Arundo donax or Bust? A Preliminary Investigation into Alternative Natural Materials for Oboe Reeds

Since at least the Baroque era, all Western classical woodwind instruments have only used Arundo donax for reeds. This preliminary investigation is one of the first inquiries into alternative natural materials for oboe reeds. The first chapter of this document is an overview of what we currently know about the materials used for reeds from the start of historical documentation until today. The second part of this overview surveys double reed instruments outside of Western classical music for reed materials and candidates for oboe reeds. The second chapter is a survey of some plants in the Poaceae familya group of woody grasses and the family Arundo donax is into determine if there are more candidates for oboe reeds. The third chapter consists of Martin Schuring and I making reeds from two experimental materials: Phragmites and Bambusa textilis. Additionally, Dr. Gardner and I conducted a study involving six participants. I processed Phragmites, Arundo donax, and Bambusa textilis into gouged cane and sent the participants three pieces of each material, which were labeled A, B, and C, respectively. The purpose of the study was to test if oboists with diverse backgrounds could scrape the provided cane into a reed that produces a sound on the oboe. The full study responses are in Appendix B. The last chapter of this document is a scope analysis, courtesy of Professor Jeffrey Kleim, of the plant samples I was able to obtain, which includes Phragmites, Bambusa textilis, and a few other plants. Furthermore, Dr. Lindsey Reymore and I tested the Phragmites and Bambusa textilis reeds Martin Schuring and I made by analyzing spectrograms, extracting audio descriptors from MATLAB, and running a few statistical tests to determine any statistically significant differences. Collective results indicate that eight oboists were able to make functional Phragmites and Bambusa textilis reeds, there are many potential candidates, and there were some statistically significant differences in audio descriptors between the Arundo donax, Phragmites, and Bambusa textilis reeds. Since this is preliminary research and no candidates were deemed unsuitable, future and long-term research is required for more thorough and conclusive data collection and analysis.