Fiber reeds/metal mouthpiece

[Scoots]

I played on a fiber reed and some brand of a metal mouthpiece on my tenor in college, but nobody in town seems to have them any more.

It's been 20 years since I've played - so have these gone out of style?

Personally, I think the fiber and metal combo gave the horn too much "edge", and I'm looking for more of a classic tone.

Suggestions for a great tenor mouthpiece/reed combo? I feel like a noob again ;)

[musicwriter2001]

I played on a fiber reed and some brand of a metal mouthpiece on my tenor in college, but nobody in town seems to have them any more.

It's been 20 years since I've played - so have these gone out of style?

Personally, I think the fiber and metal combo gave the horn too much "edge", and I'm looking for more of a classic tone.

Suggestions for a great tenor mouthpiece/reed combo? I feel like a noob again ;)

i have used a brillhart levelaire with a fibracell 2.5 and it cuts through like a lightsaber. if you want something less edgy, anything hard rubber might work. there are others here that have way more expierence with mouthpieces than i. but it seems hard rubber is the way to go.

[Scoots]

What's the price range of the levelaire? 2.5's were always my preference, fiber or natural.

I'm looking for flexibility - so I can move from Michael Buble, Sade, etc, with the soft, warm sound, to the edgy, cutting sound for jazzier stuff. I'm hoping to narrow it down to two mouthpieces that I can switch between.

[musicwriter2001]

What's the price range of the levelaire? 2.5's were always my preference, fiber or natural.

I'm looking for flexibility - so I can move from Michael Buble, Sade, etc, with the soft, warm sound, to the edgy, cutting sound for jazzier stuff. I'm hoping to narrow it down to two mouthpieces that I can switch between.

well, again, i play things a little differently, but i use the levelaire and i use a runyon custom with a rovner ligature. the brillhart for blasting, the runyon for something a little less blatant. the brillhart cost me 125, the runyon was i think under 100.

[jmoen3]

Just to clear things up. Metal doesn't mean bright/edge, and hard rubber doesn't mean dark/soft. Those are inaccurate generalizations.

I hear the levelaire is a pretty bright piece. If you're looking for a piece that can transition from bright to loud, I would recommend getting ahold of Phil Barone, as I hear he has a lot of pieces that can do this. Also he might be able to make modifications to a piece you already own.

[Mal 2]

Brilhart Level Aires are so bright because they are high-baffled -- but also thin-walled. Then plastic is used on top to give them some bulk, or they'd be extremely "duckbilled". The bari Level Aire 5 I have does a bangup job of making me sound like Ronnie Cuber. Too bad I can't stand sounding like that.

Fiber reeds are still out there ( http://www.fiberreed.com/ ), along with other synthetics you might want to look at -- Fibracell, Legere, Bari, Hahn. I use a Fibracell on EVERYTHING, whether it's metal or not. They just work for me and are about as low maintenance as can be.

[Scoots]

Thanks for the info. I may have follow-up questions when I start shopping. For now I'm getting my chops back and the stock mouthpiece (4C) is fine for now.

I ordered a pair of the fibracell 2's and 2.5's. EXPENSIVE from what I remember back in college, $70 for 4 reeds. But they last ;)

[cvsimson]

Scoots,
you might want to check out this thread:

http://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?t=113880

These mouthpieces are designed to be used with Fibracell reeds, and sould great.
Ivan is always willing to work with his customers to create a mouthpiece that fits your playing style.

He made one for my C-melody sax that is excellent, and also works very well on my Tenor.

With the mouthpieces if I had fibracell reeds on the sound was to edgy, with a lot of buzz. With the Ivan Meyer mouthpiece I can get a wide range of sounds with no buzzing.:)