The thing about cane reeds is that they never last as long as you wish they would.  Just about the time you get them sounding good without turning red and then blue in the face, they give up on you.

Sure, you can poke, pinch, and manipulate them but that only buys you a little bit of time, in the end they die a horrible squawking, or squealing... death.  It is always a good idea to work with a new reed well before your trusty old one dies an untimely death.  By working a reed, or two in a little bit at a time, you won't have to blow your guts out working with a new, strong, and difficult to blow reed.

Sadly, I'm not one of those "look ahead pipers", although I do try to be proactive, I'm not nearly experienced enough to poke, pinch or manipulate a reed into even barely passable shape.

Today's lesson started out working on three new reeds I had in my reed box, my current reed was well on its way out (judging from the wincing Helen was doing, it was long gone, a while ago!).  Any how Helen worked on getting the three reeds into playing shape, they are gut busters but I'm a pretty strong blower so it will take a few days for me to work them in.

I did order up a bunch of App's reeds.  I had some good feedback from several other players with setups like mine and they were all very happy with the sound.  I'm looking forward to getting my new stash of reeds.  I have been using Ross reeds up to now and I have no complaints so far, all of my reeds from Ross have been very good and I will continue to use them.  Experimenting with different things in piping is a good thing, and reeds can have the most profound affect on the sound of a set of pipes.

We'll see what the Apps reeds sound like, I'm excited to get my hands on them.  Meanwhile I have three new reeds to work in.  Time to get out there and start huffing and puffing!