Standard Oboe Bocal Reed (European Style)
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Standard Oboe Bocal Reed (European Style)

Price: $15.00
32 or more: $12.75 each
  • Manufacturer: K.GE REEDS
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Standard Oboe Bocal Reeds

We have a new product to offer our customers who prefer to make the final reed adjustments by hand scraping. We call it the “90%” Bocal reed and it will be available at a slightly reduced price compared to a 100% finished reed.

 

There is no difference between Professional and Standard reeds in terms of materials used. However, professional reeds are selected as some reeds have better intonation, articulation, tone and finishing etc¡­. The reeds are not intentionally made this way. When I make them, some of them simply turn out better than others.


The shapers that we are using is custom made according to my own measurements. Our oboe reeds are made from type “B” and “D” shaper: “Original”: shaped as dry, “Narrow”: shaped as been soaked in water. “B” shaper plays better intonation with large bore Oboe like Loree, Howarth, Rigoutat act. “D” shaper plays better intonation with smaller bore oboe like Marigaux; Josef; Ludwig Frank; K.GE act.
The B shaper is similar to Rigoutat-2.
The D shaper is similar to RC13.
The X is our most broad oboe shaper.

 

The only difference between the "German" and "French" templates is that there is a much more gradual step in the scrape from the "heart" of the reed down to the tip on the french template. When you look carefully at reeds made from each of the two templates and compare them, it will look as if the german template reed has a much more clearly defined tip area.

Both the "german" and "french" scrapes would work on all oboes.

 
 

Question: What is the difference between oboe reeds made from cane gouged with a C/S (centre to side ratio) of 0.15 and 0.18?

Answer: The centre to side ratio is the difference in thickness measurement between the centre of the cane compared to the side of the cane at the time the cane is gouged, before it is shaped and tied on and finished scraping. The difference in behaviour of two reeds made identically but from the two different C/S ratios, is that the 0.18 gouged reeds generally blow more freely and have less strong openings when compared with a reed gouged at 0.15. The resulting tone or timbre of the reed made from cane gouged at 0.18 is often less "thick" or "heavy" sounding than the 0.15




 
Question: What is the difference between the reeds which have been shaped dry as opposed to wet? What effect does this have on the reeds tone/ intonation?


 
Answer: The reeds shaped dry and wet are actually shaped on the same shaping tool. The difference is that if the cane is soaked before shaping, it comes off the shaper more narrow after it has dried than when it is shaped dry. Therefore, shaped wet cane has a tendency to be higher pitch than shaped dry on the finished reed. Cane shaped dry has a more "full" tone and is more vibrant due to the greater surface area of the reed.