nova."

After doing some research, I found out that the adjusting that Clark Fobes does on his Debut acrylic mouthpieces is limited to the tip rail.

https://clarkwfobes.wordpress.com/

“My experience with the injection molded acrylic mouthpieces from Babbitt has been exceptional. The tolerances and consistency of these mouthpieces is remarkable. I do finish every single mouthpiece by hand (about 8,000 last year!), but I have a very consistent starting point which makes large production runs much simpler. Injection molding is such an accurate method that molds can be made to exact dimensions and the tolerances of the molded product are extremely fine. Also, injection molds can be very highly polished leaving a very fine finish on the mouthpiece that needs very little buffing. Babbitt puts a facing on my Debut clarinet and alto sax mouthpieces from cams that I have had custom made. No other maker is allowed to use these facing cams. The nature of acrylic is that it resists the cutting wheel extremely well and when i receive a run of 500 mouthpieces from Babbitt they are all exactly alike. The slight variation from mouthpiece to mouthpiece is only seen in the tip rail width, which i adjust as part of my final finishing. I love the sound of these mouthpieces and I doubt that anyone would guess that it was acrylic in a blind test.”

The above comment is dated 10/21/2008.

From https://cafesaxophone.com/threads/clark-fobes-debut-alto-mouthpiece-pass-around.6600/, TomMapfumo said: “Clark Fobes hand finishes and play tests all his Debut mouthpieces (8,000 pa) before sending them out.” (Comment dated 01/21/2012)

On the same page is an analysis comment by rhysonsax:

“Interesting statistic. Say 200 working days per year, that would be 40 mouthpieces per day, throughout the year and so about 10 minutes per mouthpiece for all hand finishing, play testing etc without doing any other work at all.

Doesn't sound right to me - have I misunderstood or made a mistake?”

Again, in Clark’s own words, his hand finishing of the Debut is limited to adjusting the tip rail and doing very little buffing. Nowhere does he state that he play tests every mouthpiece and makes adjustments for voicing and playability.

It still appears that only Lee Livengood does that.

Post Edited (2023-12-30 11:46)

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