When you tweak a reed to play fantastic and the tip gets weak or damaged, clipping the tip will give extra life to the reed.

When my reeds sound bad I just rub them in the gravel for a minute and afterwards they sound great! 😀

I found out that just wiping my reed with some very very very soft sandpaper is a game-changer!

I love sitting down with a bunch of cheap Ricos, rating each for fatness of tone and ease of playing, picking the gems, and seeing which of the rest can be rescued like this for spares.

Anyone see his shirt? Amazing Jay!

At first I thought all these would be boring to do but then his shirt convinced me.

hats off the all you woodwind and brass guys that have to deal with reeds and actually putting things in your mouth to get a sound. it's annoying enough for me to change my guitar strings, i can't imagine dealing with reeds and mouthpieces...

Lol that t-shirt has me cracking up

My instructor taught me to use some sand paper and sand down along the top and sides. I had medium reeds at the time.

I love the tune accompanying your video. Can your provide the credits and whether or not it's commercially available somewhere? Thanks, Norm.

I want to buy a Reed Geek so I can mangle more of my $$$ reeds. Great tool, user error is a thing.

If you drill a hole at the top of the reed it sounds amazing

What’s the name of the track you have playing over the video?????

I’ve burned many reeds and they have turned out to be very playable. I would only recommend to that on the plasticover reeds though

Hahaha, I tried the flame trick and had a reed or two go up in flame… An 800 grit nail file works just fine in order to clip or reshape the tip of a reed. Just make sure you work on a dry reed. I will add that polishing a new reed using a burnishing paper or cloth ( 15um to 10um grit) makes it feel so much better and resist water logging; tricks you learn hanging out with concert clarinet players…

New to the saxophone and I had no idea a reed could be too soft🤧

I needed this

I just use every reed I get from the box as long as possible. 😝😝😝

Good one !

I love your shirt❤😂

Can’t you do all of this with a drill bit from your local hardware store and some sandpaper for cheaper?

i find it hard to get my hands on reed clippers

saxophones seem cool but i just cant do a reeded instrument lol, mouthpiece or emb hole pls

People do crazy stuff with their reeds, I heard this guy saying once he put his reed in the microwave because it was too hard...LOL it burnt of course.. :/ Reed Geek is a must have, I was a bit skeptical at first, but it works. I used in a bunch of reeds that I thought it was going to be impossible to play with.

And this is why I've used plastic Reeds for the Last 30 years.

Yup, most of what I was taught to tweak reeds in college. Works on clarinet too. I used dried reed rush plant and ultra fine sand paper. A flat piece of glass and a little water are also helpful to check how flat the table is.

Hi! Any tips on cutting synthetic reeds? Super présentation ultra-groove, Jay!

I like the shirt

nice t-shirt :)

Hemke reeds were the best reeds to me

my reed always works

Where can I get that T-shirt?

If your dip your reed in Clorox, it works like a charm

*Laughs in brass*

Thought for a moment you were going to smoke the reed!

I dollar for the name of this track - Anyone? Way cool. Its a shame you can't save these clips.

The bic trick works with 2 coins

🤣🤣recuerdo que en el colegio, no tenia para comprárme una nueva, así que la tuve que hacer yo mismo, usando una moneda de 20... mas tarde supe que pasó de 2/2 a 4 . estuve asi por un año entero🤣🤣🤣

What does stuffy means?

What song is that?

My SYOS mpc and plastic reed won't sustain a suck for a second, but they play easier, cleaner and better than any other mpc/reed combo I have.

Go Legere reed, still using cane is pure nostalgia.

Sidewinder??? 🤔

I’m getting a high pitch noise when going between notes and only happens on a brass mouthpiece, why?

With reeds that have gone a bit soft, I have a couple of the same mouthpieces with different tip openings, one narrower than the other, so I just move the softer reed to the wider tip and it usually plays well for a while on that. I do that with Legere reeds since they are synthetic and don't adjust the same way as cane reeds can be adjusted. PLus I don't like the idea of shaving off bits of plastic and having potentially shavings of plastic left behind, in my mouth.

The lipping thing looks like a torture device

I learned that in elementary school. I was told to use a quarter.

I uhh just play until it sounds good? I didnt know there were ways to "modify" the reed 🤷‍♀️

Hi Better Sax So I've been playing sax for at least a year now and I've been seeing that at the bottom of my lip gets raw. Here are my questions: What am I doing wrong to do that? Am I playing sax to much? Am I pressing my embouchure to hard on the reed?

A saxophone player at an honor band having reed problems and me an oboist offering to fix it and the other kid let’s me and then after playing on it he said I was a game changer

The reed burning 😢

Tenor sax reed on a alto has changed the game for me…. I also never get bad vandoren reeds. Like never. They all work great and I never have stuffiness or any of that. I honestly don’t scrape em clip or anything. Like one in 20 may not be great at hitting lower altissimo but that’s it.

I just use Legere.

His shirt

Why portrait mode (vertical) instead of landscape (horizontal)?

I break like atleast 2 reeds every week

And Royale are not same as what Rico royale produced. The guys say it's same but I have heavy doubts. Should stick to guitar strings d addario.

I went to 4 years of college originally starting as a music performance major. This kind of content was not available then. I am SO angry at the piece of crap tenured loser that was supposedly over the sax/clarinet students. The man was absolutely worthless. If he showed up to lessons at all, he was late. Didn't answer questions. Didnt provide tips or solutions for using the instruments. No assistance with figuring out the difficult nuances. Amd most insulting is he would just give all of his students B grades. The good, the bad, whatever. I ended up switching majors keeping music as a minor. But this guy absolutely ruined my musical experience freaking turd burger if a human. Obviously not all of us are going to be Kenny freaking G. But come on! Why the hell was I NEVER taught how to maintain or fix a reed like this?? It's so simple its almost insulting! Thank you for sharing this kind of content to help your fellow musicians. The musical spark may be dead for me but this is definitely going to help break down some barriers for others! Good on you sir, please keep it up for them.

i dont even play the saxophone, why am I here. I'm a brass player...

nice ad.

Just buy a new reed

Or you can get a new reed

Imagine needing a reed to play your instrument -trumpet player

You can't make a shit reed sound good when it's weak timber from the start. Don't try it

Legere

Or get a good synthetic and be done with all that nonsense.

😂

Flute is by far the easiest instrument to maintain... There is no maintenance.