Reed Shaving Experiment – with nail file

[john]

I’ ve just shaved 11 reeds with a nail file after soaking them for 3 mins after they dried out (some of them were mouldy – tip dont store them in plastic bags when they are damp). if i say R for rico, RR for rico royal & V for vandirin. I’ve got one R3, three RR2.5, three RR2, one RR1.5, one R2, one V2, and one V1.5.
I broke 2 reeds – RR2.5 & R2.
of the rest i ended up with 4 good reeds : R3, RR2.5, R2, V1.5. These are good because with the mouthpiece in exactly the same position for all the reeds tested they were the only ones closely in tune on the tuner , the other 5 were way out on the tuner. Also these were the only 4 i could get an altissimo G on.

[john]

Good lesson there. Some people just open a box and expect the reed to play…even worse, many beginners will only buy 2 or 3 reeds at a time… what if those were the worse reeds from that box? There goes a few weeks or months of some grueling practice sessions.

[john]

Yes i’m definitely going to buy a box of reeds next time. its a toss up between vandorin 1.5, Rico 2 or RicoRoyal 1.5! and i also need to invest in a reed case as well to hold the good ones.

[john]

I just keep em in the little individual plastic cases they come it…the Vandoren’s that is.

[john]

yeah i could that, i’d just have to mark the plastic cases with the good reeds in with a felt tip.

[Author]

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