Ligatures PPT Tenor - best ligature

[TomMapfumo]

Certainly no longer popping out........................:shocked:;}

 

[kevgermany]

It's all about (breath) support.....

 

[VirusKiller]

That is odd, my EVO its beautifully with the Legeres, with plenty of tightening still available.

Well, I tried my EVO-5 again last night with the lig further down the PPT and the results were better. It does seem placement-critical though. Will be interesting to compare with Kev's lig.

 

[Chris98]

Hi Kev,

I'd be interested to to know more about your ligature, are they for sale?

I'm having personal issues with my Rovner Ligature!

All the best,

Chris

 

[kevgermany]

Chirs, it's a replacement leather strap for a rovner, but with a more pronounced taper to suit the ppt. I'm trying to get the design right, possibly make the metalwork as well. At the moment I can't find the knurled nuts. However if they do go on sale, it'll be via Pete and the charity(assuing he agrees), I don't want to make a profit. Am still experimenting, but it's made a huge difference to me.... I just offered Joel one to get some feedback. More would be welcome. Perhaps we can take this off-line...

 

[TomMapfumo]

For anyone who is interested I emailled Marc Jean - a Canadian that makes excellent quality sax ligatures, asking about this subject. He has a PPT tenor model and designs specific ligatures for individual mouthpieces. He said that his #735 ligature is spot on in terms of fit. Do have a look at his website - the ligatures are approx 65$ (Canadian) with 10$ postage to UK. Maybe worth a punt and could lead to a bulk order where desired. His website is www.musiquedemarc.com and there are reviews on Sax On The Web and Steve Neff's website - sounds excellent.

Kind regards
Tom

 

[old git]

Seeing it has wood strips, Pete must have one to match his wooden touch pieces.

Next, the all wooden saxophone, although people who have heard but not seen me play, have asked me if mine is wood? I wonder why?

 

[TomMapfumo]

Hi OG!

Apparently someone in Canada who owns a PPT had one made by Marc - and Marc showed me the feedback said client had sent back to him - talking about a "perfect" fit, which "allows it to sing effortlessly". Interesting.

Kind regards
Tom

 

[Pete Thomas]

Hi OG!

Apparently someone in Canada who owns a PPT had one made by Marc - and Marc showed me the feedback said client had sent back to him - talking about a "perfect" fit, which "allows it to sing effortlessly". Interesting.

Many thanks, I didn't know about that, I must contact Marc.

 

[VirusKiller]

Won't these metal ligatures mark the PPT?

 

[Pete Thomas]

Won't these metal ligatures mark the PPT?

That is possible, but teeth also mark the mouthpiece. As you probably know, teethmarks can make the onyxite go white and more opaque looking on the beak. I have toyed with the idea of a biteplate, but this would add enormously to the cost for what is a purely cosmetic feature. Especially as many people use patches anyway.

 

[TomMapfumo]

Not well made, perfectly fitting, carefully applied ones.............

 

[Pete Thomas]

Just tried a Rovner Platinum P-2R - perfect fit!

 

[Pete Thomas]

One thing I have noticed with the Evo and the platinum though, the holes where the screw goes are wider on the EVO, so there is more play in the screw. This allows the ligature to conform better to the taper of the PPT.

It got me wondering whether some Rovners have larger holes and so more play in the screw than others. If so then slightly widening these holes could be an answer for those who find the Rovner is not so good.

Just a thought. I'll post some pictures later to show exactly what I mean.

 

[TomMapfumo]

So are you and Ed and someone else not going to design the ultimate PPT lig - the PT WyverGripper........:shocked:;}

 

[SopJob]

Hi there,
what a long discussion. Anyway, I'd like to add a few bits. My old tenor lig (BG Traditional) got stretched over time, and now does not fix the reed firmly enough anymore. So I had to get a new one. I checked:

Vandoren Optimum (gold-plated, 65 €)
Francois Louis Pure Brass (silver-plated, 58 €)
Francois Louis Ultimate (brass, 46 €)
GF System III (textile band, 30 €)

Let me say that the differences were scant. To give the manufacturers credit, though, I have to admit that the different materials, or exchangeable plates, as in the Vandoren case, had an effect in the direction indicated, although barely noticeable. So why buy a custom ligature at all? Compared with the original lig, I noticed that the custom ones make the instrument more responsive/easier to blow. And: I like ligs with just one screw, simply because they make life easier.

After one hour of testing with the same reed on my old Link Tone Edge, I came to the conclusion that the GF was the best choice for me because:

- It offers the best price/value ratio
- A textile band lig cannot be bent or damaged, not even if you sit on it accidentally. The Francois Louis ligs look impressive at first sight, almost like pieces of jewellery. But in my opinion, they are hardly more than the wires used to fix champagne corks. You have to handle them with great care when putting them on or off.
- I tried Rovner and BG textile ligs a couple of years ago. I found the sound a bit subdued if not muffled because they had rubber or metal cushions inside. The GF did not have this. The sound was as brilliant as with one of the metal ligs.

 

[johnboy]

Rovner "Eddie Daniels" fits my PPT8 perfectly, with loads of adjustment available 🙂

John.

 

[TomMapfumo]

If it matters to you get a good ligature. If it doesn't matter to you then get a good ligature - it is fairly subjective at the end of the day. I am one of those people that can tell the difference listening to a certain ligature from where I am playing, and prefer some more than others - especially around the subject of responsiveness. Whether anyone, apart from my wife, can tell the difference in sound when I'm using a different lig is open to question, but I do know when I am maximising my satisfaction with a particular mouthpiece/reed/ligature combination. On my BW Curved Soprano I love the combo of Berg 70/1 mouthpiece/Marca Jazz 2.5 reed/Selmer One Screw ligature and do not have any need to explore further. So, it may be a personal and subjective thing but I am happy with my choices, given my research and experimentation in the areas of mouthpiece/reed/ligature, of which I have tried several of each. At the same time others may well have a very different subjective experience. The only thing I would discourage would be not exploring in the first place - we may end up making a poor choice primarily through lack of knowledge.

A friend of mine who was a noobie was playing a Yamaha 7C/Vandoren Traditional reed/standard Yamaha Lig on his Alto and was "very satisfied with" his sound, or so he thought. He simply tried all my mouthpieces/ Rico Jazz reed/FL Basic Lig and one of the mouthpieces really stood out to both of us - much more pleasing sound all round. No way was he now happy with his original sound. The mouthpiece that sounded best was an ebonite mouthpiece with a smaller tip opening 0.070" and the reeds seem to open up the sound quite significantly. So experimenting can be helpful and clarifying, even if it confirms that our original choice was a good one.

Kind regards
Tom

 

[Pete Thomas]

Rovner "Eddie Daniels" fits my PPT8 perfectly, with loads of adjustment available 🙂

I suspect why some people find Rovners are fine with a PPT and others don't is to do with how well the Rovner forms to the taper, and there may be inconsistencies between individual ligatures in theis respect.

As I mentioned earlier I found that by drilling out the holes where the screw goes can help this.

You can see the difference here, before and after using a 4mm drill to make the hole slightly larger:

This doesn't alter the effectiveness of the screw, as these holes are unthreaded, the screw tightens into the nut, however it's likely that doing this would void any warrantee.

This works well on the platinum, probably on the Star, but I'm not so sure about the ligs where the fabric wraps round the clamping bars.

 

[johnboy]

Hi Pete,
I have just measured my Rovner ""Eddie Daniels". Fitted in the mid position on the PPT, it gives a clearance of 3.6 mm at the front of the bars, with 5.0 mm of thread adjustment remaining. I very much doubt that any manufacturing errors would reduce these dims. sufficiently, so that it wouldn't fit (Once again thank you for a superb mouthpiece! :welldone).

Another thought that came to me - If guys are having trouble with metal ligs, an elastic band slipped over the m'piece at the front of the lig. might well provide the answer.

John.