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10 Posts
I've been using Vandoren's blue box reeds for about 6 years now, and I've had an odd problem with the last two boxes I've bought:
-The reeds have been consistently airy and resistant, even after being soaked, "broken in," sandpapered, etc... doesn't change a thing!
-The print on the reed is brown, as opposed to the usual black print. This could be irrelevant, but I've been skeptical about it. The Vandoren website is alerting its customers of "fake reeds" being sold. Is this a possibility?
-The print on the back is at a different elevation than the rest of the reed, preventing it from being ALL of the way on the mouthpiece. Oddly, even after I sandpaper them (be it softly or roughly), it just will not even out like I need it to.
Coincidentally, EVERY SINGLE one of these reeds have been very difficult to even BEGIN to play on! I've bought two boxes from the same store over the course of the past 4 or 5 months. Just recently I went to another store down the road, and got a normal blue box. They had the same-old black print. They sounded great!
On another note, I've bought boxes of the individually-packaged reeds, and they've sounded lovely until these last two boxes.
Has anybody else encountered these problems? Are they fake? Defective? Do I have to keep these other nine unopened reeds that I know are going to match the rest? Any help, suggestions, or ideas would be greatly appreciated!
Steve
-The reeds have been consistently airy and resistant, even after being soaked, "broken in," sandpapered, etc... doesn't change a thing!
-The print on the reed is brown, as opposed to the usual black print. This could be irrelevant, but I've been skeptical about it. The Vandoren website is alerting its customers of "fake reeds" being sold. Is this a possibility?
-The print on the back is at a different elevation than the rest of the reed, preventing it from being ALL of the way on the mouthpiece. Oddly, even after I sandpaper them (be it softly or roughly), it just will not even out like I need it to.
Coincidentally, EVERY SINGLE one of these reeds have been very difficult to even BEGIN to play on! I've bought two boxes from the same store over the course of the past 4 or 5 months. Just recently I went to another store down the road, and got a normal blue box. They had the same-old black print. They sounded great!
On another note, I've bought boxes of the individually-packaged reeds, and they've sounded lovely until these last two boxes.
Has anybody else encountered these problems? Are they fake? Defective? Do I have to keep these other nine unopened reeds that I know are going to match the rest? Any help, suggestions, or ideas would be greatly appreciated!
Steve