Author: mschmidt
Date: 2006-02-09 23:30
My parents, who were definitely NOT wealthy, thought it was ok that I wanted to learn to play oboe because they understood that you could borrow them from the school system. (This was the early seventies, before tax revolts sucked any non-essential resources from the schools.) I borrowed the Blevins Jr. High oboe for about a year and a half. In that time my oboe teacher (who was also the orchestra director at Blevins, and a darn good oboist) had the instrument sent away to Neilsen to see if anything could be done to improve its abyssmal playing. During that time the band director lent me his Kreul (he was a woodwind player, primary instrument clarinet), which was wonderful. When the lousy "student oboe" came back from Neilson without much improvement, my oboe teacher (the orchestra director--are you keeping track?) nagged my parents into buying a wood Prestini which he personally selected. That instrument was my sole instrument until one month ago. I talked with Peter Hurd (see one of ohsuzan's links, above) and he had fine things to say about Prestini; he didn't think there were ever "student" model Prestinis. He thought that, with an overhaul to make it seal up better, the Prestini may still turn out to be a good adult instrument.
What's the point of this? Well, my band director trusted me with his pro-model Kreul for two weeks. My oboe teacher found me a good deal on a good instrument. Nobody said "he's just a kid, let's buy him plastic." I had been playing for a year and a half, I had begun to make my own reeds, and I was 13 years old. Whether you're going to trust a kid with a $2000 or $3000 instrument probably depends on the kid. But if the kid has potential, isn't flighty, and seems to honestly like the oboe, I can't think of a better thing to do for him than to get him a good oboe that can help him sound good. And count on spending a bit of money to maintain it--I think I could have improved a lot faster if I had my Prestini overhauled to eliminate leaks back when I was in high school.
Mike
Still an Amateur, but not really middle-aged anymore
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The Oboe BBoard
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