Author: OboePrince
Date: 2015-01-28 05:13
I play on this very instrument myself.
I love the sound of the horn. I have had to use a plastic Fox when mine was getting aligned, and you can warm it up faster because plastic barely needs warming up at all.
The RIEC is a beautiful instrument. I would warn you, however (even though every oboe is different, so mine might be a lot different, but for me) the oboe is about a half inch longer than most other oboes, and it has a larger bore. I think it's both good and bad. You can play with a lot of resonance and a really nice sound on the horn. However, where most oboes ride a little sharp, this one sits flat in most of its tendencies, so in your reedmaking, you need to be aware of that and tune the reeds a tiny bit higher. Maybe 5 cents. Or tell your reedmaker.
Another problem with the horn is that it will accept more air than an oboe should allow, which is actually nice for a lot of the notes, especially the half hole notes are beautiful, but it allows you to play louder and brighter than you should, so YOU have to be conscious of how much air you are moving through the reed, because this oboe won't do it for you. It is only of medium resistance, which I prefer to low or high resistance oboes, but you have to be in control on your air, because your instrument won't do it for you, and if you overblow, you will run flatter than all holy hell.
Hope this helps! I love my RIEC. It's hard to say whether or not I liked it more than my Covey. Different animal. It has a bigger sound, and overall more resonance, but if you push too much air, bright and flat. The covey would never do that, it had so much resistance that I would just turn red in the face, it refused to accept my overblowing. Actually I loved the tone on that thing, and it was a professional model (where as a RIEC is a "Collegiate" model) but it was from the late 70's and didn't have some of the keys I actually NEEDED (such as the right Ab, but screw that third octave key, I don't need that, I used to play flute) so the RIEC has been a BEAUTIFUL replacement for him, and it is SO different from a Loree, which I love, because I don't like their horns. (I know I'm not the only one, but I'm in the minority.)
I just think Loree's scream. Brightly. Projection at the cost of timbre.
Anyway, RIEC is a great investment. It's a really good oboe. Mine is 10 years old and can still sing even better than if she were new.
Hope this was informative.
American Oboist. I currently play on a Rigoutat Riec. She is beautiful.
|
|
The Oboe BBoard
.jpg){kind=small}
