BassoonSong

All too often, the wires of the bassoon reed are overlooked when adjusting reeds. However, unlike scraping the blades, you can actually undo wire adjustments. When I was teaching, I would teach my students about adjusting the wires before anything else. Please note: always put the reed on your good holding mandrel to adjust the wires.

I have about 8-10 reeds that I rotate for practicing. Playing them once a week or less keeps those reeds in shape for months, even a year. However, the weather changes, and the cane shrinks. If you think your reed is getting old and soft, check the wires. Mark Eubanks taught me much of what I know about reeds. I agree with Mark that the second wire needs to be tight (I use 60/40 nichrome 22 gauge wire for the second wire.) Our theory is that there's a variable "vibrating chamber" between the first and second wires (unlike the mouthpiece of a clarinet or saxophone, which is a fixed vibrating chamber), and the actual bore of the bassoon begins in the reed at the second wire. Sometimes, a sinking middle "E" (first finger, LH) can be corrected by tightening a loose second wire. Or a slightly flat tenor register can be brought to pitch. In Mark's theory, the first wire should be snug, but not tight. If the first wire is too tight, it chokes the vibrations of the reed, causing the lower register to go sharp, and muffling the sound of the bassoon.

We all know (or should know) how the wires function to control the tip opening. (First wire of course is intuitive, second wire works just the opposite; rounding the wire closes the tip, flattening opens the tip). But did you know these:
• Flattening the wires lowers the pitch slightly, brightens the sound, and takes resistance out of the reed.
• Rounding the wires raises the pitch, darkens the sound, and puts resistance into the reed.
And best of all, these adjustments can be undone if need be!

Incidentally, most of the late Mordecai Rechtman's reedmaking system is to flatten the wire according to a custom mandrel to make the reed easy-blowing (Rieger sells it). Rechtman claimed that his mandrel followed the taper of the bocal. Since I like a reed with very little resistance, I'm using Rechtman's mandrel. Lately, I've run into a problem where the tip of the reed closes too much by playing. I've found that rounding the tube between the first and second wires (using my forming pliers) helps keep the tip open. (Also beveling the cane more aggressively, but that's a different mini-article.)

Hope this helps, especially bassoonists who are just beginning to adjust reeds.

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Happy Holidays! Here's my bassoon-centric holiday greeting, "Bassoon it Will Be Christmas." Yes, that's the amazing Keith Bunke on first bassoon. This was filmed just a few years before he won the Chicago Symphony job. Keith was an amazing player as a teenager. The other two bassoonists aren't exactly chopped liver either. Kyle Olsen went on to study at Rice University, and I believe Anna Black went to Julliard. I haven't kept up with either of them though.

Jim Stephenson: Bassoon It Will Be Christmas Bassoon It Will Be Christmas, by James StephensonPortland Youth Philharmonic Hattner, Conductor and Music DirectorKeith Buncke, PYP Alumnus, Ba...

My apologies for this page being inactive for the past few months. While I’m thinking of what to post in 2026, I thought I’d say a few words for any of you playing multiple performances of Nutcracker in the orchestra pit. If you’re struggling with the triplet/duplet passage in Act one (“Lighting the Christmas Tree”), you’re not alone. I learned it for an audition for the local ballet orchestra. I brought it to my coach, Mark Eubanks. I won’t repeat what Mark said about the person who put this excerpt on the list. ;-) Mark told me that we had played several shows of Nutcracker, and kept a scorecard. Mark got a point if he didn’t flub the passage, and Tchaikovsky got the point if he did flub. I later read that Barrick Stees (retired associate principal bassoon, Cleveland Orchestra) also kept score when he was playing Nutcracker as well! Later, Mark taught me some alternate fingerings (ask me) that make this passage (and a similarly tricky passage in Stravinsky’s L’histoire du Soldat) much easier. But I learned the hard way. I was not asked to play this excerpt, and I didn’t get the gig.

Also, a word to those playing continuo on the other holiday classic, Handel’s “Messiah.” I would use lots of breath support and a relaxed embouchure. It’s long, unless you’re playing a baroque bassoon, you can’t play out too much.

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“Breathe from the diaphragm,” beginning bassoonists are told over and over and over again. Unfortunately, this oft-repeated piece of advice is neither helpful nor anatomically correct.

The diaphragm moves involuntarily; breathing happens apart from our control. Technically, every breath is “from the diaphragm.” What we mean, and what we should say, is to “allow a low breath—your lungs will fill—and support the sound with your abdominal muscles.”

I didn’t learn proper support until I took classical singing lessons in my 30s. Classical singers must all their lungs to fill and support the airflow to the vocal folds. Unlike reeds, the vocal folds at medium volume and medium pitch take little pressure to vibrate and have little to no resistance. With the bassoon, we have built in resistance in the narrow throat of the reed (and if you play resistant reeds, you have that much more resistance to blow through).

For a proper singer’s breath, the chest is expanded, the abdominal muscles relax, and the breath drops in and fills the chest cavity. Bassoonists should aim for that same relaxed breath, where the abs release and the breath “drops in” quickly and efficiently.

In Italian, they refer to breath support as appoggio, to lean (or appoggiare, leaning). I like that image. Leaning has to do with a firm, steady framework that keeps the air moving. I would tell my students to imagine the air in a big balloon (your lungs) and the balloon has pressure on all sides to release the air. If the chest is expanded, we have the added advantage of some very strong muscles that the air is “leaning on,” the intercostals (between the ribs). Support comes when you can coordinate the intercostals and the abdominal muscles so they’re working in tandem. The chest shouldn’t collapse too quickly, nor should the abdominals push too hard. The idea is to keep a full, steady stream of air flowing at the correct speed for the pitch you’re playing. The back muscles at the bottom of the rib cage also come into play. In fact, when I’m in shape and play for a long time, my back gets sore long before my embouchure gives out!

Note: my wife, a speech pathologist specializing in voice, double checked the terminology and physiology and provided me with the diagram below, by William Shearer.

For both the aspiring and seasoned musician, I think it’s important to be inspired by other musicians, and not necessarily other bassoonists. When I was in music school, I drew inspiration not just from listening to my teacher, Sherman Walt, play. That clarinetist who sat to his right was fabulous. I’m speaking of Harold Wright, principal clarinetist of the Boston Symphony from 1970 until his sudden and untimely death in 1993.

Harold Wright could and did draw infinite shades of dynamics, color, and nuance from the clarinet. I could only listen and think, “I wish I could do that on the bassoon.” The mid-1970s Boston Symphony recording of Sibelius’ 1st Symphony is worth seeking out just for Wright’s playing of the opening solo, grading the dynamics from a barely audible pianissimo to a noble forte, singing the line, and capturing all the melancholy that Sibelius wrote into the score. (The rest of the recording is excellent as well. Sir Colin Davis was perhaps the greatest Sibelius conductor of his generation, and the BSO plays like a house on fire for him.)

I’m sharing a live, Boston Symphony Chamber Players recording of the first movement (Andante) of Mozart’s Kegelstatt Trio (K. 498) for Viola, Clarinet, and Piano. Wright’s collaborators are the excellent Gilbert Kalish on piano and the near-legendary Samuel Rhodes (44 years with the Juilliard Quartet) on viola. In the clarinet’s first entrance, the attack is perfectly poised, effortless, and fully under control. Throughout, Wright phrases with understated elegance and nuance. It’s a recording to cherish. I hope you find it inspiring as well.

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Our third bassoonist in the singing Firebird Berceuse series is Sherman Walt, principal bassoonist of the Boston Symphony from 1954–1989 (and for a few years before that, he was principal bassoonist of the Chicago Symphony).

Of the three, Sherman Walt was not only one of my teachers, but I heard him play “The Firebird” live. His playing was magical; the Berceuse was a lullaby that enchanted not only the evil Katschei of the ballet, but the audience as well.

This recording, consisting of the entire ballet, was made in 1984 in Symphony Hall with Seiji Ozawa conducting and captures some of the magic of hearing Sherman Walt live.

I daresay I could go on with at least two more bassoonists, Bernard Garfield and Leonard Sharrow, if there is a recording of him playing “Firebird.” Both of them were extraordinary players who made the bassoon “sing.”

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For professional bassoonists preparing for a busy season, it’s cane-processing time! I understand that those of you who process your own cane will try to process at least 200 pieces of good cane to provide you with blanks and reeds for the season. For those of you with reed-making businesses, it’s always cane-processing time. I don’t process my cane because I barely play professionally and I sustained a repetitive stress injury from computer use and a tricky clarinet part I had to learn in a week (my clarinet playing isn’t worth mentioning beyond that.)

I have a dear friend who has a Doctorate in Physical Therapy. He agreed to watch a couple of videos, one on gouging cane, the other on profiling cane, so that he could make suggestions for avoiding repetitive stress injuries. His thoughts are below:

I had a chance to review both videos… I did observe noticeable hyperextension (1) in the wrists and fingers during the activity. This positioning can increase strain on the joints and soft tissues and may contribute to repetitive strain injuries over time.

To help mitigate this risk, I recommend avoiding hyperextension and maintaining a more neutral (2) wrist and finger alignment whenever possible. It’s also important to incorporate regular breaks to allow the muscles and connective tissues time to recover.

In addition, I would suggest integrating the following into the routine to support joint health and function:
· Stretching – Gentle stretching of the forearm flexors and extensors after activity can help reduce muscle tightness and promote flexibility.
· Strengthening exercises – Targeted exercises for the intrinsic and extrinsic hand muscles, as well as forearm musculature, can improve joint stability and endurance.
· Nerve gliding techniques – Median and ulnar nerve flossing (3) can help maintain neural mobility and reduce the risk of nerve-related discomfort from repetitive tasks.

Medical terms (this is BassonSong again):

1. Hyperextension occurs when you move a joint beyond its normal range of motion, and often in an opposite manner. For example, elbows move towards the body, but severe hyperextension occurs when you move the elbows away from the body, beyond their normal range of motion.

2. Neutral positioning occurs when the joints are at rest, in a normal position.

3. The median nerve provides motor and sensory function to the forearms, wrists, and hands. The ulnar nerve is one of the longest nerves in the body, running alongside the long bones of the forearm. Injuries to the ulnar nerve are common. Nerve flossing or gliding stretches the nerves in a healthy way. Don’t do these exercises if the nerves are inflamed! (Link to exercise in comments.) Link to the exercises in the comments.

I resisted long tones. For nearly 50 years. Long tones are boring. I got my long tones in when I played cantabile, particularly Marcel Moyse’s “Tone Development Through Interpretation” (a great book that I hope will be redone for bassoonists who haven’t taught themselves to play treble clef down an octave at sight). And I could always practice the soft attacks separately.

I’m now playing long tones as part of my daily routine, going through the full Kamins-Herzberg on at least one note a day. Why? Well, first of all, the attack is important. Ben Kamins would say that most of our playing is entrances. Entrances need to be on time and in tempo. Having a responsive reed and knowing how the reed will respond to your articulation are key to being on time, in tempo, and at the proper dynamic level. Long tone practice (see link below) includes practicing attacks at both pianissimo and fortissimo.

More importantly, as David McGill (former principal bassoonist, Chicago Symphony and Cleveland Orchestra), in his highly recommended book, “Sound in Motion,” argues: music is always going somewhere dynamically. Phrases have micro-dynamics. McGill gives us Marcel Tabuteau’s music by the numbers, volume from 1 (softest) to 9 (loudest), and how to move a phrase. If you want to make the bassoon sing, you have to consider the shape of the phrase, which means swelling and diminishing from softest to loudest, and vice versa. Long tone practice gives you the dynamic control to do that and make the bassoon sing.

Also consider the following: you just might have to play someday under a conductor who just doesn’t like to hear the bassoon in the Orchestra. The Oregon Symphony had such a conductor (nameless, to protect the guilty), and the valiant bassoon section at that time, Carin Miller, Adam Trussel, and Evan Kuhlmann, all deserve praiseworthy mention for a) being fine bassoonists, and b) being able to deliver extremely quiet bassoon playing over several seasons.

Back to the long tones, I practice the long part of the long tones to a count of 9, (1-9 swelling and 9-1 diminishing, then reverse 9 to 1 back to 9) so that I know where the Tabuteau numbers are, if I ever need to refer to them. (Incidentally, equally legendary oboist Robert Bloom, a Tabuteau student, denigrated the numbers as being for people who weren’t inherently musical. Just FYI). Below is the link from William Short’s excellent teaching page.

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The best bit of reed advice I ever heard was at a virtual seminar being taught by William (“Billy”) Short, the fabulous co-principle bassoonist in the equally fabulous Metropolitan Opera Orchestra.

He spoke about the “point of release,” that point in your reed making where you realize that nothing you can do is going to make that reed usable. To that, I add: the sooner you get to that point, the better! Less heartache, less stress, and there’s always hope that the next reed will be better.

Ben Kamins (one of Mr. Short’s teachers, and someone I’ve known for nearly 50 years, but from whom I had one or two lessons) says, “A good piece of cane is one that responds to the work you do to it.” If you scrape, and the reed doesn’t change, toss it! Or if you scrape, and it changes, but then changes back in minutes, it’s the same thing. Toss it! You can’t make a good reed from a bad piece of cane.

Using GSP cane as I’ve done, I know from bitter experience that if the gouge is uneven, or—in an eccentric profile where the profile creates a spine—if the spine is off center in the profile, it will never, ever, make a good reed. I evaluate and toss, if necessary.

A personal note: I like to cook. Years ago, I took a sushi-making class. Our class learned to make sushi in a few hours. I found out that in Japan, sushi chefs apprentice for seven years. The long apprenticeship? It’s to determine the quality of the fish! Bad fish = bad sushi. I wish bassoon teachers would give more help on determining the quality of the cane. In that sense, bassoonists who have the time and healthy joints (no repetitive stress injuries!) have an advantage: in working with tube cane, they can determine early on what makes for a good piece of cane.