Leblanc Classic

Thanks to Melody for giving me the opportunity to see this instrument. Her research indicates that it was made sometime in the 1950s.

Only the LH joint has “Classic” marked.

Serial #9777

Barrel: 66.5mm (somewhat too long for many playing situations)

Bore LH joint top: 14.8mm

Bore LH joint at bottom: 14.9mm

Intonation results taken when playing loud and not lipping. See how to interpret these results on the Wooden Clarinets main page.

This test was made with the too long barrel. I needed to pull out in the center almost 2mm, although that helped very little. It may have contributed to the low High Register.

Intonation summary: I get much different results if I use a real cane reed rather than my favorite Legere reed, that is I am able to play all the flat notes in tune. But as a result, many of the perfectly in tune notes in my test then go sharp. Even though this was probably made as a professional model instrument, by today's standards, it is an intermediate level instrument.

Key work quality: Superb. This has cool wavey-shaped right trill keys (pictured below), and very unusual separate posts for the Aflat/Eflat (above).

The C#/G# key also has the end post separate from the one next to it. Only the higher level Leblancs have this feature.

This clarinet is most appropriate for: Intermediate to fairly advanced musicians.

I was surprised that this style case was used before 1960.

The clarinet also had the L ligature.