Author: HautboisJJ
Date: 2011-04-19 16:36
What i would be curious at this point is to what extend this nice tone dissapears....since sharpness can be a problem, consider using a wider shape. Over lapping reeds also become thinner towards the top in my opinion with short scrape reeds. (the best ke xun reeds dont overlap, although reeds that don't overlap can give you flatness, even serious flatness for the more sensitive notes) It's also true that thinning the tip too much which will result in the lost of tone, but the shape of the tip contributes too (straighter = brighter, as opposed to more inverted V = warmer). I perfer a straighter tip most of the time. My tips are generally 0.08-0.10 mm but always blending into the heart area. If there is a profound step into the tip, this can cause the thinning of the sound as you describe as well. A gradual blend is very very important! (before you lose your octave G that is....ha...ha....)
Side tracking a "little" from this thread:
The flat middle C is not a problem that you yourself have. (i have heard so many recordings of famous famous people who have that, but perhaps everything else is so good that we don't need to care anymore) General sharpness was common too. I had it for years. I thought it was an instrument problem as well. Brought it to one of the best instrument makers/repairman in the UK/Sweden, he said he did the maximum, and still i had problems. I tried a million types of staples. Indeed, narrower ones will bring the C and G up, bigger ones the opposite. Narrower shapes work very much the same. But really, the ones i mentioned before all brought new problems after they corrected old ones. For example, Chiarugi no. 1 will give you stable and nice middle C's, but they will also bring down the 2nd and 3rd octaves for many French type oboes. Another example: narrower shapes tend to close more quickly and have less energy in sound.
But my conclusion now is that i used to have such flat reeds, and really i was trying to push them so high up (and you know it's NOT very hard with the tuning A) that actually my technique was compensating (constantly pushing everything else as high up as i can and "attempting" to push middle c up, haha) on those reeds and compensating really has its limits. (it can be blinding for many years, even for very accomplished players)
Accoustically speaking as well as intonation wise, there are some notes on the oboe that doesnt sit well OR sits so well that you can't do much about it with physical alteration. Middle C seems to be one of those notes. The only way to alter the pitch of that note is actually to make a reed shorter by way of shorter or longer staples. Once you have decided on a staple you like in general but gives flat C's, try a shorter version of it. At first you might get something like a good C but everything else is too sharp, but keep playing, practising and working on it, you might be pleasantly surprised! Now my reeds are 69-70mm with 45mm Chiarugi no. 2/2+ staples! (Guercio D12, Glotin, and Chiarugi 2 are all very similar and fit basically with the same mandrel) And i have had beautiful Ke Xun reeds (72mm) so old that everything was 20 cents sharp but still had flat Cs. Ha! And i played wonderful concerts with them and no one spoke of the Cs....(perhaps really we shouldnt care too much about it but how can we oboists not....)
On the other hand, that is my oboe and my embouchure and way of playing. These reeds of mine are crap and basically too sharp for a friend's Patricola but perfect for another 2 Marigauxs and a Loree that i have tried. I play a Buffet Greenline. I know people who play on reeds that are 74mm long on a Marigaux 901 that sounds absolutely amazing (but complains too of flat c's and g's). Go figure!
Regards,
Howard
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