 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Clarimeister
Date: 2011-09-03 17:06
Hi all. I have tried searching the forums for this but it's really tough to search for something like this. You know those really old vintage Buffets/Selmers/etc that you find on that auction site and other websites? How often than not are those clarinets still playable with a decent sound? I figure most of them are blown out, but what about those ones from the 1910s, 1920s, etc? I'm sure most of them need some keywork and repadding, but if you were to get it done, would they still sound alright, or is it a toss of the coin really? Just curious. Thanks.
Post Edited (2011-09-03 17:11)
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Author: BobD
Date: 2011-09-03 17:13
Depends on just what "sound" you want. With proper restoration I'm sure they could be made to sound "as new", but that sound may not be to your liking.
Consider the sound of "Period Instruments" for comparison.
Bob Draznik
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Author: Tony F
Date: 2011-09-03 17:42
As a retirement hobby I buy old clarinets, mostly from that auction site or garage sales, and restore them to good playable condition. This generally involves repadding, recorking, often swedging and occasionally a spring replacement or key repair.
I normally work on Selmers, Buffets, B & H, Pruefer, Penzel Mueller and sometimes one of the better early Europeans such as Kohlert, Marigeaux or Jerome Thibouville Lamy. Mostly I like to find instruments from the 20's or 30's, but I've bought earlier and later. I find that nearly all of them can be brought back to where they wouldn't be out of place in a community band or college orchestra. Some come back better than others. The B & H Edgware and Emperor can be very good when set up, as can Pruefer, Selmer and Penzel Mueller. Buffets seem to be a mixed bag, some restore well and some will always be clunkers. The older European instruments can be a real surprise when restored. Some of the instruments made in France in the late 1800's and early 1900's are of excellent quality, and will play well against modern instruments, likewise the pre-soviet era Kohlerts. Sometimes I find one that can't be brought back, but it's generally because of mechanical abuse or extreme use with little care.
There's a lot of nonsense said about instruments being "Blown out". Frequently it just means that the normal mechanical maintenance and adjustments haven't been carried out, and after a bit of TLC they come back as good as ever.
As to whether it's worth buying an oldie and getting it repaired/restored, that's a decision that only you can make. If you're going to pay someone to do the work then it's probably not, but for me it works well. I generally buy them for small dollars, cost of materials for a good restoration would be perhaps $40-50 and the labour is my own time. For an outlay of perhaps $100 I can end up with excellent instruments that are mostly bought by students or jazz players (They seem to favour vintage instruments) for enough of a profit to subsidise my hobby.
Tony F.
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Author: William
Date: 2011-09-03 18:05
thr terms "blown out" and "swabbed out" are myths. more accurately, it is the player that 'changes' who mistakedly blames his equipement for playing differently rather than himself. we all change over time as a result of maturation and experiance--our instruments remain the same. an old clarinet properly restored should play like new. too bad that restoration of ones abilities are not so simple to do...........
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Author: SteveG_CT
Date: 2011-09-03 20:34
Tony F wrote:
> As to whether it's worth buying an oldie and getting it
> repaired/restored, that's a decision that only you can make. If
> you're going to pay someone to do the work then it's probably
> not, but for me it works well.
It all comes down to the initial investment in the instrument. I also more or less collect vintage clarinets. Many of them I repad/recork myself much as you do. When I get one that I think will potentially be a very good player I usually send it to someone who knows what they are doing for a real overhaul. Even in these cases it usually ends up being a bargain.
For example, I've got a few older clarinets that compare favorably to new $3000+ clarinets and yet I've got less that $500 invested in each of my oldies.
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Author: dclarinet
Date: 2011-09-06 05:04
I have a 1929 vintage Selmer clarinet that has been restored and it plays wonderfully, especially when you use a cylindrically bored mouthpiece like I use on my 1960 vintage Boosey and Hawkes symphony 1010's. SteveG_CT wrote:
> Tony F wrote:
>
> > As to whether it's worth buying an oldie and getting it
> > repaired/restored, that's a decision that only you can make.
> If
> > you're going to pay someone to do the work then it's probably
> > not, but for me it works well.
>
>
> It all comes down to the initial investment in the instrument.
> I also more or less collect vintage clarinets. Many of them I
> repad/recork myself much as you do. When I get one that I think
> will potentially be a very good player I usually send it to
> someone who knows what they are doing for a real overhaul. Even
> in these cases it usually ends up being a bargain.
>
> For example, I've got a few older clarinets that compare
> favorably to new $3000+ clarinets and yet I've got less that
> $500 invested in each of my oldies.
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Author: SteveG_CT
Date: 2011-09-06 06:30
dclarinet wrote:
> I have a 1929 vintage Selmer clarinet that has been restored
> and it plays wonderfully, especially when you use a
> cylindrically bored mouthpiece like I use on my 1960 vintage
> Boosey and Hawkes symphony 1010's.
Most of the vintage clarinets I own are pretty mouthpiece friendly. Certainly more so than vintage saxophones. There has often been talk about the old large-bore clarinets needing different mouthpieces but I find that my Selmer CT plays just fine on the same mouthpieces I use on my smaller-bore clarinets.
Congrats on finding yourself a B&H 1010. I've had one on my wish list for a while but they seem to be pretty rare here in the States. I have a few B&H clarinets in my collection (Edgware's and 2-20's) and they all play very well. I'm surprised that they aren't more popular.
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2011-09-06 14:05
The likelihood that any clarinet from eBay is in immediately playable condition is close to zero. They will all need pad adjustment and, almost always, fresh pads. Older ones will almost always have cracks, particularly at the top of the bell. I bought several older Buffets a few years ago, and only one was any good, even with repairs.
Strangely, what you look for is a clarinet that's covered with grime, with no signs of damage, and in an ancient, original case. I got a Buffet Bb/A pair from 1908 for next to nothing because they were so encrusted that they were almost unrecognizable. They were also nearly unused and had been in a closet since probably 1909, and they restored beautifully.
The only auction clarinet you can be sure of is a Bundy Resonite, which is built like a tank. As long as no chunks are missing, they can be fixed up to for beginners and outdoor use.
Ken Shaw
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Author: BobD
Date: 2011-09-06 14:15
"The likelihood that any clarinet from eBay is in immediately playable condition is close to zero. "
I think that is an overly critical opinion, Ken. Some of us only sell "instantly playable" instruments there.
Bob Draznik
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Author: BobD
Date: 2011-09-06 14:16
"The likelihood that any clarinet from eBay is in immediately playable condition is close to zero. "
I think that is an overly critical opinion, Ken. Some of us only sell "instantly playable" instruments there.
Bob Draznik
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Author: SteveG_CT
Date: 2011-09-06 14:34
Ken Shaw wrote:
> The likelihood that any clarinet from eBay is in immediately
> playable condition is close to zero. They will all need pad
> adjustment and, almost always, fresh pads. Older ones will
> almost always have cracks, particularly at the top of the bell.
>
It all depends on who you are buying from as Bob mentioned. Some sellers guarantee playability while others sell as-is. I've never gotten burned by an instrument where a guarantee was offered. I've gotten burned a few times when buying as-is, but that's the risk you take when trying to get a good deal. Most of the folks selling clarinets as-is on the auction site are not clarinet players and have no idea how to evaluate the condition of the instruments.
Post Edited (2011-09-06 17:41)
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2011-09-06 14:42
Bob Draznik wrote,
>>Some of us only sell "instantly playable" instruments there. >>
Yeah, I'm not wild about a "one size fits all" rule. There's a lot of value in knowing something about the seller, if possible.
Ken wrote,
>Strangely, what you look for is a clarinet that's covered with grime, with no signs of damage, and in an ancient, original case.>
Does sound counter-intuitive, but it's not a bad idea. If the seller's reputation is unknown and we can't inspect the clarinet before buying it, it's safer to buy something we can see is unrestored, because that way we know, going in, that the clarinet will need restoration (and the selling price will need to reflect the cost of restoration). Equally important, we know there's less of a chance that someone's messed up the instrument.
But "less of a chance" doesn't mean "no chance." Once again, the rule isn't infallible. Case in point from just this past weekend: At the Civitan flea market in Arlington, Virginia, a dealer in miscellaneous household stuff offered a pro-quality Leblanc for sale. The case was in shabby condition and looked like the cases from the mid-1960s.
If I'd seen a photo of that clarinet, instead of picking it up and handling it, I might have bought myself a whole lot of trouble. As it was, I examined the instrument, left it there and kept on walking without even asking the price. Why? Because even though the clarinet looked unrestored at a quick glance, someone *had* messed it up, probably many years ago.
The first thing I noticed: All of the metal tenon rings had been glued down and two of them were glued so crookedly that I knew the clarinet wouldn't fit together properly. I couldn't be sure what type of glue the person had used. Could I get those rings off without cracking the wood? Maybe. Maybe not.
Once I spotted that bad glue-job, I looked more closely and noticed a tone-hole with chipped edges. Huh? So I put on my geeky miner's lamp and my reading glasses and looked up inside the bore of each section. Some ignoramus with big ideas and no skills had tried to undercut the tone-holes. The insides of most of the holes were badly chipped and their contours were irregular. There's no way Leblanc in the 1960s let a clarinet out of the factory in that condition.
Humpty Dumpty. Sad.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: Tony F
Date: 2011-09-06 16:33
> The likelihood that any clarinet from eBay is in immediately
> playable condition is close to zero. They will all need pad
> adjustment and, almost always, fresh pads. Older ones will
> almost always have cracks, particularly at the top of the bell.
I also think this is a bit overly critical, although there are certainly instruments like this on EBay. I've bought a number of good instruments from that source that were in first class condition and needed only the right mouthpiece to make them sing. That being said, I always factor in the probability of a repad and recork. Cracks are occasionally present but are by no means universal. A couple of years back I bought an 1895 Jerome Thibouville Lamy for peanuts. It needed a simple key repair and a repad, but it's a superb instrument. I also bought at very low cost a B & H Emperor that looked as though it had been made that morning.
Plastic Bundy's are very tank-like, but I think a Vito or Buescher Aristocrat of almost any vintage can be made into excellent student instruments at very little cost.
Tony F.
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Author: bbrandha
Date: 2012-04-11 15:22
Bringing back an old thread!
What "really old vintage" clarinets do you have? I have 2 now and hope to have a third soon. I am using one of them as my very first restoration project and am assuming it may come apart several times before I'm happy. I also assume some help from a pro, as Youtube videos can only get you so far.
I have a Jean Marbeau Paris stencil with wrap-around octave key I found at a junk shop for $50. It plays beautifully, but the repaired crack as split open and it is now retired.
My project horn is a Chapelaine Paris. The military case that it was in is dated 1893. It had no pads or corks and the barrel was taped on with electrical tape, like a thick black cast. It had also had something spilled on it so that maker's marks and the color of the keys couldn't be seen. It is now beautiful and shiny. I have replaced most pads with cheapo practice pads and recorked 2 joints. I am waiting for more (better) pads and more cork so that I can finish the job. It does have a bent rod that I won't try to fix myself.
I hope to soon have a JTL of unknown, but old, age.
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Author: Bill
Date: 2012-04-13 15:58
50% of my clarinets obtained from auction were somewhat playable, but of course playability is a very refined concept that could, for some people, eliminate even the best new clarinets.
Harold Wright said that clarinets do blow out. But, of course, he was referring to professionals who play for hours on the same clarinet every day. He gave them a decade.
Regards,
Bill.
Bill Fogle
Ellsworth, Maine
(formerly Washington, DC)
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