Anybody play the clarinet?

[MrsMuddle]

If so, how often do you change the reed? I feel like DS is going through one a day at the moment! How long should one last?

I'm guessing he's just started playing so on quite a soft reed? IIRC (and this is going a loooonnnng way back) a soft reed would last 1-2 weeks. Is he being careful with it, putting the cap on properly and not splitting it?

Tbh, like I said, I'm trying to remember 20yrs ago to when I'd just started so that might not be much help now!

it's how long is a piece of string really!

with children, the reeds tend to get dirtier than they do with adults/more experienced players. so, play with clean teeth/not just after eating etc., also clean hands etc before handling the clarinet. And as Ros says, get him to be v.careful not to break them (it's very easy)

he will no doubt be on soft reeds and they do go a bit quicker as they get very soggy. it's worth having a few and rotating them, leaving the unused ones on a piece of glass or similar surface to dry out - that way you can often reuse them

Same here- I used to go through them every couple of weeks when I used very soft reeds, and that is with (ahem) minimal practising. Different makes varied though IIRC, some were more brittle than others.

I had one of these which meant I could have a couple of reeds on the go and rotate them round

If he is just nipping bits off the end you could trim them with a reed cutter. Only take a tiny bit off otherwise the reed will become too hard for him to blow - though he may get a better tone out of it. Most likely he isn't holding the clarinet properly when not playing and catching it on his sweater. Try training him to replace the cap as soon as he stops playing .

Whenever mine went gooey or I broke it - week or so I guess? Depends how much I played.

Is he actually breaking them, or is there any chance he simply likes playing with a new reed in preference to a used one? I adored having new reeds when I first started to play; they always felt much nicer to play when they were fresh out of the box, and you lose that very quickly with a soft reed once you've spat all over it for a short while!

dd changes it every 2weeks or so I suppose. Not sure. She gets reeds in boxes via her teacher, rather than buying the one at a time, so I don't really notice how many she's getting through.

you can also buy 'reed rush' with which you can gently sand off the worst of the mank that accumulates on them (ewwwwwwwwwwww) so they last longer

Thanks, everyone, for posting on what I thought would possibly be the most boring question ever asked on mumsnet! He has a 30 minute lesson per week and practises maybe twice or three times, and he says he uses one reed a fortnight.

For the past week, they've been practising for 2 or 3 periods in the run-up to a concert, so he's going through more.

On the back of this thread, I looked up the price to buy reeds on the internet, and found I can get a box of 10 for half the price that I'm paying in the music shop, so that's good.

I'm going to tell him to let them dry out on a piece of glass, so thanks for that tip MJC, and I've just bought him that reed case from Ebay, rosmincepieater.

Thanks again everyone.