Author: seabreeze
Date: 2014-05-24 06:07
Hi Tyler,
First, a quick answer. It takes weeks or months to really get to know all the quirks and strengths of any new mouthpiece. Noodling won't tell you much and even playing through an entire concerto won't tell you everything either. But you have to look for the most important features. If the mouthpiece doesn't articulate well, doesn't tune well, doesn't bridge intervals well, and can't begin a tone smoothly and taper up and down to different dynamic levels while retaining a core sound, then you can't use it in an orchestra. Even if makes a tone that would bring tears to an angel's eyes.
You can do more than noodle on any new mouthpiece, but only if you can match a reed to it. Noodling, in fact, merely wastes the time you should be using to really become acquainted with the mouthpiece and its reed requirements. My Jeanjean example was just an extreme way of making this point.
Any clarinetist with a decent assortment of reeds can best find out the characteristics of a new mouthpiece by playing something with STRUCTURE to it. Ralph McLane reportedly tried out new clarinets and mouthpieces by playing nursery rhyme tunes like "Rock A-bye Baby on a Tree Top on them. You can noodle any way you want to but a nursery rhyme demands something more of you than the aimless caprice of noodles. You have to make nice beginnings (entrances) to the tone, play it in tune, phrase it with a certain respect for its melodic and rhythmic contours, and taper off at the end. How well your mouthpiece lets you do this tells you more about its properties than narcissistic rippling through scales. arpeggios, and somebody else's jazz licks.
Even if you want to play heavy metal or the most outre avant guard, those kinds of music have their own structural requirements (multiphonics, percussive articulation) that also require some deliberate attention to more than noodling.
Like anyone else, when first trying a mouthpiece, I will play a few scales, both slurred and articulate. If I get squeaks or whistles, if the resistance is so great the tone is muffled, or it is so lacking in resistance that the sound rattles, then clearly I must try several reeds to see if the fault is in the mouthpiece or the reed. If I can clear up the problem by finding a decent reed match, the next step is to try some passages and etudes most familiar to me to test certain properties of the mouthpiece that are important to orchestral, chamber music, and solo playing more or less in the "classical" style.
Most clarinetists with a few years training and at the high school level or above can play many of the etudes in Polatschek's Advanced Studies. They do not have to be played at a fast pace to test the mouthpiece. Study #1, based on J.S. Bach, is a wonderful test of the "cushion" that a mouthpiece has in making legato connections between the notes. Playing this etude very slowly and taking care to be a legato as possible will stress the embouchure enough to know if the mouthpiece is difficult to play. If it leaves the performer exhausted that may mean the reed needs to be thinned to accomodate it, or perhaps the mouthpiece is just more resistant than the player should play. The player needs at the very least to make a note of this characteristic of the mouthpiece and keep it in mind.
One of the reasons I don't play mouthpieces with facings wider than about 1.06 mm is that in 50 years of playing I've never been able to make them feel comfortable precisely when I play long legato passages like those in Polatschek #1. I've tried every possible reed combination but my own lips and lungs like smaller openings by far (0.96 to 1.05). Noodling, I would never have discovered this. I can blast away most contentedly on a Vandoren B40, B45, or B40 lyre. playing the highest C and wailing on the Rhapsody in Blue Cadenza, but I can't can't make those mouthpieces ride a silky path through the Polatschek #1 the way I do on a Vandoren M14 or a Grabner G11*, or a Behn Artist (0.98 mm facing). So, I conclude that those wider facings are just not right for me, though they may be perfect for others.
Just because mouthpieces are different doesn't mean you can't find out their most salient features in a relatively short time. Let's look at some mouthpieces I have on my desk that I am either reasonably happy or very happy to play. I still remember my first impressions for most of these and of course after playing them for some time I have more deeply ingrained impressions.
The Zinner-Based Group
These tend to have a darker, more covered sound that many other models and do not emphasize a strong focus point. My Mo-Ba Camerata is open just 0.99 at the tip. It plays easily on many brands of reeds, usually #3 strength.
I can play all the way through the Polatchek #1 on this with a smooth legato and still feel quite fresh.
Next, my Kessler/Backun II with a 1.06 tip. Right away, I sensed the power of this one, which is capable of playing a wider dynamic range than the Mo-Ba Camerata. I have to thin the reed a little to accomodate the more open tip. This one also gets me through the Polatchek #1 smoothly but with a bit more edge on the tone and leaves me a little more weary. I knew right away that if I am feeling very energetic, The Keller/Backun II is fine. If I want to lay back a little, the Mo-Ba Camerata is better.
The Walt Grabner G11*. This one has a tip opening of 1.02. It got me through the Polatschek #1 the first time, very smoothly with a very dark sound. This Zinner-based piece does not incorporate the tonal edge of the Kessler/Backun II or the Mo-Ba Camerata. That means you have to find a very vibrant reed to focus the really chocolately tone. Vandoren V-12s do the job. When I tried other demanding excerpts, I sensed that I could really "paint" the tone on this one but if my mind wandered a little it might go out of focus. Still, if anything, this is my favorite of the three Zinner-based pieces and I am willing to work a little harder to voice the tone and exploit its possibilities for richness.
next, Brad Behn's Artist Model 0.98 mm. facing, on a Behn rubber blank.
This is very different from the 3 Zinner-based models above. Behn gave me a heads up that I should use an AW 3 on these, and I settled on the 301 cut. If the Zinners are like chocolate or dark chocolate, this one is like a little laser light. When I first played through the Polatschek #1, the Behn got me through, making the legato intervals in a very lean and sculpted way, like a greyhound. You can sense the steel-like frame on each note, holding the tone together. Very focused and taut, the sound would still have center, I think, even if I dozed off a little while playing. I knew all this after playing it for just a few minutes, and several months playing it have just deepened by impressions but not changed my opinion much.
So the very different Grabner G11* and Behn Artist Model have become my two working mouthpieces. I have to change reeds and even mindset to switch from one to the other, but I think that is giving my embouchure more flexibility then ever. Both make soft entrances, are easy to articulate on, bridge wide intervals smoothly, and let you play for extended periods without undue fatigue. The sound is the last thing I look for. There is an objective standard to dynamics, pitch, and articulation. Sound or timbre is much more subjective. The Grabner G11* and the Behn Artist don't sound much alike. but I like both sounds and both can accommodate a wide range of musical genres. I may find a third fasvorite mouthpiece with yet another timbre, but I won't choose it if it doesn't get me through the Polatschek (or the equally excellent Alfred Prinz Twenty-Five Etudes) and my favorite test orchestral excerpts.
No, you don't need the hardest etude in Jeanjean to choose a mouthpiece. A careful playing through sections of the Mozart Concerto would make you "demand" something real and musical from the mouthpiece just as well.
Post Edited (2014-05-24 07:59)
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