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Re: a new metal ligature

Author: Bob Bernardo
Date: 2018-07-02 02:05

This is a really great topic.

Actually the table of pretty much all commercial bought mouthpieces are not flat so they put on something called French curves. To prove this out you can take the backside of sandpaper such as 3M that has a wax coating and a glass surface to assure flatness and take a few swipes and then look at the table of the mouthpiece. You should see shinny marks and dull marks. The dull marks are a clear indication of where the table is not flat. This of course effects the the reeds play. You haven't damaged the mouthpiece as this was wax from the sandpaper. You can also use an index card too if you wish. The shinny spots only show where the high spots of the mouthpieces are high. the dull spots show where the mouthpiece is not level. I repeat, you can't hurt the mouthpiece. The table was already screwed up!

Fixing this should go to a very qualified refacer and or mouthpiece maker. There are a mess of mouthpiece refacers but only a few can make or put on a flat table. Most of the really good ones use special tools and techniques. I use parallel bars and 10,000 grit sandpaper sometimes. Yes most people have never heard of 10,000 grit sandpaper, but that's often what it takes. The bars let you see light through the holes in the table. This is surely why commercial mouthpieces don't work. No one is educated enough to know the needs and values of such details as a flat table. So if the table isn't flat the rails will have flat spots on them. This sucks because reeds have curves. So the rails should curve as well.

Ligatures are so important. Prices can cost from nothing to $900. What you are looking for is that ligature which allows the reed to speak in all of the registers, have a warm sound, lot's of freedom, it can be metal, it can be rubber, or a combination of both, which I use. I strongly feel the ligature should be light weight, the cost to satisfy your needs will probably cost under $75, maybe as little as $25. But maybe something around $200? We are all different. Mine cost pennies as I got a metal ligature and gutting out most of the metal and added some tiny rubber strips using contact cement. Total cost was about $3 including the contact cement. To get the German feel of string I glued pieces of shoelaces to the ligature, but I didn't like the sound and the articulation. The rubber was much harder, so I went with the hard rubber. I found that soft rubber deadens the sound. So there is this happy medium.

So not only is the mouthpiece table and facing critically important so is the ligature you decide on. It can really help with your sound and your articulation, as well as confidence when asked to play pieces such as Mendelsohn's 4th, and many other pieces.

To help find that great ligature practice the G scale or F scale (Major) and learn to play them 3 octaves slurring and articulating. When trying out mouthpieces and ligatures you should be able to feel the freedom of a good one and the stuffiness of another one. Also don't be shy to ask a fellow player in a band or orchestra to try their ligatures.

Designer of - Vintage 1940 Cicero Mouthpieces and the La Vecchia mouthpieces

Yamaha Artist 2015

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