Inside of a Reed

Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.

 - Groucho Marx -

Instead of the inside of a dog, I'd like to discuss the inside of a reed in this post!

The taper of the space inside the reed from tip to butt end constitutes a continuation of the taper of the bassoon bore.

Therefore, it stands to reason that any change of the dimensions of this space changes the bore of the bassoon at that point and, thus, changes the way the reed responds and sounds.

Yet, after an initial reaming and adjustment of wire roundness, few bassoonists examine this aspect of the reed.

However, the photos below demonstrate how much change can occur on its own inside the reed during its lifetime.

Reed next to mandrel pin for comparison.

Note that the tip of  the mandrel pin, when inserted, would extend well under the blade. The pin has a collar stop for consistent reaming depth. Forming and drying blanks using a mandrel pin like this ensure a consistent interior taper from tip to butt end from reed to reed.

Reamer with reed.

Using a reamer like this gives a consistent taper to each reed from butt to throat. Many other reamers are shorter and do not size the throat of the reed.

A reed after proper reaming with butt end at collar stop of the mandrel pin.

Mature reed fitted on mandrel pin.

 

 

 

 

Note that the reed no longer fits all the way on the pin. During soaking, the cane in the tube area expands inward, taking up some of the space inside.

Change of taper in throat after repeated soaking and drying due to continuous use.

In the two photos above, you can see that the reed's interior dimensions have greatly changed as the reed has been soaked, played on and dried over time. The above is an extreme example, but I have found that this happens to some degree to EVERY reed. 

Aside from the fact that the reed in the above photos doesn't fit on the bocal as far or as securely as when it was reamed new, is there a problem here?

Many have noticed that reeds, as they age and are played in tend to rise in pitch and loose vibrancy. Some of this is due to embouchure pressure and finishing scrapes and adjustments made to the exterior of the reed.

However, I have found that these deleterious effects can be lessened and the reed's performance can be improved and even extended by re-sizing the taper inside the reed.

The two easiest ways to do this are:

1. Re-ream the reed periodically. You must use a reamer that reaches into the throat of the reed, however. Most reamers are shorter and do not address this part of the reed.

2. Push the soaked reed on the mandrel pin to nudge the reed back to original dimensions.

Re-reaming the reed is most effective. However, if the original ream is pretty aggressive, due to bevel and shape (amount of backflair), you may not want to thin the reed at that point by repeated re-reamings. Also, reaming can be messy, with lots of reamed fibers accumulating inside the reed throat.

I usually re-ream a reed just once or twice during its lifespan.

Re-sizing the reed tube and throat with a mandrel pin is quicker and not messy at all. If you need to twist to get the reed tube up to the collar stop, twist as little as possible and twist in both directions.

However, re-sizing this way is temporary. It lasts a short while and then the cane relaxes back to its collapsed position again.

Re-sizing the reed a few times over use is helpful in maintaining the opening dimensions.  Initially, dry the reed out outside of the case by placing it on your drying rack with it fully inserted into the mandrel pin. You can even soak the reed with it on the mandrel pin before playing on it. Doing this a few times is sufficient. After a week or so, the reed will stabilize and no longer shrink in the tube and throat.

I've found that reeds maintained this way preserve resonance and steady pitch longer and are just generally usable longer.

Try these ideas and see what you find!

If you don't have a reamer that shapes the throat as well as the tube (most are shorter than mine), or don't have a mandrel pin that extends past under the first wire of your reeds, check out these products on my website.

If you are concerned about cracking your reeds using these tools, just be sure the first wire is round enough to accept the tips of these tools before inserting. A normal first wire opening works fine for me resulting in about 1mm between blades at tip's widest opening. No problem! 

As usual, most of these ideas are not my original, so I'd like to credit friend and bassoonist, James Roberson for his idea about using the mandrel to re-size the reed's interior.

Also, check out the fixed chamber reed of Mark Eubanks of Arundo Research Corporation.

There is also very interesting research done by British bassoonist, Thomas Palmer. A Study of the Air Gap Between Blades of a Reed.

Phyllis McGinley Song Cycle

It's been a year since the bassoon world lost one of its leading figures; K. David Van Hoesen. I thought it would be fitting to upload the wonderful recording he made with Jan DeGaetani

and his daughter, Gretchen Van Hoesen

of Alec Wilder's Phyllis McGinley Song Cycle. Listen here:

Here are the poems he set:

Van Hoesen Mozart

I've just uploaded a live recording from the 1960's of David VanHoesen performing the Mozart Bassoon Concerto with the Rochester Chamber Orchestra. Thanks to Jim Gorton for sharing this with me. Here's the first movement. The opening statement is exemplary!

Movement 2: A lesson in lyricism

Movement 3: Brilliant playing!

K. David Van Hoesen (1926-2016)

Bassoonist and teacher, K. David Van Hoesen left us today. He passed away in the company of his family in Pittsburgh. He was 90 years old.

He was my musical "father". He taught me so much about the bassoon and also about music in general. He showed me what great teaching was all about.

He played much of his career in the Rochester Philharmonic.  

His sound was beautiful, smooth and even. Listen to this excerpt from William Schuman's "New England Triptych" and you will hear a good example.

Here is an interview  (see item 12 in the Table of Contents) I did with him shortly after he retired from teaching at the Eastman School of Music. In it he discusses the bassoon, music and his early life.

Rust Never Sleeps

What does the title of a Neil Young album have in common with tone production on the French Horn?

Read Principal Horn Bill Caballero's short article in the Pittsburgh Symphony musicians' newsletter to find out!

Good breath support, proper metering of the air through the instrument are essential for a great tone and smooth legato. Caballero says, "Probably 85% to 90% of my time is spent on fundamentals. Long tones, scales, tonal centering exercises." 

It's inspiring to learn that one of the best horn players in the world works on his breath control and tone every day!

However, these fundamentals are often neglected in practice. As bassoonist, Norman Herzberg said, "Mastery of the bassoon is transitory and must be renewed daily." I have written about my efforts to maintain good fundamentals here.

Tchaikovsky 6th -- helpful fingerings

The first bassoon part to Tchaikovsky's 6th Symphony presents many challenges for the bassoonist. Much of it lies in the extreme soft playing demanded from the score.

We played this piece this summer at the Blossom Music Center, so the measures I took to make the soft playing as comfortable as possible are fresh in my mind.

The challenges start right at the beginning with the famous solo. Along with the Rite of Spring, this is one of just a few solos for the bassoon that open a major piece of standard repertoire. Like the Rite, it is in a difficult register for solo bassoon writing.

There are many solutions to helping the first E start softly, securely and down to pitch. Below is the fingering I use -- notice that the register lock is on (see the strike through on the whisper key) to allow for safe passage to the F# in the solo.

Try with the low Bb key completely closed or just part way down for a dampening effect that also can lower the pitch of the E. Adding the extra key will make the attack more resistant, so you can use a little more energy when starting.

On my bassoon I have a lever that partially closes the low B when the low Bb is depressed. You can make one of these for yourself by cutting a small strip from the backing of a notepad (like cardboard only thinner) and placing the strip in the linkage between the top end of the low B key and the arm from the B pad cup that overlaps it. This will close the B pad partially. Try different thicknesses. A match will also work.

Just remember to take it out when finished!  Also, be sure to lock the whisper key when playing this solo, so it won't pop open the bocal vent!

At the top of the second page of movement one and at the end of movement two there are some soft low A's to play. If you need to cover your sound, try either of these fingerings:

Just before the end of the exposition in the first movement comes another famous stretch of soft playing.

 In the first line, hold down the low D key and low Eb key for really soft, secure D - F and D - F# slurs.

Now for the famous "pppppp" passage! Ideally this should be played by the bass clarinet. It sounds better following the clarinet solo before it. However, if the conductor insists you play it, here is a set of fingerings shown me by Willard Elliot which work well.

Low Bb and Low D key are added to 3 of the 4 notes. The low F# may balk with this fingering combination, so I use the usual muffled F# fingering for that note, going back to the Low Bb/Low D combination for the Low D. Note, once again, the whisper key lock is on for safety!

If that's not soft enough, you can play with a mute in the bell.

In the 4th movement, both bassoons end a long passage together on a low C#.


This fingering may help, but be sure it doesn't make the C# too flat in pitch.

Website is back!

My website, steesbassoon.com is back! It's been redesigned by my daughter, Grace, who is a graphic designer.

Most of the old content is still there, including the reed making instructions. Thanks to those of you who use it for reed making for your patience!

lefreQue follow up

I wanted to write a follow-up to my first post about the lefreQue sound bridges.

In the first post, I mentioned that I use only the bridge for the bocal/wing joint connection. After some experimentation and trial, I've branched out significantly.

After hearing from other bassoonists about their experiences with these sound bridges I thought I'd give the larger 76mm bridges another try.

I had heard that attaching them to the bell/long joint juncture would add resonance and help response. Initially, I was skeptical because I didn't hear enough of an improvement to warrant a purchase.

That all changed when I took a friend into Severance Hall while it was empty to try them out again.

Trial with and without the bridges on my bell/long joint juncture with my friend at the podium and me in the bassoon section yielded no difference to his ears.

However, when trying them with him placed in the audience seats on the orchestra floor, the difference was quite noticeable. With the bridges, my sound had more power, depth and evenness throughout the range. With them, I could sustain a crescendo a bit farther than without.

I repeated this trial for two other people, both of whom noticed a difference.  I also tried with bridges on the bell/long and long/boot junctures (also 76mm size). The bridges on the long/boot juncture added less of an improvement, but it was noticeable -- especially in the low register. An added benefit was greater security when producing a "pp" attack in the low register.

I tried them out in our concerts last weekend. We played the Sibelius Violin Concerto. In this piece, along with much touchy writing for the second bassoonist, the first bassoon part has its share of delicate entrances and tough low note slurs. With  these bridges on I felt more secure making those tough entrances in the slow movement

At the end of the second movement, there is a very lonely slur from low F to low Bb for the first bassoonist.  Here was the method I used to make that slur secure:

1. Insert a small strip of note pad cardboard backing (about the size of a long match stick) under the low B key so that it fits between the low B and the low C touch. This will lower the low C and low D keys slightly. It will mute the F a little bit and make the slur a bit more secure.

Warning: make sure that the strip isn't so thick that the B pad will not close completely when the low Bb is fingered!

2. With the register lock on, play the low F with the low Bb key depressed.

3. Slur to low Bb. Make sure the left thumb contacts all four low register keys at once.

lefreQue Sound Bridge

What's that metal baffle doing on my bocal and wing joint?

It's a lefreQue Sound Bridge! 

For hundreds of years, instrument manufacturers have broken the bassoon into several parts to make it more compact for carrying and to keep it out of harm's way. I've certainly never thought about what acoustical trade-offs occur when you cut up the body of the instrument into several parts.

However, it stands to reason that some resonance must be lost when an integral piece of wood is sectioned off. Especially when the sections are joined by tenons with cork or string wrapping. 

In the chart below (from Maarten Vonk's bassoon website), you can see the relative speed of vibration for various materials. Cork is on the slow end. Thus, it is often used to insulate or dampen vibrations in a room, for instance. Cork is a great material for maintaining a secure, tight seal between joints, but not the ideal substance for the resonance of a musical instrument. 

Air                      330 m/s

Glue less than       50 m/s
Cork less than      500 m/s
Solder (lead)        1260 m/s
Wood soft/ hard   1500 / 4000 m/s
Brass                  3600 m/s
Gold                    4700 m/s

The concept behind the lefreQue Sound Bridge is to link the resonance in the individual joints of the body of the instrument by placing a bridge between them.

The bridges are easy to install and take off. They are not permanent and do not require a repair technician to modify your instrument.

Research:

Before purchasing, I did some investigating with other bassoonists, repair technicians and by viewing various Internet sources.

There is a lefreQue YouTube channel but no bassoon demos at this point.

West Virginia University Bassoon Professor, Lynn Hileman has written an informative blog about her trial of the sound bridges.

Photos of them in use on bassoons show various methods of deployment.

Trials:

I have only tried the bocal/wing bridge (known as the Double Reed model) and the bridge for the long/bell juncture. I tried the various materials available, too -- sterling silver, solid silver, red brass, etc.

I tried them on my students' bassoons and we probed them in our bassoon section. 

The results were surprisingly variable. While my tests were by no means scientific, I noticed a wide variety in result (ranging from no audible difference to near life-changing difference). 

What I've come away with from months of testing is that every bassoonist needs to decide for him/herself if these bridges do anything at all, and if so, which ones, and how best to deploy them on your instrument.

Ways to Try:

Here are some ways I tried. My conclusions are based upon what worked for me, so try them yourself. In trying yourself, be sure to investigate all the different materials and ways to deploy them.  I've heard from other bassoonists who use these very differently from me and are quite satisfied!

1. Which bridges?

Some bassoonists are "fully lefreQued"! They use the bridges as a system. However, these little baffles are very expensive, so I would suggest trying one bridge at a time to see if a particular bridge is really adding anything at all.

My trials show that the only bridge that added any resonance for me was the Double Reed bridge -- or the one that bridges the wing joint and bocal. The only other one that had even a hint of added resonance was the long/bell bridge -- but not enough to justify a purchase.

2. Which material?

I tried the various materials (a lot like shopping for bocals!) and found the solid silver added the most resonance and gave the best sound.

3. How to deploy?

This may be the area that needs the most investigation. There seems to be no standard way to apply these, and for me, some of the most recommended ways didn't work very well.

The bridges seem to be very finicky if not assembled and positioned just right. Some people notice a fuzziness or buzzing coming from them at times. Like what you may experience from a sympathetic vibration coming from the body lock.

If you experience this buzzing, before rejecting a lefreQue for your bassoon, try re-positioning the bridge on the joint and make sure the two bridges are perfectly aligned one on top of the other with no overlap.

Overlapping bridges

Tension from the silicon band may cause the bridges to slip apart slightly when you put them on. Keeping one exactly on top of the other will decrease damping caused by metal touching metal (which may also cause some of the buzzing).

Each lefreQue comes with a set of two bridges. They should be used together, with the smooth bridge on the bottom and the "bumpy" one on top.

Top side

Underside

These two photos show the top and underside of the two bridges.

These bridges are not interchangeable. My trial with the bridge with the bumps placed on top of the smooth bridge produced more resonance than vice versa.

In the photos you can see how the two differ. The bridge on the left side is the bridge that contacts the body of the bassoon. It helps the body resonance jump from joint to joint.

The bridge on the right has little bumps that act as feet. This is the bridge that goes on top. The feet keep the bridge from completely contacting the bottom bridge and dampening its resonance. Originally, lefreQues were sold as single bridges. However, it was discovered that pairing each bridge with another one allowed for more resonance, as the lower bridge was not dampened by the fastening bands.

The tapers of the bridges are purposeful, with a more sharp taper at one end for each. This sharper taper is made to help the fit against the bocal, whereas the taper at the bottom better fits the circumference of the wing top band.

Taper

Fit against bocal and wing

 
How to attach?

Photos I viewed showed a few different ways of attaching the bridges. Here are the two most common ways:

Bound at feet

Bound at middle

You should try each way to see which produces the best result. I found a pretty big difference between the two, with the fitting the silicon band over the middle yielding the best resonance and sound.

I've thought a little about the use of silicon (also an insulator, not a very good material for carrying vibration). I wonder if a metal coil spring or something that also transmits vibration well might be a better agent for attaching these bridges?

The lefreQue company offers a few different kinds of bands. Indeed the package includes a veritable smorgasbord of bands. It's not clear there is one recommended way to attach as well!

How much tension?

Along with how to attach, I've wondered about the amount of tension placed on the bridges by the attaching bands. Too much could dampen the bridges' resonance, too little could add a buzzing sound.

I found a good amount of tension by accident. I lost the original band sent with my bridges. Upon obtaining a new one, I noticed that it was wider and not as big in circumference as the old one. the fit was much more tight than the old one. An upgrade? 

After trying it, I thought the new band inhibited some of the resonance I was getting with the old one. To reduce the tension and, hopefully, free up some of the resonance, I cut the band's width in half. A more narrow band would be more elastic and free.

Original, cut

New width

This new width restored the resonance I was missing!

Where to position?

Another variable in deploying these things is exactly how to position them. Here again, different positioning yielded different results.

Here are the ways I tried with the bocal/wing bridges:

Under the post

By removing the whisper pad key, you can slip the band under the spring and mount it right up against the whisper key post. Putting the key back in place prevents the band from slipping out of position.

However, on my bassoon, this necessitated placing the band across the lower part of the bridge. This placed greater tension on the feet at the bottom of the bridges and very little on the top feet. There was a tendency for buzzing from the top and they were more prone to slipping out of place.

Moving the bridges down so the band could fit across the middle of them (near the trademark) caused the bottom bridge to contact the metal band at the top of the wing joint, resulting in a loss of resonance.

The best position for the band was fitting it around the very top of the wing joint metal band. It's best to put the band on before you insert the bocal. This makes it easier and safer to move or adjust the band if needed. The band is thin enough that it should fit between the wing and long joint without pushing the joints apart.

Best band position

Unfortunately, without the band locked in place under a key, it is necessary to keep an eye on the band so it doesn't slip out of place.

Where, exactly?

Front

Back

These photos show two possible locations for the bridges. Trying both, I found the front position to be the better of the two for sound and resonance. If you like this one, you must be careful to leave clearance space between the bridges and the swinging of the whisper pad key,so the whisper pad cup doesn't get caught up on the bridge!

The Bulge

One last thing I tried was putting the band on with the fat bulge over the bridges vs. rotating the band so the bulge is on the opposite side of the joint from the bridge. The sound was better with the bulge over the bridge. This is nice, because the bulge provides a nice, easy spot for your fingers to grab onto when removing the band. The bulge needs to be positioned exactly in the middle of the bridge's width for best resonance.

Bulge over bridge

Conclusions:

The lefreQue Sound Bridge provided a noticeable improvement in the resonance of my bassoon. It also helped some of the other instruments I tried it on, but not every bassoon showed improvement.

Attention to how the bridges are deployed, which ones are used, which material is best, how to attach them, tension of the band and where to place them on the body of the bassoon are important details you should explore when trying these bridges out.

Getting Back in Shape

Help! I've had  a few weeks off and I'm really out of shape! The new season is looming so I've got to get it in gear.

The first day back on the bassoon is always a blast!  I reconnect with how much I like making a sound on the instrument and I'm inspired to read through some fun repertoire.

Then comes the next day. . .

My embouchure is shaking, my tone is unsteady and my fingers don't do what I want them to.  My reeds are feeling worn out.

Now the hard work begins!  I wish I could just pick up where I left off, but that isn't possible. I've lost ground and need to get it back.  Very humbling!

I've tried just practicing a few scales and the repertoire I need to learn in the immediate future, but often find that's not enough to get me in tip-top shape by the first rehearsal.

I need to focus on some physical and mental things that I take for granted when in shape.

BREATHING AND SUPPORT

Even though I'm in excellent physical shape (training for a marathon right now), in some ways, the act of breathing and supporting while playing a wind instrument is specific to that activity.

There are some things that carry over from cardiovascular exercise to wind playing, but things like controlling the exhalation of air over a long period of time, holding the support while doing so, etc. do not.

You can lose a little ability in this area even with a short break from the instrument.

Perhaps the best way to get back these skills is to practice long tones.  Focus on the control of the air and embouchure/reed at all dynamics and all registers is mainly what we do as wind players. Yet it's often overshadowed by things that are more fun or rewarding such as practicing solos, etc.

There are many long tone studies out there. You could easily make up your own.  I have my own on my website.

For younger players and those who are not physically active there are many ways to raise awareness of how your body works while breathing and supporting the sound.

I like to use a Voldyne spirometer to help bassoonists learn to increase and control the volume of air they inhale. You can make up exercises using this device and others such as the Breath Builder.

Arnold Jacobs, legendary tubist with the Chicago Symphony for many years demonstrates the use of the Voldyne spirometer in the video on this page. You will need Windows Media Player to play this.

Another device I've found helpful is the Breath Awareness Trainer or BAT. This is sold by MG Double Reeds. With the straps and baffle around your abdomen you can really feel what happens with support during a breathing cycle.  It's especially interesting to notice the difference in support needed for high vs. low notes, loud vs. soft dynamics.

MENTAL

Another skill that wanes a bit when I take time off has to do with hearing and vision.  No, I'm not going blind or deaf, but my ability to hear what I want before I play it and my ability to use my eyes to feed my brain just the right amount of music at just the right time drop a bit.

This can be practiced, too, of course.  For the critical skill of hearing exactly what you want before playing it and hearing the pitches as you play, long tones are best.  With all technical difficulties removed you can really focus on imagining the sound you want and then trying to produce it.  Try this with your eyes closed to block out visual distractions.

Sight reading works best for setting up the visual assembly line of moving information from the page through your eyes to brain and then fingers, tongue, breath apparatus, embouchure, etc.

Seeing the Sound

The concert is over. My bassoon is silent now.  I swab and put it away for the night. Tomorrow I will continue my search for resonance. 

Every night my sound disappears. I must search it out every time I put a reed on my bocal and begin to play.  Will I find the sound I’m looking for?

“Mastery of the bassoon is transitory and must be renewed daily.” – Norman Herzberg 

The bassoon makes no sound on its own. It is my responsibility to coax the sound I imagine into life.

In this post, I'll show you some pictures of my sound!  These are called spectrographs.  They are a visual realization in the form of a graph of the different parts of an individual pitch.

I recorded samples of various pitches after finishing the recording session for "Curly Maple Rag" and "Lancashire Rag" for Bryan Dykstra's "Neo Ragtime" CD.  

Since I'll be showing you several spectrographs, a short introduction is in order.

The horizontal axis of the graph shows the number of Hertz (or cycles per second) for every part of the sound.

The vertical axis shows the relative amplitude of the sound throughout its spectrum as measured in decibels.  Roughly speaking, this axis shows the strengths and weaknesses in a given pitch.

Resonance peaks or harmonics in the sound are represented by the peaks of the red "mountain range" in the graph.

Why is knowing about the strength of the harmonics in an individual pitch important?
Having at least a passing understanding of this is important because the timbre, focus, projection of your sound is directly related to the strength or weakness of the harmonic series for each pitch you play.

In this post I'm going to show you what the sound spectrum of a pitch played on a good reed looks like versus that played on a bad reed, loud dynamic, soft dynamic, sharp pitch versus in tune, etc.  I'm sure you'll find this interesting.

A couple of disclaimers before I start.

1.  I don't know how easy the graphs will be to read.  I'll try to crop, enlarge, label for easier reading.

2. I'm wading into deep waters with this subject and feel a little out of my league.  If I'm throwing around terms that any of you know more about than I do, please comment and help correct/amend my arguments!

Seeing My Sound

Words used by one person to describe sound may not mean the same thing to another.  While it is important to focus one’s thoughts when describing sound, I wondered if there was a way to present qualities in bassoon sound objectively.

The answer, as it turns out, is yes and no. 

In 1962, Paul Lehman recorded bassoonists from orchestras in Detroit, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Boston and Berlin in an attempt to discover what physical qualities characterize bassoon sound.  (The Structure of the Tone of theBassoon, Paul Robert Lehman, University of Michigan, 1962). His study recorded individual notes covering the full range of the bassoon at soft, medium and loud dynamics for all 11 bassoonists. The charts in the study show the strength of each partial for each note recorded. The results make fascinating reading.

      Below are some of the conclusions Lehman drew from the data in his study. 

•         There is a strong formant in the tone of the bassoon extending approximately from 440-494 cycles per second.

• There is also a weaker formant extending approximately 1220 to 1280 cycles.                                     
• The strongest partial in the spectrum is normally the one that lies closest to the center of the first formant.                                                                                                                                     
• The fundamental, except when it lies in the formant, tends to be relatively weak.

• Although there are significant variations in the pattern from one register to another and from one dynamic level to another, the envelope of the bassoon spectrum tends to rise steadily from the fundamental to the peak of the first formant and then descend slowly in a strongly skewed manner.       
• In general, fewer partials are present in a pianissimo tone than in the same tone played fortissimo. Also, fewer partials are present in a high tone than in a low tone of the same dynamic level.                  
• There is a marked drop in the relative energy of the partials above the first formant in the pianissimo tones as compared with the fortissimo tones. However, the partials below the first formant including the fundamental, tend to be somewhat stronger, relatively, at the pianissimo level.                                                                                                                                                   
  

In the summer of 2009 I recorded some music at SoundEngineers studio in Bentleyville, OH.  After one of the sessions, the engineer, Bruce Gigax, spent a few minutes with me recording individual notes in isolation.

I started with a very resonant note on the bassoon, c (Using Helmholtz’ system the C one octave below middle C on the piano). 

In these graphs, the high points are resonance peaks, corresponding with the frequency of each partial in the sound. Areas of solid color below the peaks can be described as “noise” in the sound that does not contribute directly to the recognition of the pitch in question.

As noted by Lehman, the fundamental is relatively weak with the second and third partials progressively stronger, rising to the peak of the fourth partial in the range of the first formant.

Compare this spectrum with my next sample, the same c played on a bad reed.   

This was a very dull and unresponsive reed. In this spectrum, the resonance peaks are particularly weak above the formant, whereas in the first spectrum they remain strong well into the 3000Hz range.

Here is a graph of both spectra.  The good reed is graphed in green, the bad in purple


Good reed = green
Bad reed = purple

You can see that after the first few harmonics, the bad reed loses resonance quickly with the peaks much lower than the good reed.  The good reed also keeps a much wider variance in peaks and valleys throughout. Perhaps this accounts for its clarity and focus?  

The next graph shows a “pp” c.

In the “pp” c, the resonance peaks and valleys are less stark than in the first c spectrum. This is especially true above the formant where the peaks appear as though they have been planed off. 

Below I plotted the spectrum for the c played at three different dynamics -- "pp", "mf" and "ff"

"pp" c = green
"ff" c = red
"mf" c = purple 

The big differences again come with the higher partials with the "pp" reed "flat lining" and the others maintaining more contrast in peaks and valleys.  Perhaps the fortissimo peaks a little higher in places than the mf. 

Next I sampled the same note c, but played it very sharp by squeezing the reed.

This spectrum looks very similar to the “pp” c, with a higher amount of “noise” in the sound and smaller resonance peaks, especially above the formant range.

Here's the sharp c compared with the regular c from the top of the blog.

sharp c = red
regular c = blue 

Following is the spectrum for c₁ or middle C on the piano.

Comparison to the lower C will show that the odd number partials are missing – appropriate because this note is played by fingering the lower C but leaving the bocal vent open, thus eliminating the fundamental.  Thus all harmonics for this note are based upon the first harmonic of the lower C.

Compare this c₁ to a vented c₁, played by opening the high C vent on the wing joint while closing the three tone holes on this joint.

Vented upper c = orange
upper c - blue

The vented c₁ loses contrast in the peaks and valleys in the higher partials, much as the “pp”  C and “sharp” C do when compared with the full C. There appears to be more “noise” in the sound in the higher partials. The resonance peaks in the vented C appear higher, though.

Moving on to other pitches, I chose a d-flat.  Known for its unfocused, stuffy and unstable quality, the resonance peaks are much more inconsistent in strength in this spectrum than in the “full” C.

The spectrum for B (low B) shows resonance peaks with very even strengths (only a little stronger in the formant range than the fundamental).  There is quite a lot of noise in the sound on this note. It is interesting to note that the harmonics of this note are so confusing that tuners often register this note as an F#!

Last is open F.  The open note on any instrument is always difficult to match with the tone of other notes on the instrument and open F on the bassoon is no exception.  It tends to have a simple, blaring tone.