The Big Double Reed Day 2012

I have had a great weekend in London which, on Sunday, included "The Big Double Reed Day" at the London Guildhall.

The "double reedness" actually began on Saturday with a trip to Howarth's to buy some new music and a few other bits.  It always feels like a visit to Aladdin's Cave, with so many treasures to look at and browse through.  In the circumstances I was quite restrained but I picked up some music recommended by my teacher and a book called "techniques in Oboe playing".  I knew that there would be more temptation the following day.

Sunday was quite an early start due to planned engineering work on the Tube.  I was very grateful for the clock's changing as leaving the house at 7:30 still only got me at the venue for 9:15am and I was straight into the reed making class.

The classes were run with small groups as tutorials and the 90 minutes allocated whizzed by so quickly that we didn't even get round to doing any actual scraping.  We did have a very good discussion about common problems of reedmaking, where to get supplies, how to sharpen knives, using a micrometer to select cane, first things to check on a problematic reed, tips on scraping technique, how to manage reeds and when to give up on a reed.  I suppose the key thing that I came away with is that there isn't one correct way to make reeds and everybody's reeds will be slightly different.  The only way to learn is to actually make them, play on them and find out what works best for you.  The other tip was to try and be as consistent as possible and, if you want to change something, change just one thing at a time.  It has given me a push to start doing more reedmaking and to make a determined effort to use my reeds more rather than relying on my teacher.

The next class was an opportunity to try out a Cor Anglais.  I have wanted a Cor for ages but have managed to put it off so far.  I was worried that as soon as I tried one that I would fall in love with it and want one straight away.  I was correct!  The session was lead by a professional oboist/ Cor player and, again, it was a very small group so was run as an informal tutorial.  We all had the option to have a go and the tutor had bought some music for us to try if we wanted (the New World Symphony of course!).  In between she talked about the differences between the oboe and Cor, reeds, the repertoire of the Cor and her experiences of playing both.  One thing that took me by surprise when I played was that someone else in the class immediately complimented me on my vibrato.  I have struggled hugely with vibrato on the oboe and, only last week, I began drafting a blog about it so I was quite taken by surprise that it just turned up quite naturally on the Cor. I  think it is probably due to higher airflow required.  So it seems like the way to fix that problem I just need to buy a Cor, work on that and then hope it transfers to the oboe.  Well,  that seems a reasonable enough justification to me  for buying one. ;-)

Lunch was an opportunity to have a look around the trade stalls and spend some more money - I bought a new reed case for all the reeds that I will be making, a reed making DVD that I have had my eye on for a while, a CD of Malcolm Arnold Chamber music (which included the Sonatina and Fantasy that my teacher had asked me to pick up) and another bobbin of reed thread which I don't really need but was a lovely colour!

After lunch was an hour long oboe concert which seemed to have a huge variety of repertoire, styles and instrumnets - with oboe, baroque oboe, Cor anglais and oboe d'amore all included.

The afternoon session was a 2 hour long performance workshop.  Again the group was quite small with only about 12 of us.  Everybody that wanted to was given the opportunity to play a piece and have some feedback.  There was a variety of standards from someone who had only started playing in January right through to someone doing a Masters in Oboe performance.  But everybody was very supportive and encouraging.  I played Chansonette by Harty and don't think I embarrassed myself too much, there were lots of things to think about through this so they will probably come out in other blog posts.  I thought the tutor had a good balance of comments which were directly about the piece and which were more general to help us all benefit rather than it being focussed on the person playing.  We finished off the session by having a go at a two oboe Concerto by Albinoni with about 4 people per part with the piano.  It just about worked and was great fun.

There was a massed ensemeble rehearsal and concert at the end but I decided to miss that.  I was completely exhausted by this point and as the rehearsal started it did look as if there were plenty of people there and it seemd to be aimed more at the children and parents.

So overall a very enjoyable, if tiring, day.  I loved the informality and the small group feel to all the sessions.  The tutors were all incredibly encouraging, helpful, down to earth and incredibly knowledgeable.  I feel inspired to make more reeds and develop my playing.  Hopefully I'll be back for more next year...