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All about Clarinets / Re: An Interesting Italian Clarinet
« on: January 22, 2023, 11:35:26 PM »for me it looks like a Buffet Crampon, maybe a stencil, very commun in this historic times
Claus
You're right. I took a closer look at the pics and saw the donut key. I have only seen two other names attached to donut keys - Buffet Crampon, and M. Lacroix. I imagine you're correct with it being a Buffet Stencil. This would also mean that Buffet possibly stencilled M. Lacroix. The plot thickens!
That's quite interesting! I did not know Buffet used to do stencils. That would maybe explain explain why my clarinet, despite the bargain-bin barrel, sounds as good as it does. However, what's interesting about this one-piece full boehm is that the alternate C#-G# banana key is it's own separate tone hole; not connected to the usual C# key. Was this a feature on Buffet and M. Lacroix stencils like this? If so, It's a good feature because frankly it sounds better than the usual key.
Buffet stenciled clarinets for Carl Fischer in New York,
Keilwerth stenciled cheap clarinets for Buffet
Claus