The Clarinet BBoard

Pay it forward....sorta

Author: JJAlbrecht  Date:   2010-04-23 19:46 Last weekend, I was going through a junk drawer and throwing things out. I came across a sealed box of Mitchell Lurie Premium 3.5 reeds and most of a box of V12 #3 reeds, both which are a tad soft for me. I bought them ages ago, wwhen I had just resumed playing. Well, there's a new guy sitting in my section in our adult community band, who is now just returning to to playing the instrument after a number of years. Rather than can the reeds, I brought them to our last concert on Sunday, and gave them to him. I got a nice e-mail back the other day. He told me the new reeds have already made an improvement in his sound. He was playing a little too soft of a reed, and these are better suited to him. It felt good to do something so simple that substantially helped a fellow clarinetist. Jeff

Reply To Message

Re: Pay it forward....sorta

Author: GBK  Date:   2010-04-23 20:13 About 15 years ago I was asked by the conductor of the local community band to come and sit in to help the struggling clarinet and sax players. The band is made up of mostly retired adults who played their instruments many years ago in school and have now resumed playing for the joy of making music. I would often sit in the 3rd clarinet section and help the adult clarinet players with their rhythm and fingering difficulites. Some times I would bring an alto sax and help an 80 year old widowed gentleman who was a member of the band for 50 (!) years. Not a great player, but very devoted to the band - week after week. He would come to rehearsal in an old, beat-up automobile, play on a 3rd hand alto sax which was in dire need of repair, and would often not even have an unbroken reed for rehearsal. Feeling sorry for him, I would occasionally take his sax, do a minor repair and bring him a few new reeds from time to time. When Ralph (the 80 year old) sax player finally passed away at the age of 90, he left the community band a gift of $750,000. Today, the band, with his generous gift has bought much needed supplies and established a yearly music scholarship in his name for high school kids studying music in college. Obviously, the band was Ralph's entire life and he wanted to repay the group for all the pleasure it gave him. If I knew he was secretly that wealthy, I would have at least charged him for the reeds (Just kidding....) ...GBK

Reply To Message

Re: Pay it forward....sorta

Author: skygardener  Date:   2010-04-24 06:08 GBK worte; " play on a 3rd hand alto sax which was in dire need of repair, and would often not even have an unbroken reed for rehearsal. Feeling sorry for him, I would occasionally take his sax, do a minor repair and bring him a few new reeds from time to time. When Ralph (the 80 year old) sax player finally passed away at the age of 90, he left the community band a gift of $750,000." This makes me wonder how much money we are all spending on reeds!!

Reply To Message

Avail. Forums  |  Need a Login? Register Here

User Login  User Name:  Password:  Remember my login:

Forgot Your Password? Enter your email address or user name below and a new password will be sent to the email address associated with your profile.