People do different things to reeds when they're new. Some soak them in water for x number of minutes, baby them, wine and dine them, etc. In my opinion these steps are not necessary.
The best and most efficient way for me to break in a new reed is to run it under the tap for 10 seconds or so, rub it to seal off the fibers, play some overtones on it, then play it like normal. After I'm done playing I wash out the reed and store it on the mouthpiece. Reeds warp even if you put them in reed guards anyway, you might as well just let it warp to your mouthpiece.
Personally, I just play them for a little bit the first day, a little more the second, then by the third day, they're usually ready to go full-on playing/practicing. No soaking or anything, I think water is just detrimental and makes reeds stiff. But some people swear by it.
Whatever you do, just make sure you rotate through a bunch of them, e.g. don't play one reed every day until it dies, then move on to the next one. Have about 4 to 8 reeds going in a cycle. I like to do 8. I think the more you do, the longer they'll last. Number them with a pencil on the butt end (I just use little notches) to remember which ones you've played and what order to go in and all that.
Isn't it common sense among us sax players that a reed's strength can change when the moisture level in the air changes? Or the reed might have warped?
I have a question that I cant seem to find the correct topic for, hope you can help anyway...I recently bought a meyer 5 mp for my alto w./ a rovner lig. and I played on 2.5 reeds, when i hold a note, it seems to over vibrate and fluctuate madly, is the reed too soft?
Saxplyr91: Everyone is different when it comes to how they play mouthpieces and reeds. But on average, I'm guessing the 2.5 reeds are a good place to start on an alto Meyer 5.
You might want to go up and down in reed-strength (and use a lot of those reeds in the test because all reeds vary in their playability so just trying one reed of different strengths won't give accurate results) to see if your results improve. DAVE
dave, thanks, I will try different strengths, I usually play on a 3, but I had an extra box of 2.5s and with the new lig they seem to over vibrate a bit, Ill have to experiment around, tho I did find, its easier to control when I moved the lig up a bit, so Ill have to try a stronger reed
My god. Does anyone actually do all of the things in that article?
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