 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: clarinet713
Date: 2001-11-22 03:46
Has anyone ever heard of putting electrical tape on the heart of the reed to darken the tone?
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Author: Hiroshi
Date: 2001-11-22 05:29
Yes.
Mr.Nagamatsu, a pro-clarinetist, experimented this with many instruments.
Use not blank tape but recorded tape. Both video and casset tapes work. 'Darken' means more harmonics not damping some harmonics. It works on mouthpiece, or on barrel too. Another tip he found is to bring a clarinet to forests and breath forests air. He also developed a electric magnet (reed activator he calls that)to arrange reed molecules in line.
http://www.c-d-k.ne.jp/~nkk-plan/goods/goods-e.html
I am not joking.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2001-11-22 06:04
The laughing you now hear is from the great Robert Marcellus...
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Author: Wes
Date: 2001-11-22 08:08
Yes, I would be interested in more details of Mr. Nagamatsu's ideas.
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Author: Douglas
Date: 2001-11-22 14:13
I've heard lots of players who should have their reeds taped.
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Author: clarinet713
Date: 2001-11-22 14:43
No, I'm serious, I read this tip in Ben Armato's reed book and was wondering if anyone does this to their reeds? I tried it and to me it sounds a little darker but I don't know if it's in my head or not!
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Author: Bob Arney
Date: 2001-11-22 15:22
Ever see that guy on telly repair his whole refrigerator with duct tape? Every MAN knows the whole world can be repaired with duct tape. Why not on a reed?
Bob A
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Author: jbutler
Date: 2001-11-22 15:40
Sounds like something from the Red Green show, ie. duct tape.
jbutler
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Author: spf
Date: 2001-11-22 17:22
I would venture a guess about now and say the consensus is a RESOUNDING ... no. But I gotta admit to being one of those described by Douglas! :-
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Author: GBK
Date: 2001-11-22 17:49
Top 5 ways to "darken the tone":
5. sell clarinet - buy tuba and sunglasses
4. 60 days past due on electric bill
3. preheat oven to 450 degrees - insert clarinet
2. "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik"
1. Vandoren V-12 #7
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-22 18:12
Daniel regularly pulls the mouthpiece off of his Selmer 1400 and uses the barrel as a cup mouthpiece, does that count?
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-22 18:24
Daniel regularly pulls the mouthpiece off of his Selmer 1400 and uses the barrel as a cup mouthpiece, does that count?
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Author: Emms
Date: 2001-11-22 21:43
Did an experiment myself. Tied electrical tape round my reed after magnetising it on refridgerator door. Took clarinet out to plum tree in garden. Breathed in garden air and blew. Result - VERY dark tones of voice from neighbours. Just joking
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Author: Suzanne
Date: 2001-11-22 22:51
I think it would work if I took some,as Hiroshi suggests, "recorded tape" (of Robert Marcellus playing), attached it to my reed (along with my tape player), and pressed "play." Very dark sound indeed.
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Author: Jack Kissinger
Date: 2001-11-23 04:03
I've never known anyone who tried this but, in college, I knew a guy who taped shut all the keys on his clarinet (one of Benny Goodman's old instruments, BTW, but that's another story) that would be used for sharps or flats. He was concerned about accidently playing wrong notes! True story!
Best regards,
jnk
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Author: Bob
Date: 2001-11-24 14:52
I think Hiroshi also claimed to be a poor clarinetist. However, he seems to be equating magnetic recording tape with electricians' insulating tape. Also, I can't seem to find the heart on any of my reeds. Maybe the Tinman got 'em. Many things in the world are unbelieveable until you experience them.
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Author: ron b
Date: 2001-11-24 16:44
My understanding is that, from the heel of the reed to the tip of the reed, from where the cut portion begins, the central part that slopes, or tapers, toward the edges/sides and tip is called by some of the more knowledgeable folk, 'the heart' of the reed. So, in my understanding, woodwind reeds do have hearts and slight changes to the heart portion will result in marked playing characteristic changes. It's easy to remove material there. Tape may be an attempt to put some back, to re-thicken it, to 'darken' the sound.
Hiroshi has been making valuable contributions to the BB for a long, long time. This one may seem a little odd and good for a few laughs and chuckles but, in the long run of things, I have no doubt Hiroshi's heart is in the right place. I personally would encourage Hiroshi to explain further about his findings. In some modern clarinet factory practice, ultrasonic waves are used to seat pads. I don't find that hard to believe. Do you?
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Author: Fred
Date: 2001-11-24 18:59
I suggest duct tape on the bottom of the reed, and WD-40 on the top.
The old (male) adage goes -
If it moves and it isn't supposed to . . . use duct tape.
If it doesn't move and it is supposed to . . . use WD-40.
Takes care of most all your basic household repairs including clarinet adjusting.
Disclaimer: If you are one to take things seriously and literally, please understand that this is a joke. And if you needed this disclaimer to understand that, you need to get out more.
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Author: ??
Date: 2001-11-24 20:16
where can i buy electrical tape???????????????????????????/
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Author: clarinet713
Date: 2001-11-25 02:37
hey guys this is really funny-but I am dead serious about what I read! It's in Perfect A Reed...and Beyond by Ben Armato on page 35 and this is what it says:
"Tape on the reed's vamp can dramatically enhance the sound. Cut a piece of electrical tape 1/4" by 1/2" and place it on the reed's vamp about 1/4" below the tip, and even with the rails. The tape darkens the sound, extends the life of the reed, prevents foreign material from impregnating and clogging the xylem, and feels comfortable to the embouchure."
So I guess no one has tried it, but I bet you all secretly have gone out and bought a roll of electrical tape and have it on your reeds as I type! :-)
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Author: ron b
Date: 2001-11-25 06:27
I'm sure some will, some won't, some don't care Cl-713 but, who can argue with Ben Armato? I surely can't... I haven't a clue who Ben Armato is. But it's worth a try, I guess. Yeh, I'm game, now that you explain how to do it -- will check back tomorrow 
Who said we don't have any fun around here?
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Author: Bob
Date: 2001-11-25 23:28
Oh, now I see, you put the tape where your bottom lip hits the reed. Maybe I will give it a try.
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Author: Hiroshi
Date: 2001-11-26 01:35
So I misunderstood electric tape for recorded tape. I do not think electric tape works. I do not know recorded tapes work either. I only wrote there is a man who thinks recorded tapes work.
Another hi-tech thing is cryogenic treatment of brass instruments and flute.
Powell flute and Yamaha Xeno trumpet do this. This is a certain technical background, i.e. stress relieving.
By the way,do you know Anthroposophie by Rudolf Steiner? If you believe this you can easily believe anything. This kind of thing may be defiend Clarinetist Anthroposhophie.
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-26 01:59
With all due respect to Mr. Armato, electrical tape leaves residue behind after it's been exposed to heat and/or moisture, and I would venture to say that using it thus, on a reed, is exposing it to both.
Even though I am not as picky about my reeds as others here, I would have a difficult time doing that to my good or better reeds.
There are too many people out there (who worked for it) getting a nice, dark sound out of their instruments, without the gimmicks, for me to believe that if a "nice, dark" sound is what I needed to ring my bell and make my life complete, I couldn't learn to achieve it, then enhance it with normally, available (or custom made)accessories. (Like matching custom made reeds, mouthpieces, instruments, etc.)
That goes double, in spades, for Nagamatsu-san's mystic gimmicks. (Although I plan to try Emms suggestions, I can see where they might work!)
Y'all who spend all that time coming up with all these gimmicks and looking for new equipment: If you would just spend the years of conscious practice that the people who get that "nice, dark" sound have usually spent, and quit looking for the "gimmicky" way out, you might be able to do similarly, and just wonderfully.
Think what an achievement that would be, to learn that sound on your own, by practicing and learning how to make it happen!!! It would be in mine!
Not that some don't get lucky and find it "store bought," but most don't, and only the New Yorker's directions on how to get to Carnegy Hall ("Practice, practice practice...") can get most of us that wonderful, sought-after sound.
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-11-26 02:27
Peter wrote:
>
> With all due respect to Mr. Armato, electrical tape
> leaves residue behind after it's been exposed to heat and/or
> moisture, and I would venture to say that using it thus, on a
> reed, is exposing it to both.
Bennie Armato made a very nice living playing for the Met for a long time - until a career-ending illness forced him to leave.
I'd try what he suggests before I'd try 99% of what gets suggested by some of the people here.
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Author: David Pegel
Date: 2001-11-26 02:46
I've actually tried the tape thing before I even read this, just to experiment. It works. Believe me. Just don't take it off.
As for using the barrell as a cup mouthpeice, If you insert a tuba mouthpeice instead, it sounds almost like a digeridoo!! So one girl says...
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-26 03:37
Mark,
I don't doubt Mr. Armato legitimately found that tape works. And well it should. But, as Gregory Smith brought up on another thread, is it darker, or is it muddier? I can't feel but that the tape will work to dampen the reed's vibration, as much as making the sound "darker," if in fact it does.
I also don't doubt Mr. Armato's credentials and virtuosity, I'm somewhat familiar with them myself. I have a great deal of respect for him. Furthermore, I have a great deal of respect for the Met, and have been lucky enough to have been able to attend many of their concerts, over many years.
But I still wouldn't do that to my good reeds, unless I planned to just throw them away long before their time. (I presently have several reeds I've been playing for more than a year, although I do, sometimes, throw them away somewhat prematurely.)
I would rather practice as many hours every day (or over as many years) as it took for me to come across the way to that "nice, deep, dark" sound on my own, if it came to that.
If I achieved that coveted sound, on my own, through excersising proper wind control, embouchure, tongue, whatever, etc., I would probably be one really good, proud, accomplished clarinetist.
If I did it through gimmicks and/or substitute equipment, it would be just something else I did too easily to really appreciate it, and it wouldn't make me a better musician, just a get-over one.
What was it that has been repeatedly said about the real masters sounding like themselves regardless of what someone else handed them to play or what they played on at any given point in time?
Many people I know who busted their chops (pun intended) trying to achieve it, never made it.
But almost every one developed such a wonderful "substitute" sound through their long practice and unrelenting perseverance, and were eventually so pleased with the accomplishment of their own good sound, that they no longer needed to sound like anyone else's, or even their own past idea of what constitutes a "nice, deep, dark" sound.
It's things you learn as you grow.
But please, I would be neither disrespectful to, nor disdainful of, Mr. Armato.
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Author: Richard Fong
Date: 2001-11-26 03:50
I would like to have a try.
But little question...
electric tape = used video and casset tapes ???
how can I "place" the tape on the reed and don't let it drop during playing??
If there are really make difference, I will post in step by step in JPEG and record the sound in MP3.
For the "Forests" experiment, bring them to forest.... do I need to setup them up or just let the parts lie down and let them breath? Under the sun or under the moon?
Look like pick the kids to picnic, interesting!
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-26 04:08
As they say in China:
Oy, vey! (Or is that: Oh me tuo Fo?)
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-11-26 04:18
Peter wrote:
>
> Mark,
>
> I don't doubt Mr. Armato legitimately found that tape works.
> And well it should. But, as Gregory Smith brought up on another
> thread, is it darker, or is it muddier? I can't feel but that
> the tape will work to dampen the reed's vibration, as much as
> making the sound "darker," if in fact it does.
And how would you know unless you tried? Do you think Mr. Armato's job depended on a "muddy" sound? Somehow I think not. Maybe you should try it out - with an impartial judge of the sound that results - than just "pooh-pooh" it. After all, we're not talking much money here, and testing it for a few moments isn't going to damage your reed much. Perhaps you shouldn't use the reed that you're going to use in your next concert at Alice Tully Hall ...
You speak as though you are an authority on all of this, yet you have no idea what the results are; you're just guessing. Mr. Armato made his living playing clarinet. Perhaps his ideas are a little on the "strange" side (read his book - you'll find a few really "interesting" things in it) but I'd rather listen to what he says than dismiss it out of hand.
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Author: Jim
Date: 2001-11-26 19:06
In this regard, ( one's own personal sound) I recall the principal clarinet with a major U.S. symphony saying that he switched clarinets and set-up with his second once and was amazed at how the other continued to sound the same, though they used quite different set-ups on their instruments.
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-27 01:20
Guys and gals,
FYI: I am presently silent because I'm preparing to take on Mark Charette's challenge. I have now cut several right-sized pieces each of 3-M Vinyl electrical tape, 3-M rubber splicing tape, fiber-filled box strapping tape, paper masking tape, and (yes!) duct tape.
I want to see if we can determine what difference the tape will make.
I will soon select some, not great, but good reeds to do this with, but will probably have to wait until tomorrow, to actually do it, for Daniel and I both to be able to do this together, and listen to each other's sound, etc.
This will also be done in front of a tuner connected to the instrument by way of a pick-up so as to eliminate extraneous noise interferance.
Onward and forward!
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Author: GBK
Date: 2001-11-27 01:49
This sounds like it could have made a great Saturday morning experiment for Mr. Wizard (for all you baby boomers out there)...GBK
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Author: clarinet713
Date: 2001-11-27 02:35
ummm the book doesn't say anything about any other tape but electrical tape. Electrical tape is black and it's kind of thin. I don;t know where everyone is getting the idea of a video tape or whatever. Mr. Charette, could you tell me why Mr. Armato;s career came to an end? He has written to me several times and I have not understood what happened that made him stop playing, though I can tell that he really misses it. Thank you!
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-11-27 03:33
Throat cancer. They removed his larynx and until recently he had to use one of those "buzzers" to speak. He now speaks using a "grunt" technique and can be understood pretty easily!
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Author: Suzanne
Date: 2001-11-27 03:52
IMHO, the purpose of experimenting with equipment is to find something that helps you sound like "yourself" with the most comfort and ease. Sometimes I think the whole "dark" sound idea is just a bunch of hooey. I want to sound like ME. I am unique and I want to have a special sound that is all my own... maybe I am in the minority, but people always say the nicest things to me about my sound, when I just let it be what it is.
Now, if electrical tape helps me sound like myself, with more ease and comfort--more power (or watts?) to it.
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Author: Emms
Date: 2001-11-27 08:59
Peter, I hope you're going to do this experiment properly - results in a table please and a proper conclusion. You should publish them. As an extension experiment, take the clarinet and different tapes to a variety forests and breathe the air.
As for finding things that make you sound like yourself, YOU ALREADY DO IF YOU'RE PLAYING YOUR CLARINET. If you don't play in comfort, get a cushion.
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-27 13:15
Emms,
I am having bottled forest air from all different parts of the world shipped directly to my office, as well as a magnum bottle of large city air in case my city-raised clarinets should become ill, in some way, from too much clean forest air.
You have to be very careful about these things, you know.
I am also borrowing an electromechanical devise used in a 1936 experiment to magnetize cork for fishing floats. The idea was to dump ball-bearings in the water and wait until the fish ate them before using these floats.
Apparently it never took off, but the surplus devises have been offered for sale by the Ripley (believe-it-or-not) Company all these years and they still have all of them in stock.
I've always wondered why? Such a bargain!
I understand the devises were originally developed and marketed by a Doctor Frankenstein, somewhere in Europe, the result of some otherwise failed experiment or another, but for what purpose I couldn't begin to imagine...
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Author: Suzanne
Date: 2001-11-28 01:46
I beg to differ. Most people I know (at least students and amateurs, not professionals) spend a lot of time "trying" to make a "good," "dark," whatever sound, and very little time discovering the sound that their body makes naturally--based on the shape of lips, acoustics inside the mouth, physiology of the throat, etc. etc. etc. Your true natural sound is something that needs to be uncovered, discovered--kind of like finding oneself existentially... okay I'm getting too philosophical now. I just know that trying harder doesn't make the best sound. I am anxious for the results of the electrical tape experiment.
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-28 22:03
Precisely what I'm talking about, Suzanne.
Spend the time. Work at it. Develop your best sound.
And if eventually your best sound is not what you (or others) think that coveted deep, dark, smooth sound you heard other people talk about should be, but is, nevertheless, a good to excellent sound, then that's your sound and you are better off accepting it and working at developing it, as such.
Once you know what your sound is, if you experiment with equipment and find some that will enhance it, by all means, jump on it.
But making a priority of the search for gimmicks or equipment to accomplish the sound you think you want is tantamount to taking time away from the real priority, which is to practice as much as you can so that you can achieve your own good sound, in time.
Equipment is important, but once you choose an instrument that really suits you, including the accessories that go with it, give it your best shot for whatever time it takes to consolidating your talents before you go looking for other trinkets.
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Author: Peter
Date: 2001-11-28 22:06
BTW, so far GBK is correct, this is turning more and more into a Saturday morning thing.
But not to worry, if it does, I'll make another post for the results.
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