The good ones are very good. Suitable to play anywhere.
That may be true, or that may be wrong. That Auction Site Whose Name I Constantly Manage To Forget has a lot of stuff on offer, some gems, and a lot of rubbish. If you have the time, navigate to clarinuts.com and check out their prices. I heard a lot of praise about them, and I compare their prices to what is on sale on These Auction Sites, just to get a rough idea of a "market price".augustgarage said:One thing to consider though, is that to keep a clarinet in top playing condition, you may need to invest a fair amount of money in the instrument's upkeep. This is especially true of some cheaper instruments in "working condition," that in fact need quite a bit of initial repair. Be cautious, especially if you are going to pull one off of ebay...
If you can find a Noblet that doesn't need much if any work initially for <$200, go for it. The ones I tend to see are a little bit more than that:amhso said:Thanks for the quick reply. I am not willing to spend more than 200 on the actual clarinet, since I see so many good deals out there. Since flute is my main instrument, I'm putting more money into savings and for a pro or semi-pro piccolo.
So far I have repadded every clarinet I bought off That Site. Just because. And I'm very generous re recorking too, so the "plays" argument is moot for me. As you work in a music shop, try to lure one of the techs into showing you how a repad is done (it isn't all that complicated).amhso said:I work part time at a music shop (...) I read a lot of auctions and sales of such that say they may require repadding in the near future, but they currently play well.
I'm only a very part-time musician and no expert, but I just have to jump in because I have one of the aforementioned BC20s, which a friend purchased for me in France in the early 1970's. (It was a bargain back then).Another dark horse is the BC20 model, which is the pre cursor to the RC. These can still be got at a reasonable price and will absolutely amaze you when you play one. It is identical in bore to the RC model. They are very rare but look hard and you may find one.
I have to say, I've learned more about saxophones in the year since joining this forum than in all the gazillion years that went before. And the same goes for other woodwinds as well. Fascinating, and thanks! I'm not in my home city right now, but when I get home I'll look at the serial number. I think it does in fact have an F. Thanks again.The BC20 is a pre cursor to the RC, not the R13. You will find that the BC20 usually has the F in front of the serial number denoting the French market models. The bore is larger than an R13, a very different type of bore which gets rid of most of the typical R13 intonation foibles.