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Re: shaper tips

Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2005-07-12 14:12

Here's a great posting from the IDRS board, by Kate Eakin, Mechlin Reeds in Montreal:

Last summer I spent some time comparing shaper tips. For reference, I play a Loree Royale oboe, and I use Pisoni tubes. Just in case you're not familiar with one or the other, the Royale gives more back pressure than any other oboe I've ever tried, except a Laubin, and Pisoni tubes are relatively wide. It makes a difference in terms of what shape you might try.

I used the Jeanne tip for many years, but I have now found several tips that suit me better. My main finding was that the low notes articulated far better with a change in the diameter of the throat. That said, what I liked about the Jeanne was that it was easy to make a relatively free-flowing reed without having to take off a ton of cane. For that reason, it was good for me before I developed substantial lung capacity and while I was learning the basics of reeds.

I found the Samson +1 to get a similar sound - actually with a few more overtones - and to articulate much better below low G. However, I still couldn't quite get it up to pitch in the middle of summer when everything swells, so I got a custom made Samson [no numbers after]. Mr. Morley at Adam will do such custom work for a few extra bucks.

At the same time, I also tried a Joshua, which is incredibly stable because it's so parallel. It's a piece of cake to make something that plays exactly in tune over the whole range of the instrument. However, your tip finishing has to be perfect in order to get a warm sound out of it. It tends a bit toward the nasal, and it took me quite awhile to figure out how to handle that. Using a heavy gouge helps, but then you end up taking a lot off the rails in the heart. Presently, I am using the Joshua for other reasons - it's a whole lot easier to play at 442, should you be required to do so. Once I finally got the hang of the necessary tip work, I found that I actually get more sparkle in the upper notes with this shape than either of the other two mentioned.

Recently, just for kicks, I tried the Joshua +2. There's a lot to like about it, since it offers the stability of the Joshua with an inherently darker sound - it doesn't take as much work to get lower overtones. But the top notes don't sparkle as much as the regular Joshua. For me, the real temptation with this tip is that it allows me to play the oboe more like the English horn, in terms of how much reed I take, as well as general construction of the scrape with a shorter tip and thicker heart. I do a fair bit of doubling, so I could foresee this being desirable in the future, but I'm not quite ready to bite on it.

A few other things I've tried: Caleb -1: This is what my previous teacher, Nancy Ambrose King plays on. It's a moderately flared shape. I can't get anything decent out of it, and she agreed that I should give up on it for myself. I suspect it's incompatible with my tubes, since she uses the far narrower Sierra and/or Chudnow tubes. I know plenty of people who love it, it just doesn't work for me.

Weber 1-A: Favored by my present prof here in Montreal. This is a similar curve to the Joshua, taken one step further--it's about as wide as a matchstick. I never figured out how to take enough cane off to get the thing to vibrate as much as I'd like, but stability is the word, and I think it has potential. I'll probably experiment with it further at some point.

I'd also really like to try David Weber's wider tips [1-B and 1-C], but no one [including Mr. Weber] has had them available when I've tried to get them. I guess they only make a batch every so often. So, if you're interested, perhaps you should order shaped cane. Ruth -2: Incredibly wide and flared. I couldn't get anything up to pitch. Gilbert -1: Similar to Samson at the throat, but more parallel sooner toward the top, so it's in between the Samson and Joshua in terms of its properties.

If you want to further research comparative measurements, I'd recommend Brian Moses's web site through the University of Kentucky. Just Google it.

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