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« on: January 26, 2018, 04:59:58 AM »
This is a bit of a long shot.
A friend of mine brought an old clarinet to the pub last night. It was marked "A Buffet - Paris".
Albert/simple system, 2 rings, patent C#, no rollers, very old fashioned straight LH pinky keys, straight speaker key. The throat G# key jumps over the A like a modern one but is not designed to be lifted by the A key. Unplated german silver keys with spring rivets/(screws?) showing on the tops of the keys.
As a guess I'd date it at around 1900, maybe a little earlier.
Does anyone know anything about these?
Clearly, it wasn't made by Auguste Buffet. Did the firm continue after his death? Phil has one marked "Auguste Buffet" on the clarinet pages which he thinks was by Couesnon but that is way later than this example.
It's in surprisingly good condition for it's age, no cracks or shakes, just a little surface damage at one point where it looks like someone's scratched it with a screwdriver and some holes where the thumbrest has been replaced. It plays a bit but we only had some 1 1/2 reeds that were far too soft.
Does anyone know anything about it?
There was a book in the case. "How to play the Clarionet [sic]" by Archie Gibbon 1929. Despite saying clarionet on the cover it's spelt "clarinet" inside.
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