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Re: What was so special about Chedeville mouthpieces?

Author: Bob Bernardo
Date: 2019-12-17 22:41

To this very day, I feel they remain the best ever. We can't forget about Iggie Gennusa who many feel had the very best sound ever. There are others of course that had incredible sounds such as Harold Wright, and Bob Marcellus, but Bob played on Kaspar's. The first Kaspar's were actually Ched's that Kaspar refaced and thinned the rail thicknesses a tad. Sometimes the rails were too thin causing reed tips to squeak.

There are a few players that sound very good, but another problem is the change in design Buffet did to their R13's. Known as the Golden Era. So the sound these masters got was a combination of the mouthpiece and the Golden Era Buffet horns.

Today, I feel the Yamaha CSVR horns are very close to that old Buffet sound, but just close.

The Chedeville's today are not the same. Horrible in comparison. I have a few old Ched's and Kaspar's. People that copy these have failed. I won't say who these people are. I've tried pretty much all of the copies, The measurements are not even close to these old mouthpiece measurements. It's actually a shame that these people claim to have copied these old Ched mouthpieces. They shouldn't advertise and say that. But I guess false advertising is legal. The best Kaspar mouthpieces came from Cicero, a city just outside of Chicago. Some of the Chicago Kaspar's were also very good as these were also Ched's, but not all of them. The worst made were the Ann Arbor Kaspars. The baffles are too shallow.

I don't think it is the rubber, because of testing rubber for about 40 years. However, this rubber is special and it's still available. But it's not what makes these so great, it's again the measurements.

Rumors are some of the older mouthpieces from Buffet and other companies were Chedeville's. From my research and also from buying a lot of mouthpieces, this is not true. I haven't found any mouthpieces that are truly Ched's.

You also have to have a very keen eye for these Chedeville's. A lot of them were never stamped. Yet others had an 8 marked in the botton right side, but if you look closely the 8 are actually a C and inverted C, so they look like an 8! These are the only markings on these mouthpieces.

People can write to me with questions. My goal is to protect people from spending 1000's of dollars on a FAKE!

Last comment - There were 2 types of Chedeville's. The Charles Chedeville and the Henri Chedeville. Both mouthpieces were from the same mold. The Henri Ched's sometimes get a higher price, but this is due to his limited production.

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

Yamaha Artist 2015

Post Edited (2019-12-17 22:46)

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