Evelyn Barbirolli, the distinguished English virtuoso, is the author of a new method- "The Oboists Companion. " The first volume has recently been published by the Oxford University Press.
Fibre glass (or plastic) reeds would seem to be the answer to the oboist's prayer. When they first came on to the market I imagined, as presumably did many of my colleagues, that here would be reeds that would not vary, and which would last almost indefinitely. Accordingly it seemed worthwhile to work with them and I spent a good while doing this, in high hopes. Alas the hopes never materialized.
I bought a good many in England and in the U.S.A. for my experiments. Selmer seem to have a monopoly on the material and all the "reeds" appear to be made in the same way.
The shape is appalling, and so is the lay. If one imagines a normal cane reed made on such a shaper and scraped in such a way, surely this normal cane reed would be a very bad one and useless for most of us. Therefore I came to the conclusion that it is not necessarily the artificial cane which is at fault, but the way in which it is made into reeds. There is no means of proving this at present. I wish that some good oboe reedmaker could be allowed to experiment with the available cane substitute material, but I presume that Selmer have a monopoly on it, and also that part of the processing may involve industrial machinery.
I tried hard to alter the available "reeds." The tip can be cut off and the "cane" can be scraped, but these normal processes have curiously little effect. Crossing the blades (quite a tricky operation) will occasionally produce a minimal improvement. As almost all the "reeds" are very sharp in pitch, I tried taking off the "cane" and re-attaching it to the tube. This proved really quite difficult to manage. l found that the binding on these reeds is only for visual effect: the "cane" is attached to the tube either by heat moulding or an adhesive. It can be removed, but it tends then to spring apart and it is not easy to tie on to a tube without leakage. I did achieve this and was able to flatten the pitch, but otherwise produced no beneficial effect.
I experimented with heat. By putting the "reed" into boiling water it is possible to remould it slightly and to change the aperture, but again I was not able to make any real improvement, and often the whole reed collapsed completely.
The insurmountable snags are a) that the shape is so abnormally wide in the throat and ill balanced, and b) that so much "cane" has been removed where most of us like it left in. The "reeds" play as if they were made with the old-fashioned French type of lay (a short "U" with a thin lay, evenly graduated from its base to its tip). They need practically no breath pressure but a great deal of embouchure control. The intonation is difficult to manage because they are so free and easy blowing. It becomes a really skilled task to achieve a good range of dynamics without becoming extremely out of tune.
Their greatest disadvantage is that it is virtually impossible to produce any real quality of tone, and the sound does not carry in a large hall.
Three only possible advantages are: a) that they are not at all tiring to play; b) that they are very easy in the low register; and c) that they will play dry. Just take one out of the box and it will play right away, (after a fashion!).
Contrary to my expectations they have two further disadvantages. They vary just as much as do those made from real cane, and they are extremely vulnerable to damage and to wear and tear - more so than real cane. This makes them unsuitable even for the veriest beginner.
Also, in Great Britain they are very expensive.
In past years I have experimented a good deal also with varnishing and treating cane with silicones. I had in mind that the life of cane could be lengthened and that a good oboe reed could then last much longer. After all, stringed instruments are varnished to make their life so long. Unfortunately, none of the many substances I used had any satisfactory effect. Several violin makers were good enough to give me samples of their ground and top varnishes, I bought several commercial substances, and a friend who worked in a firm making varnishes supplied me with many silicone liquids of varying types. I even inquired about the material which is injected into wood which has been so long immersed in water that it falls apart when brought into the air. The kindly Swede who was then in charge of raising an ancient ship from the sea, sent me all sorts of information but warned me that this substance would be a deadly poison to humans!
My findings were that either the varnish was too heavy for the reed to be playable sensitively, if at all, or that it was too light and thin to have any noticeable effect - but here again I feel that a solution might be found. When I am even older than I am and no longer a playing oboist, I may try again!
All in all, the large amount of time I have spent on artificial or treated cane reeds has been wasted, because my hopes proved to be unfounded.
However, I feel that there must be an answer, and that some day an enterprising oboist will find it, and maybe make his or her fortune! With the speedily increasing number of reed players in the world, and the correspondingly greater difficulty in obtaining good quality cane, an answer HAS to be found.
Editor's note: James Lakin, professor of oboe at the University of Iowa, Iowa C1ty, is presently engaged in a cane-treating experiment. He promises to report the results of his study in these pages.