 The Oboe BBoard
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Author: WoodwindOz
Date: 2014-01-21 18:43
Since I have returned home from the US, I have not made a good reed.
Admittedly the climate is a little different, but I have made reeds across all season on both continents and so far, climate doesn't seem to be the deciding factor.
So...
Same oboe
Same cane/tubes/thread
Reeds made on the same cane/tubes/thread in the US play beautifully here (possibly eliminating climate?)
Some of the reeds I have made here were tied before I left, some tied here.
Cane has come from batches ordered at different times.
And they all wind up with the same sound - kind of like a beginner at their first lesson. Very duck-y, shrill, no warmth. They sound very soft even though they are hard to attack. Once they get to this point, I can't do anything to turn them back. I have made perhaps 10 reeds like this. The only two reeds I have made that were good were a student reed (same cane gouge and shape, but softer cane) and a Franken-reed (two halves of a shaped piece of cane because the other half split).
The only difference is that I had a couple of months hiatus from reedmaking during the move. I can only conclude that something has got lost from technique as everything else seems consistent.
So, on a short scrape reed (or perhaps if you have noticed this on a long scrape reed, some techniques do transfer) what on Earth am I doing wrong? I suspect I am not taking enough out of the base/sides of the scrape initially, but would this cause this much of a difference? I am running out of old reeds, too, so I need to fix whatever it is I am doing wrong soon!
Thanks for any advice!
Rachel
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Author: mjfoboe
Date: 2014-01-21 20:13
Okay lets start to get some details:
When you hold the reed up to a back light what do you see?
When you crow the reed what do you hear?
When you attack the low notes ... how do they speak?
When you play high register how is the tone? Stuffy? Shrill? Warm?
When you play long phrases how resistant is the reed overall?
What are the dimensions of the reed and its parts: tip, heart, back?
What shaper tip do you use?
Mark
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Author: darryoboe
Date: 2014-01-21 15:28
Did you gouge the cane yourself? Anytime I have reed anomalies I check the gouge.
I mention this because I had a shipment of gouged cane arrive earlier this month with the gouge off-center. It took me a couple of days (and a huge amount of frustration) to figure out why I couldn't make a decent reed.
The usual adjustments had unexpected/undesirable results.
Fortunately on hearing about the problem, my supplier replaced the entire shipment.
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Author: Oboe Craig
Date: 2014-01-21 22:48
To reduce reed frustrations, which at one point in my early life had me ready to call it quits ( go back to clarinet and/or sax) I finally got some really good advice.
Don't make reeds for tomorrow or even this week....
Get way ahead of the curve.
So, my current practice is to tie up 100-200 blanks over a few days.
From tube cane through the process, then work 1 or 2 a day over a few months.
(I don't supply reeds or sell them at this point in my life.)
So, I do that process a couple times a year to keep up with my own playing demands and all the reeds that fail to become useful just become staples again.
Get a few reed cases, or put small nails or glue old staples onto a board. Just keep the reeds coming.
I have 40 or more in process at all times (oboe). Ehorn I can live happily with 6 - 12 in process.
It takes a while to get ahead of the curve of demand, but life becomes so much more GRACEFUL, once you get this routine down.
I still bow in gratitude to the teacher who put me on this path.
-Craig
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Author: darryoboe
Date: 2014-01-21 17:54
That's good advice. I'm not quite that organized but I'm currently making reeds for jobs in March & April.
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Author: WoodwindOz
Date: 2014-01-22 09:39
Craig, I am actually using the peg board system, made up a pallette with nails I coated in heat shrink tubing. It was full of blanks the other day (about 30) as was my case (30). I made 6 reeds on a recent amateur orchestra camp and they are all terrible. Life really got in the way in the second half of last year, and I just couldn't get into any routine. I would love to change this...
Mark, I can answer a few questions. I still get a crow on all of these reeds, and they blow fine before putting them in the oboe. There is nothing before play testing that gives them away as terrible reeds. Low note attack is non-existent, which is strange given the crow is pretty strong. There is no chance of playing long phrases with them. I'm too scared to play high notes given how they sound in the middle register. :0 They sound like they might have a leak, but I have never had leaking issues before, I have wired them and I have attempted to teflon tape any potential leak spots, to no avail. Clipping the tip does help a little, but not enough to be able to play them in public.
It is not a gouge or shape issue. I buy my cane gouged and shaped, and all of this cane has come from at least two different batches, some of which I have already made amazing (as in, my best ever) reeds out of. Aside from climate (which I think I have eliminated seeing as this has crossed several seasons) I am pretty sure it's me.
Admittedly I did alter my scraping routine a little to make my reedmaking more efficient. Maybe I am spending too much time in one area and not enough in another, making unbalanced reeds. I am going to go back to basics over the next couple of days and stop trying to be fancy.
I'm just gonna curl up in a corner and tie a hundred blanks. At least I can do that. :S
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Author: mjfoboe
Date: 2014-01-22 13:26
"Mark, I can answer a few questions. I still get a crow on all of these reeds, and they blow fine before putting them in the oboe. There is nothing before play testing that gives them away as terrible reeds. Low note attack is non-existent, which is strange given the crow is pretty strong. There is no chance of playing long phrases with them. I'm too scared to play high notes given how they sound in the middle register. :0 They sound like they might have a leak, but I have never had leaking issues before, I have wired them and I have attempted to teflon tape any potential leak spots, to no avail. Clipping the tip does help a little, but not enough to be able to play them in public."
Hi ..
I play a long scrape reed so my advice may or may not apply to you.
This is my experience as a reed maker. I am not a professional by any means just a competent amateur who has always made his own reeds.
My reeds that play well have a core sound to the crow ,,, there really isn't much "rattle or extraneous vibrations" When I do get lots of noise - the reed is unbalanced and not finished.
If the low notes are not playing you may have too much wood in the heart/tip blend and the heart as well. I loosen up my low notes by scraping in that area.
High notes is the thinness of the tip in relation to the rest of the reed. If the blend is too abrupt you may get a shrill sound; especially if you thin out the tip to compensate for the thickness in the blend/heart area. You can also adjust the quality of the sound by taking more out of the windows and thinning the tip if everything else is on good proportions/balance.
If the reed is too hard or stuffy you may have too take more wood off the entire reed keeping everything in good proportion.
So it sound as if your reeds are not in proper proportions/balance.
Then again you play a short scrape reed and I do not know if my observations apply to your reed problems.
Mark
Post Edited (2014-01-22 18:28)
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Author: jhoyla
Date: 2014-01-22 14:36
Rachel, I'm short scrape myself, so a few ideas to get you thinking. You will resolve this yourself, of course, but I hope this will "prod" your thoughts.
remember Martin Schuring's sterling advice - the golden rules of reedmaking:
1. Sharpen your knife
2. Don't make any mistakes
3. Adjust for function, not tone.
Your reedmaking is just fine. We all have bad periods, and we get through them. So there is light at the end of the tunnel. That said, let's go back to basics:
1. Are you tying too tight? Too close/over the end of the staple? Try backing off the thread tightness for the top two wraps before wrapping over, and aim to leave .5 mm staple projecting inside the reed. [justification: I'm looking for something that would affect ALL the reeds you make, and that may have changed (say) with the "frankenreed"?]
2. with the sharpest knife, the lightest touch, get the tip right. Then the blend and the back. Adjust for function. Still hard to blow? (short-scrape) dust in an extended V from the centre-back to the extreme edges of the blend. All four quadrants, same strokes - you know the drill.
Take everything. very. slowly.
Check you are not leaving "rails" up into the tip - this can kill response.
3. Check the opening and squeeze if necessary before testing in your oboe
4. Only adjust when you have decided what is wrong. If you don't know, keep playing ..
5. If I have a reed that doesn't play the low register well, I carefully thin out the channels hard up against the bark. It can really help! If it doesn't, I will sometimes extend the back by removing more bark. If the pitch drops I can clip it up, and then feather-scrape the extreme tip (especially corners) for responsiveness.
I really like Linda Walsh's CD for short-scrape. Her explanations are clear, and you can expect to get a playable reed by following her advice. Final adjustments should be done with almost zero downwards pressure on the knife - if nothing happens, go back to Rule 1 ...
Hope this helps,
J.
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Author: WoodwindOz
Date: 2014-02-05 10:22
Thanks for the tips, J. I am happy that we use a lot of the same techniques and philosophies.
I spent a whole afternoon reedmaking last Friday, determined to take one step at a time and figure out what the blazers was going on. I am here to report that it was definitely entirely me the whole time.
I was able to resurrect at least 2 of the worst of 6 reeds I made. They are still a little on the thin side, but useable for sure. I made one particular reed which I played in a lesson with a student and then played in orchestra on Monday. Probably about an 80% reed, but at the moment, I'll take it!
It was a case of me rushing through the process and trying to get to creating the 'structure' of the reed too soon. Here's what I discovered:
I wasn't leaving enough bulk in the centre of the tip (the chimney in a long-scrape reed). I was trying to thin out the whole tip too early in order to clip it quickly.
I wasn't taking down the sides thinly enough before starting on the U or the base of the scrape. Therefore, to get response, I seemed to take too much out of the middle of the scrape before the sides were thin enough. This was one of the biggest issues.
I could feel that the reeds stiffened significantly towards the bottom of the scrape, which my best reeds do not do. This I believe was a case of me becoming lazy and not sharpening regularly enough, therefore I wasn't able to 'dig in' enough at the base of the scrape. This significantly affected the response of the low notes.
So, I am hoping I have cured myself, and that I have actually learned something from this.
1. Sharpen
2. Take time
3. Sharpen
4. Be patient
Now to make a bunch of cor reeds...luckily I am yet to make a bad one of these.
Thanks for the support, all!
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Author: Wes
Date: 2014-02-05 11:09
After a trying summer and fall with reeds being hard to deal with, December and January (very dry months on the west side of the USA) were simply great for reeds, good tuning and stability. Last Saturday, the two reeds I tried were not behaving. After a few moments, I thought that it will rain tomorrow, Sunday. Sure enough, it rained on Sunday.
May I respectfully suggest that one can help the reed situation a little by keeping the reed box closed most of the time to minimize weather effects.
Also, it seems to make the reeds respond a little bit better if they are scrubbed out with a small feather frequently to remove deposits from our mouths, despite teeth brushing. I used to also leave them in H2o2, hydrogen peroxide, for a couple of minutes to clean them, but have not done that lately, but probably should.
If desperate, I've put two turns of #26 brass wire near the thread in order to close the tip a bit, but I really do not wish to wire them at all. Good luck!
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Author: WoodwindOz
Date: 2014-02-06 11:36
I'm kind of glad it was me, J, to be honest - I can change that pretty easily!
I have 10 playable-in-public reeds in my case today, about 7 of which I would be comfortable playing in performance. That makes me a lot happier!
I do feel like I need to pay closer attention these days when I am reedmaking than I used to, but I guess I just don't have time to make the consistent quantities I was when I was studying.
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Author: Oboe Craig
Date: 2014-02-08 04:53
Good progress....
7 - 10 should be a decent supply..... just keep working ahead.
4 - 5 starts and refinements a week can keep you sane while you play off the stable ones in your case.
Here in Colorado, I travel up or down a couple thousand feet and that adds some interesting challenges to using fresh reeds for anything other than recording in my home studio.
And thus, the work well-ahead approach is more important than ever for me.
On a related topic for later, the 3 lives of a reed is also useful for this sort of oboe life.
-Craig
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