Moeck Historical Woodwinds

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04/14/10

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05/03/2010

After much consideration, Moeck has ultimately decided after four decades, to close their department, "Renaissance and Baroque Woodwind Instruments".

Without exception, making these instruments involves even today, extensive and complicated work by hand and demands an incredibly high level of manual skill, precision and experience from the instrument makers, besides indispensable expertise acquired over decades.

Despite all Moeck's efforts, the number of customers and people interested in these unusual instruments has always remained small. Moeck's idealism always weighed in favor of their production and keeping tradition alive as opposed to the dictates of economy.

However, both the employees entrusted with the making of these instruments are now taking their well-earned retirement. Thus the point in time has arrived where Moeck is discontinuing the production of these instruments, which were always more admired rather than acquired.

Moeck has not taken this decision lightly as the crumhorns, the shawns, the cornets, and all the other instruments represent more than 500 hundred years of European history of music and culture.

Moeck's recorder production is in no way affected by this decision.

Moeck will gladly continue to deliver high quality recorders according to diverse requirements, whether they be recorders for beginners, ensemble or solo instruments, historical reproductions or innovative new developments.

Contrary to rumors, Moeck is not going out of business. They are just discontinuing their reed instruments. They still are making recorders and plan to keep doing this for many years, as another generation of Moecks is preparing to take over the business.

NLA= No longer available

Moeck Historical Woodwinds

Jellyfish, Monterey Bay Aquarium, December 2004; Bill Lazar

 sounding in C, transposing in G
3 brass keys,
Design: Gerd Figge and Hanns-Peter Wagner

For a long time woodwind and brass players have been looking for a suitable beginner's instrument - besides the recorder - for children from the age of 6. We now present our idea of a clarinet for beginners which may perhaps remind some people of the chalumeau, the historical predecessor of the clarinet. The embouchure is more suitable for children than the normal clarinet, whereby we use rubber for the mouthpiece.

Determined by childrens' lip muscles and taking into account the change to second teeth, the pressure from the mouth had to be calculated in such a way that good intonation could be maintained. This was achieved by modifying the chamber, the table and the thickness of the reed as well as lengthening the mouthpiece so that normal Vandoren Bb clarinet reeds (German cut) with 1.5 and 2 thicknesses could be used. The ligature bracket consists of a milled screw and a pressure plate of rubber and brass. By this means the reed is pressed onto the mouthpiece table with a constant pressure. Changing reeds is very simple.

The wood chosen for this instrument is either the relatively hard plumwood or ebony. The closely-placed finger holes are a concession to childrens' hands playing on the soprano clarinet. It is no larger than a soprano recorder and is lightweight to hold. As a transposing instrument it prepares the way very simply for the larger Bb clarinet. As an instrument sounding in C one uses the fingering in the lower octave as on the recorder. One can use our soprano clarinet in place of a baroque chalumeau (which originally has a range of only an eleventh and does not overblow) and with original literature for that instrument. One can also use it in ensemble with other instruments, particularly with recorders and especially for classical, pop and jazz music.

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