While making reeds…

I watch TV. Sports are always good. Reality shows are usually fine too. I’d probably get more out of audio books, but TV is more available.

And since I make a lot of reeds, I’ve watched a lot of TV. All of the American Idol seasons. Eli Stone. Desperate Housewives. New Amsterdam. Chuck. Project Runway. Prison Break. Rome. First 7 seasons of CSI. Then sometimes I download some oldies. Wonder Years. Twin Peaks. Nowadays, I have found that Netflix has online movies/tv shows you can watch via streaming! Currently I’m watching Quantum Leap season 4. What a great show, eh? Ranks right up there with the Wonder Years for me.

I know the standard rule is most people listen to music while making reeds but does anyone else do something different? Anyone have suggestions of movies/tv shows for me to watch? Most of the good TV shows (Lost, 24) I take the time to actually sit down and watch it.

Oh yeah, foreign films don’t work so well. Too many subtitles to read while concentrating on a reed.

Update

Well, my summer plans have been going down the drain quickly.

Things didn’t work out for me to go down to Arizona. We crunched all of the numbers, and financially we just couldn’t make up the big difference, so I’m still stuck here in Oregon.

I was still going to meet the Webers in Utah for the IDRS convention, play on the masterclasses and work at their booth, but now they themselves are not planning on going due to some last minute family difficulties! So now it looks as though I might not even make it to IDRS.

I’m taking two classes here at the UofOregon, trying to blast out some of my requirements to leave more time during the school year for playing/practicing. They’re sucking up all of my time and energy.

I am backed up on reed orders. After returning from Seattle a week ago, I got a horrible canker sore in my mouth, too painful to play and make reeds, that that set me back a ways. I’ll be catching up on those this weekend.

Seattle was great. Adam and I had a great time at his house and he loved the reeds I brought him. My best reeds seem to be coming from my Brannen X shape, and he ordered 8 more. Meanwhile, he has an Udo Heng profiling machine that he’s trying to get a new profile based upon my scrape. If we’re able to get a good one, I will definitely be investing in one myself. I recently spoke to a music store in the Seattle area looking to replace their reed supplier, now that Jones is in legal trouble and last we heard is at least 8 months or so from production.

I also spent a good amount of time with Laila Storch at her house, asking and getting supplementary information that was not completely clarified in her book. She confirmed a lot of theories I had, and gave me  good direction in my research.

One book discussed in my Music of the Romantic Era class is the Whig Interpretation of History which basically states that it is difficult for one to recollect and document history, because man’s tendency is to take the evidence (quotes, facts, etc) out of its original context to fit their specific argument. Ms. Storch agreed with this theory, and noted that she didn’t think she was the right person to write the book, namely because she felt she was “too close to the action” to give an unbiased opinion. I find this very relevant to my research with Tabuteau, and we discussed how difficult it is for someone of my generation to discover “the real Tabuteau” since there’s been so many of his students who teach different sounds, styles, playing, concepts of air, tonguing, and reedmaking. With everyone running around saying “this is what Tabuteau taught…” to lend creedance their style of playing, it’s practically impossible for I to find the “true Tabuteau”. That said, tne thing she did state was that I was right to listen to de Lancie. As she put it, “He probably got the most complete picture, but not the intensity in the upper register that Tabuteau had.”

Back to writing this paper. These classes are killing me.

MQOD

“There is so much talk about music, and so little is said. I believe that words are not at all up to it, and if I should find that they were adequate I would stop making music altogether.”

-Felix Mendelssohn, Berlin, October 15, 1842

Funny how some things don’t change much.

Catching Up Now that School is Out

Well, with the reed sale, orders are coming in and I’m getting a bit busier again. My first year is finally over, and while I don’t feel like I’ve improved a huge amount, I’ve been told by the faculty that I made great strides.

I was debating it, and now… I did it. I pulled my gouging machine blade and sharpened it. It’s always a bit nerve-racking pulling the blade and sharpening it because you don’t know if your curve will be the same, and it always takes 20 or 30 pieces to get the setting back. Oh well, it’s a good thing I have a free day!

Summer Reed Sale!

Ever want to try my reeds but didn’t have the courage? Well, my reeds will be going UP soon, (www.CooperWrightReeds.com) so now I’m marking my prices down $2 a reed. Now is the time to put in an order! Write me if you would like more information.

Old, OLD Loree pics

Some nice chips out of the top… interesting reed well.

Trill keys look similar. The modern upper trill key extends further up.

Toneholes are in immaculate condition. Notice the itty bitty half-whole key.

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Ab key hugs the trill key rod much closer. It’s also shorter and more curved.

Interesting trill key there. It’s an entirely new (or rather old) hole!

No, your eyes are not playing tricks on you. The old instrument (on the right) really is that much thinner than my CL Loree (and C series instruments are that much thinner than modern instruments).

I love that itty bitty half hole key. Notice the difference in distances between the holes.

Even more of a difference in distance between the A and the G key!

Maybe they had itty bitty thumbs back then too…

The usual no adjustment screw on the F#-G# bridge.

Notice the lack of posts in this area. Unlike modern oboes, The open ring D is also connected to the E key and the F# resonance key. The E key is part of the same hinge.

Naturally, no F resonance (as Tabuteau would have wanted it!)

The bell was missing its ring. No doubt the wood had shrunk leaving the ring loose to fall off.

The grains on this piece of wood are gorgeous.

Somehow I got the feeling the instrument had been on a shelf in an attic for a long time…

A REALLY long time…

Notice the difference in grain pattern and texture between the bell/middle joint as opposed to the top joint. I believe the middle joint and bell to be palisander, while the top joint to be grenadilla.

And then… my camera battery died. :(

Tabuteau quote:

He said I was working, but on the wrong track - that once in awhile we all get on the wrong path. He didn’t blow up and tell me to quit but just said, “Don’t worry, in a hundred years all your troubles will be over.”

-Laila Storch, Marcel Tabuteau

Old, OLD Loree.

Well, it finally arrived.

The instrument arrived today. I unwrapped it and immediately checked the serials. The top joint was marked O67, the bell marked A74, and the middle joint with no number at all.

That’s right. the bell is marked A74, as in the 74th oboe Loree ever made! Although the middle joint wasn’t marked, the unique staining and color along with the grain pattern leads me to believe that it is the same instrument as the bell. These joints definitely do not appear to be grenadilla, but rather palisander or some other rosewood. Meanwhile, I need to write to Loree to ask what year O67 might be. It seems to be grenadilla wood, and perhaps if the original A74 was made out of pallisander, it would have more easily cracked to pieces, and been replaced by the O67 topjoint.

What is perhaps most amazing is the fact that the instrument is not cracked, all of the keys move and work fine, and the joints even get some suction! I can play an entire scale on it! Talk about historical finds!

Confession time

Well, it’s been almost 4 months now, so I figured I’ll ‘fess up.

Barbara the oboe is long gone. I had a crisis of conscience whether to change the name of my blog, but ultimately I decided against it. I just got too frustrated playing on a Royal and feeling restricted, so I switched to a DM bore (one that I mentioned back in November or December or so) from Peter Hurd. That instrument played exceptionally, and had a nice, dark, covered sound to it. I played the Strauss on it for the Concerto Final Rounds.

And finally, when I needed to get it fixed and Peter lent me the C series, I fell in love with that one. I gave the DM bore back to Peter (which if I was completely certain I wanted to play a modern instrument, that would be it) and kept the C series for myself. David Weber says some qualities about CI72 are even better than his own. Adam Shapiro commented that it was a “good instrument” but too bright for him, but I find that it has more flexibility than any instrument I’ve ever played. After trying it, Christina, my surprise visitor from Portland who came down for my recital, commented “…all I could think about on the drive home was how responsive that C series was.” She also commented that she could play bright, and she could play dark, and everywhere in between, which is exactly how I feel about it.

So, where is Barbara might you be asking? I gave it to Hannah Selznick of Hannah’s oboes to sell. She’s had it for about two months now, and she commented to me that the oboe selling business was in a slight slump (she speculated perhaps because people were paying their taxes) but now it is picking back up so we’re hopeful. It’s a great Royal, with a plastic top joint. TOTALLY FIXED UP by David Weber. And here’s a final bonus in case one of you readers decide to buy it: I’ll make 3 reeds a month for free to whomever purchases it! I haven’t told Hannah that bonus yet, but I promise I’ll keep my word!

On the upside, I’ve had several people recently tell me how much better they like my reeds nowadays. The C series is a brighter instrument, and is much more sensitive to “chirps” and “buzzes”, so I really do have to refine my reeds much more, so I suppose this makes sense. But I’m glad the switch in instruments is yielding better results for business.

Post recital withdrawal and future plans.

Rachel once wrote about life after recital, and I have to agree. Some come up to you and ask “How do you feel?” while others talk about how much more relaxing life must be. Still, the majority are still asking me, “So, when is your recital again?” Oops.

It’s hard to believe that the whole thing is done with, and it’s been even harder to motivate myself to practice. But I found a way. IDRS accepted me to play on a masterclass, and I chose the David Weiss orchestral excerpts masterclass (well, actually my professor kind of pointed me in that direction.) Prof. Schuring is teaching a masterclass on Baroque music, but I think my professor still wants to push me beyond my comfort level, and so she basically told me to sign up for that one.

So I’m doing Le Tombeau, Don Juan, and Mendelssohn 3rd symphony for my excerpts. Scary stuff, and to think that it will be video recorded, and then streamed on the IDRS convention website means that whatever I do, however I do it, it will be available for all to see and hear. *GULP!* That’s enough motivation right there to get my rear end back into the practice room FAST.

Le Tombeau is such a toughy for me. That little run on the bottom of the 2nd page in the 1st movement freaks me out. Do people hold down the left hand Eb throughout most of that passage (on the forked Fs) or do you actually release the Eb for each forked F? Wouldn’t it just be easier to play left hand F?

I read in the Tabuteau book this evening that the Tabuteau model of oboe is one that has no F resonance, but does have a left F. He thought forked F was “the most beautiful note on the oboe” and had color advantages when decrescendoing, which the latter I would agree with if it didn’t have a F resonance. This was one of the reasons I had it blocked off on my Royal, but now I’m playing on the C series so there’s no way to close it off. Perhaps I’ll try to attach a screw to do this when I begin work with Mr. Weber.

In any event, I have two months to get these excerpts up REALLY good before IDRS.

I’m still planning on leaving for Arizona in late June, going through SF, down through Santa Barbara, and through LA before cutting over to Phoenix. Anyone along that route care to meet up? I’d like to take my time and meet other oboists along the way.