So I did it. I got a new instrument. I went to University Music in Lowell and played all of the R13 clarinets they had in stock. For those clarinet non-aficionados in my (assumed) limited readership, an R13 is the basic professional model clarinet of French clarinet manufacturer Buffet-Crampon.
It took me two hours. I tried them in groups of three. I picked one from the first group, one from the second group, none from the third, and two from the fourth. Then I took advantage of the music store owner's offer to help me choose one. We eliminated the clarinets from the first two groups pretty quickly, and thus had to decide which from the last group would be the winner and which the runner-up.
It was a hard choice; both instruments had a very good scale (were well in-tune with themselves), and both had an overall gorgeous tone. In the end, I ended up deciding based on the fact that one of them had a scale ever so slightly more in tune than the other, combined with a slight advantage of evenness of tone between registers. The trade-off with this instrument (the one I chose) was that its tone was just a tad brighter than the other. Regardless, the tone of this (now my) instrument is still beautiful and robustly clarinetty. I will just have to make a couple minor adjustments in my playing, mouthpiece, and/or barrel to keep it dark.
It turns out that choosing a new clarinet happened to be a very important and therapeutic experience for a couple reasons, but more on that later. I have a concert to play in less than two hours.
1 comment:
i'm glad you got a new clarinet.
and there are a few tricks to make your blog look awesome. i can help, if you want. :)
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