Dmitry Baevsky Visiting the Vandoren Advisory Studio in New York City

Dmitry Baevsky Visiting the Vandoren Advisory Studio in New York City

So I just wanted to mention a few words about myself. I am Russian and I moved to New York from St. Petersburg (my native town) over 20 years ago. I graduated from the New School and I’ve stayed around and played with many, many musicians, in the states and in New York, and I’m also fortunate now that I travel quite a bit. I’m playing with various band, including my own as well in Europe, but also playing with a lot of local musicians over there.  I have 6 or 7 records under my name—we’re recording a new one in about a month. I have several projects: one of them I play with piano, guitar, bass, and drums (that was my last record) but I also have a quartet with piano, that’s one of my projects. Anyway I just wanted to say a couple of things about me so you guys know who I am.

I’m here in New York—in the Vandoren studio—trying for the first time this new mouthpiece. It’s an alto, an alto mouthpiece S+ (A9). When I walked in here I was playing A9S mouthpiece and have a feeling that leaving it and playing the S+. I am extremely happy with what I hear and how it feels. I do love my previous mouthpiece as well, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it, but the new one has a little bit more attack or punch, maybe even a little more volume. It is as easy to navigate as the old one. You can go from super loud to super quiet—no issues there. Intonation seems to be as exactly as easy to navigate as well, but I like that extra little push that projects a little further. The other case, I think it’s a really excellent mouthpiece that I highly recommend for alto players who play this a similar setup that I have.

A quick word—coming back to the equipment—about the reeds . I’m also a Vandoren reed person and I’ve been playing them very long time. I use both ZZ and V16s—both 3. The ZZs are a little bit easier to play but the other one—I go back and fourth. I like them equally. It depends on the room sometimes, depends on the weather as well. I’ve been using them exclusively since I think 2007. In combination with mouthpiece makes perfect choice. For me, I have zero issues in terms of getting what I need to get out: this equipment is perfect.