 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2006-11-30 15:59
$500 for mediocre-playing olive-green old Kaspar clarinet mouthpieces? Happens every week on The Dreaded Internet Auction Site Whose Name Shall Not Be Mentioned......
People's purchase choices often make little sense from a practical standpoint.
Remind me again, how much did Elvis' old underwear go for?
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Author: Alseg
Date: 2006-11-30 16:59
Ah, but it was once owned by member of the Sears and Roebuck family (Mr. Adler).
Can Craftsman(R) bows be far behind?
BTW the woodworkers bulletin board refers to the post-1960s brand or tools (other than the made in USA socket wrenches) as "Crapsman."
We need a new anagram for the evil auction spot.
How about Evil Addictive Board of Yuckies.
OTOH I have gotten some great stuff at bargain rates there, and sold some nice items, too....but denegration is all in fun.
Former creator of CUSTOM CLARINET TUNING BARRELS by DR. ALLAN SEGAL
-Where the Sound Matters Most(tm)-
Post Edited (2006-11-30 16:59)
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Author: L. Omar Henderson
Date: 2006-11-30 19:15
The only reason to pay more than 10 cents for a used reed of some famous player might be to extract the DNA from the embedded skin cells and clone -say Benny Goodman, Benede, etc. --- now there is a thought!
L. Omar Henderson
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Author: sherman
Date: 2006-11-30 19:49
I find the analogy between a Tourte bow and an old reed to be a non-starter;nor is a Kaspar mouthpiece, for there is no better retelling of "The Emporer's New Clothes" than the mouthpiece game, or the Grenadilla game, or the furniture game. Enjoy, but please let us not for one minute, believe.
Sherman Friedland
Post Edited (2006-11-30 19:52)
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Author: Alseg
Date: 2006-11-30 20:45
Attachment: Sears Craftsman bow.JPG (4k)
I just got home from Sears, and yes they DO have a Craftman bow.
I tried it.....now how do I get the two pieces of the violin back together?
Glue, Pins?
Former creator of CUSTOM CLARINET TUNING BARRELS by DR. ALLAN SEGAL
-Where the Sound Matters Most(tm)-
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Author: David Peacham
Date: 2006-11-30 22:18
The strangest thing about the desire of string players to play Strads and the like, is that they are not playing the instruments as Stradivari built them.
These instruments were built in the decades around 1700, when the violin was what we now know as a baroque violin. The instruments were subsequently converted as violin design changed.
Money and fame in violin playing is still as a soloist with a large orchestra, or as the leader of an orchestra or quartet, so this is still the form in which Strads are played.
If you want to hear the sound Stradivari heard, you need to listen to a baroque violin - which is likely to be the product of a lesser maker or a modern copy.
I'm not aware of any Strad that has survived in its original form, or been converted back - but I suspect there are some. Anybody know?
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If there are so many people on this board unwilling or unable to have a civil and balanced discussion about important issues, then I shan't bother to post here any more.
To the great relief of many of you, no doubt.
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Author: C2thew
Date: 2006-12-01 03:55
and for $50,000 more, you can buy something more practical!
Look here
Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. they are but improved means to an unimproved end, an end which was already but too easy to arrive as railroads lead to Boston to New York
-Walden; Henry Thoreau
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Author: cuscoclarinet
Date: 2006-12-01 17:19
I may be in the business of reeds, but as my girlfriend is a violin maker, I feel I have to put in my 2.c worth.
The fact of the matter is, while it may seem extreme to pay $200,000 for what seems essentially a stick and some horse hair to the average clarinet player, this is common amongst string players and for good reason.
Lets just start with the fact that these instruments are hand made of rare materials. A quality bow takes about a month to make, must be made from wood that has aged for many years, must be of a certain cut from a log that produces much waste, and that log, often times today, must be salvaged as there are roughly 1500 pernambuco trees left in the world today.
I know, many of you are thinking "why don't they just start plantation growing the way they do grenadilla" they do, the only problem is while a grenadilla tree can be harvested 50 years from the time it is a sapling and make a perfectly good clarinet, pernambuco trees take roughly 150 years to mature.
"Why don't they use a different cut of the log?" they can't. Due to the way that a bow is made (a straight piece of wood that is shaped then bent into the correct shape) if anything other than a quarter sawn piece is used it would not last a single season before being out of shape beyond use.
Think that clarinets come from a specific cut of aged wood? Well, they don't; of the dozens of clarinets that have been in my ownership, they seem to all have been from different cuts of the tree, and the fact that so many wooden clarinets split in the first couple years of play is proof positive that the wood is not aged as long as it could have been (aging wood "settles" it into a form, the longer it ages, the more stable it is once it's cut).
Now let's talk about quality of workmanship. Francios Tourte is considered to be amongst the best bow makers in history. Yes, it is possible to buy a bow for a couple hundred dollars that is perfectly good, but by that argument, why don't you throw out your $3000 Buffet and get a good $300 Yamaha? Because the quality of craftsmanship of the Buffet is better! Do I really need to argue that one further?
Let's take a look at rarity. How much do you think you'd pay for a clarinet hand-built by Henri Selmer or Georges LeBlanc? Probably close to the same amount. Should you find such an instrument with a complete history and proof that it was not misrepresented, I'm sure of it. How many of you own such an instrument? Probably few if any, but if you could afford it, and if it were available, wouldn't you?
As for originality, yes, many violins get altered (bows never do except in extreme repair cases) but if you had a clarinet with a grenadilla mouthpiece and cork pads, wouldn't you run out to get a new B40 and some good double bladders? Also take into account that most alterations to violins are in the form of repairs. Does pinning a crack drasticly alter the sound of a clarinet? Why do so many players like Strads and Guarneris ? Because they are amongst the finest violins ever made! By comparison even the best Buffets and Selmers are not in the same class. Do all violinsts want to play them? Of course! If you're going to argue the difference in tone between two similar clarinets with different key plating, you're at least that critical!
Mr. Peacham points out that the violins of Strad's time are barouque, however, this is quite incorrect. While the music of the period is baroque music, the violins of the time are all but identical to modern instruments. As proof, walk into a violin shop and ask them how many copies of Strad's designs they have; you may be surprised to find that most of them even have a "Stad" label inside!. Granted, at the time tuning was to A435 as opposed to A440, but unlike a wind instrument which cannot be tuned out by 5 full cycles, a violin easily could. The predecessor to the modern violin, the "viol da gamba", is a different instrument in construction, appearance, and sound, but if we want to talk about those, we must compare them to thier wind counterparts, the chalemeu and taragoto.
One last point before closing, comparing a reed to a bow is even more extreme than apples and oranges. Most of us get 20 good hours out of an average reed before throwing it away. The average violinist will buy two or three good bows in his lifetime! A better comparison would be reeds and bow hair, which is far less resilient than the bow itself. The price of a good re-hair is about six times the price of a good reed. However, as opposed to 120 hours of play (six times the average life of a reed), a violinist will get closer to 300!
So look, I may be ranting here, sorry if I am. Please though, let's not knock someone for doing something that to us seems silly and extravagant. Especialy considering how many of us will pay $20 for a piece of webbing and two steel posts (Rovner ligatures) $100-200 for a piece of plastic (all sorts of mouthpieces) or thousands of dollars for a piece of wood with some metal thingies on it (what a violin player would NEVER consider a clarinet to be), and those are the prices NEW!
Post Edited (2006-12-02 16:14)
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2006-12-01 20:32
cuscoclarinet -
It was a joke. Or at least intended as one. ![[grin]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie5.gif)
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