Barnaby Robson
Principal Clarinet
Philharmonia Orchestra of London
Barnaby Robson is Principal Clarinet with the Philharmonia Orchestra of London, and also has an extensive resume as a soloist, chamber musician and composer. Born in London in 1969, Barnaby studied at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama and as a Fulbright Scholar, at The Juilliard School, New York. During his studies at The Julliard, he was awarded the School’s prestigious Concerto Prize.
Barnaby was appointed Principal Clarinet of the Philharmonia Orchestra in May 2000. With this world class orchestra he plays for conductors such as Esa-Pekka Salonen, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Sir Charles Mackerras & Riccardo Muti at renowned venues world wide. In adddition to performing in the orchestra's annual season of over 200 concerts, Barnaby's playing can be heard on numerous Philharmonia CD's, broadcasts and film scores.
"I was first given a Légère plastic reed to try by a friend of mine in Australia. Before giving it a blow, my initial thoughts were fairly skeptical..... however, I must say that when I actually tired the reed I was more than pleasantly surprised! Having now had the opportunity to try several different strengths and cuts of the Légère reeds I have settled on using a 3.5. The consistency in the strengths is outstanding - I must say that I've been increasing frustrated by traditional reed manufactures lack of consistency between the grades. With Légère you know exactly what you're getting straight out of the box.
I also found that I didn't need a 'try out' period before I felt comfortable playing the reeds in public. In fact, within a day or so I was using them on tour with the Philharmonia, including live radio broadcasts in some fairly challenging repertoire. The quality & consistency of sound is excellent and the way to use the reeds is slightly different from the 'traditional' approach in that they need to be rotated on a daily basis in order to avoid them becoming tired. But this works fine because of the consistency between the reeds - you really can't tell one from another. All in all the Légère product is an huge asset to the clarinettist's reed armoury. I've had a very positive reaction from my colleagues in the clarinet section as well as some of the double reed players in the orchestra too - "when are they going to make one for us" they ask!
