Necessity of Introducing Courses on Reedmaking in Oboe Education in Conservatories
Ayşe SezerKonservatuvarlardaki Obua Eğitiminde Kamış Yapımının Müfredata Dahil Edilmesi Gerekliliği
Ayşe SezerReedmaking is at the center of teaching and performing aspects of oboists’ skills as other critical matters in the profession. It is a complicated process and education to obtain a reed that fits well to the artist’s tone preferences. We cannot overestimate the impact of the quality of the reed on the performance of the player. It is a fairly difficult task to produce one. When it comes to reedmaking there are many factors that are considered: The texture of the reed is easily affected by the physical conditions of the air in the setting, one needs a reed that is a good fit for the performer’s mouth and teeth and that suits well to the desired tone. Because of the various number of parameters, one can often fail to obtain a reed of the same quality even after applying the exact same procedures. Given this complexity, to master this reedmaking one needs to commit just as much to learn how to play it with skill. It is a crucial part of oboe education that a student has the skills to produce a reed in accordance with the tone preferences and the position of the mouth. Despite the significance of reedmaking learning in overall oboe education, there are not many studies on reedmaking pedagogy.
In this study, I examine the previous dissertations on oboe reed, oboe reedmaking and its education in Turkish Higher Education Council Thesis Center and Proquest database. I have sampled 15 dissertations from these sources. A search based on the keyword oboe through Turkish Higher Education Council Thesis Center yielded 16 theses and only 3 of them mentioned oboe- reedmaking and its significance. In the Proquest database, they are 220 theses classified under the titles oboe, oboe reed and reedmaking and only 12 mentioned reed making. In these studies, it is set as an eventual goal that oboists should be able to make their own reed and until then it is considered to be their teachers’ responsibility to provide reeds that students need. In these sources, reed is given the due credit for its effect on the performance and some techniques of reed making are reviewed. In one study, it is looked at how and with what means reedmaking is thought in schools.
It is concluded that there is no method on the pedagogy of reedmaking that would help teachers with learning strategies and levels of learning outcomes in this area. Reedmaking is not a part of the curriculum in music schools. Furthermore, there is no proposed method for reedmaking education in the literature. It should be noted that there are many different styles in reedmaking and reedmaking education and there is no unique way to make a good reed. The sources that are available now focus more on the technical details of reedmaking and overlook the pedagogical aspects of the education. Reedmaking education methods are not unified and vary greatly among teachers, students, and institutions.
As a conclusion, I propose that a reedmaking course should be a part of the curriculum and a unified education method should be developed in reedmaking. It is the teachers’ responsibility to describe how to make a reed and make the student capable in making a reed that can be played comfortably and can produce sounds that fit well to the tone preferences and the mouth position. Especially in our country, in every school where oboe is taught reedmaking should also be taught and this should be done in a systematic way through a well-planned curriculum. To this end, a method book can be realized that would serve as a textbook. My work is an attempt to help fill the gap in the literature and I hope that it will stimulate more research in this direction.
