Author: coguy5280
Date: 2013-02-08 07:06
He would get the tip going, extend the scrape into the back to remove all the bark, go back to the tip, take some cane out of the back to separate it out from the heart, go back to the tip, then clip to C. If it needed more response, then it was back to the tip and another clip. As you say, this took all of five minutes.
His "secret" to the quickness is that he used a less-than-sharp knife in conjunction with a "slicing" technique in which he used his thumb at the back of the knife and downward pressure to cut through several layers of cane (i.e., in the tip) all at once and quickly created a slope out to the end. You'd think he would rip off a corner, but he never did. The tips were pretty long, but the reeds were very stable because he never took anything off the heart (if he did, he would "shine" the heart with a "traditional" scrape, i.e., use very light pressure and take virtually nothing off).
Erin Hannigan is one student, I think, who successfully uses his slicing technique, and she reportedly makes reeds very quickly, too.
|
|