Playing the oboe isn’t easy. Reedmaking isn’t always easy either. So how do you stay focused and know if you are really making progress, or just spinning your wheels? It’s funny, because this is something I always notice in hindsight. Usually at the time in question, I either feel incredibly overworked or just plain discouraged. I feel like I am trying hard, but not getting anywhere. It happened a lot…
One of the most common mistakes made by young oboists (and maybe old oboists too) is playing on oboe reeds that are just too heavy for that particular player. I’ve been there, and I have certainly done that. And I saw many of my colleagues struggle with the same issue, especially when we were in school. It’s really easy to do when all you listen to is other oboists, day…
Scraping an oboe reed blank is a little like creating a shell for the reed to live in. It isn’t really an oboe reed yet, but it has to be a good enough shell so that the reed can eventually take shape within it. It seems like a rather abstract idea now, so just remember… Your initial goal is to just get some cane off the reed. All that hard…
Running an oboe reed business and all, I often get requests or inquiries about reeds and the desired tone they’ll produce. And while I agree that reeds play an important part in determining your sound on a given day, I am old-fashioned and in favor of hard work to get the tone you want!! I’ll always think of my teacher, Richard Killmer, who could take your most crude, unfinished reed…
When I was a student at Juilliard Pre-College, I was probably at the peak of my early learning about music and the oboe. I remember feeling continually challenged, and I could practice for hours on end. My teacher was especially demanding, and I learned all kinds of things about the oboe, especially about oboe technique. It was at times excruciating to go through all of the Barrett book’s articulation studies……
Let it be known that I like band directors, and that without mine long ago I would not be sitting here writing about what I know about the oboe. He was (and probably still is) a wonderful man who encouraged me, taught me what he knew but then was humble enough to say that he could take me no further. He recommended a professional oboist in town so I could…
There are many excuses for not making your own oboe reeds, but in my opinion, one of the poorest excuses is money. Let’s face it, playing the oboe is an expensive proposition. If you haven’t realized it already, then let this be your warning. If you don’t want to spend any money at all, then you should probably just pick another instrument. Apart from getting the oboe itself, there is…
Question “How do I know what my oboe reed strength is?” Answer I never bought into the whole reed strength phenomenon, so I don’t know what to tell you. Make your own and it won’t matter. If you have to buy a “strength” just remember that harder doesn’t mean that you or the reed is “better” or more advanced than you used to be. It will simply have more wood…
Question I’m a student and I will have my exam recital this May. The program has to contain a modern/contemporary piece (my teacher claims Poulenc and Britten do not fall into that category, they are too old). So, I’m out of ideas! I would like to find an interesting/cool/beautiful piece and not strange just for the sake of being strange, also one that I can have a chance to play…
Twas The Day of the Concert Twas the day of the concert when all through Sue’s house, the sound of her reed making was waking her spouse. And the noise from her scraping and clipping and crowing, was causing the pain in his head to keep growing. He said, “Don’t you think you could stop for a minute? I keep having this dream and your reed tools are in it.…