[Harp-L] Flat Reeds

["Aongus Mac Cana" <amaccana@xxxxxxxxxx>]

I would not totally rule out the possibility of Q.C.(quality control) issues
when it comes to reed failure.
I have not played hard enough (or to be honest frequentlty enough) to "do
in" reeds over a period of fifty years.
However I have had three G reeds (in the upper octave) fail on two Seydel
harps recently. The first one failed on a regular Seydel blues hsrp (in G)
which had been my constant companion and regular instrument for Irish trad
sessions for a few years. 
As I had subjected this instrument to fairly long use and abuse I wrote the
failure off to fair wear and tear. I replaced it with a Seydel 1847 whose
stainless steel reeds have so far proved "bullet proof".
Last year I was tempted to buy a Seydel 12 hole Solist in the key of G with
solo tuning which I thought would be a super weapon for Irish Traditional
sessions and as pocket friendly as my trusty 1847. So it proved, but
unfortunately the G reed in blow 9 went Kaput in the first week. 
Seydel Germany with their characteristic service and efficiency replaced the
reed without charge. Alas hanged if the G reed in blow 8 did not go flat in
the same way in a matter of days! I had not the nerve to go back to Seydel
for a second helping of their good will and decided that I willl have to get
myself some reeds and start replacing them myself - something I should have
learned how to do years ago.
What made me suspect that reeds at this end of the G harp may be 'marginal'
is that Seydel could not supply the solo tuned G harp with D in blow 11 -
only D#. They said that this was because that particular D reed would be too
low for comfort and subject to early failure. Also when I considered
suplementing my G harp with a similar solo tuned instrument in D, I noticed
from the Seydel harp configurator that a lot of the required notes were not
available - presumably for similar reasons of reed fragility.
In spite of this unfortunate experience Seydel remains my harmonica of
choice. I like the way they play and I like their customer service. One of
these days I will invest in a Super Chromatic in G.
Beannachtaí
Aongus Mac Cana