Visit to the Vandoren factory

[Geoff Roach]

Sometimes things are right under your nose and you don't see it. This
happened to me last week. I have an apartment in Le Lavandou, France where I
go to crash and enjoy the sun. Le Lavandou in in the Var between St. Tropez
and Toulon right on the coast. Knowing that almost all reeds come from the
Var, I thought it rather amusing that I could drive around and see the stuff
growing everywhere. Anyway, I am down there last week and I am on my way to
buy some wine at a local winery in the next town - Bormes Les Mimosas
(maybe to go with Barone's cooking - not). I have driven this road dozens
of times and for the first time, I see a sign - Vandoren Paris.

I turn into the parking lot and go inside. It turns out that this plant in
this marvelous village on the Mediterranean coast is where all Vandoren
reeds, mouthpieces, and accessories are made. Vandoren employes 170 people
at that location. I spent a few minutes with Jean-Louis René, the head of
quality for Vandoren. It turns out he is a classical clarinet player, 20
year veteran of Vandoren, one of the developers of the new M15 clarient
mouthpiece, and a genuninely nice guy. We talked about reeds, mouthpieces,
music, and such. I even received an explanation of the different cuts of
Vandoren reeds and things.

BTW, the myth that the French keep all the great reeds and we Americans get
the left-overs is not true. Same cane, same reeds, same boxes - at least in
this case.

I took a few pictures of the factory and posted them at the location below.
There is no page directly you to the pictures, but if enter these exactly in
your browser, they will appear.

www.cosmobrands.com/vandor1.jpg
www.cosmobrands.com/vandor2.jpg
www.cosmobrands.com/vandor3.jpg

The following picture is some of the cane growing. The white thing to the
side is a camping trailer to give you a perspective of how tall this stuff
gets. This is wild stuff. Commercial reed producers cultivate their's like
any other crop in a field.

www.cosmobrands.com/reeds.jpg

It was a good find.
--
Geoff Roach

Check out www.octobop.com

[Bruce]

Interesting post. Too bad they don't have an onsite factory outlet store
where you can hand pick your reeds!
"Geoff Roach" <geoff...@compuserve.com> wrote in message
news:9bev2u$ccu$1...@sshuraac-i-1.production.compuserve.com...

[Dave Jones]

Geoff Roach wrote:
>
> Sometimes things are right under your nose and you don't see it. This
> happened to me last week. I have an apartment in Le Lavandou, France where I
> go to crash and enjoy the sun. Le Lavandou in in the Var between St. Tropez
> and Toulon right on the coast. Knowing that almost all reeds come from the
> Var, I thought it rather amusing that I could drive around and see the stuff
> growing everywhere.

I thought Vandoren started growing a lot of their cane in South America
or somewhere at about the same time that their quality started getting
bad -- fifteen or twenty years ago. I've heard that rumor a lot of
times.

Jive

[Geoff Roach]

The people at the factory and the slick brochure say it's grown in the Var.
The variety of cane is called Arundo Donax. Maybe they tried and it didn't
work. I have heard that.

--
Geoff Roach

"Dave Jones" <djo...@innovativerobotics.com> wrote in message
news:3ADB729C...@innovativerobotics.com...

[marcosalv...@gmail.com]

Good Morning,

I like your post.
Please....Do you have that pictures yet:::

Thanks

Marcos Valente