This is a Berg Larsen hard rubber tenor mouthpiece I recently won on ebay. Â I saw that it was refaced by Brian Powell and I knew it had to be good. Â Sure enough it plays great. Â I thought it would be really bright but it has a big thick core to it that is nice. Â Thick is the best word for it. Â It can get very very loud too.This would be a great mouthpiece for an R&B gig.
I was trying to keep the recording on the more laid back side because I was afraid I would clip the mic levels. Â I really enjoyed playing this piece. For the sample I’m messing around with Sugar. Â This piece makes me want to play a tune like that! Â Listen………….
Hi:
SOunds good but I like the Links better. The subtone on the Links sound much better. The upper register is a coin toss.
Larry W
Hey Steve, you have any clips of you playing this in hyper-drive? Do you remember if it gets bright as you get higher and louder?
I’ve been wondering about this piece a lot because Eric Marienthal is a local in my area and I recently listened to a clip of him and Lee Ritenour playing “Rio Funk” and Eric is ripping (as is Lee of course) but Eric has that same thick sound here that I just love. He’s playing a Berg Larsen 100/2 in metal.
this was a great loud piece. It got a little brighter but not much as I remember. This is a tenor piece. Was Eric playing tenor?
Yes he was on tenor. He’s always been pretty attached to his setups. Always on the Beechler for alto and Berg on tenor, with the same reeds and ligs.
Here’s the link.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LpMfC2QWaA
Mmmmm, really love this one. 2 of my mentors played Bergs. Fantastic sound. I gotta say, it sounds like when you are playing you are really into this piece and diggin it!
Well.. i have the same: 110/2 sms (medium chamber) and thought I did not like it because it was me playing it. Now I have a certainty: I just don’t like the skinny buzzy sound of it even in competent hands. I come here often to listen to mpcs reviews and this is one of the most deceiving ones. One last comment: a friend has the same on baritone ( mark VI low A bari) and on that one it just sounds great.
Hi Stefano, What do you mean by deceiving? This was a very good mouthpiece. Some people love bergs and the sound they get with them. It’s not personally my sound but I thought the mouthpiece was a great example of a Berg of this size and chamber. I put up the clips just so people like you can hear the tone of each mouthpiece and make their own decisions. Steve
Steve.. what do I mean by “deceiving” ?… It’s that I have heard perhaps about a couple dozen clips you made with very different mpcs and sounds, also heard the poll on tenor sax mpcs and found them very interesting. This one to me, the berg HR 110/2 sms has such a sound – in this clip – that it doesn’t even compare with all the rest. I personally find it very distinctive, but in a negative way. So, in the end, it’s not that true that a good player comes out with his sound practically with all set ups.This is my final remark, and I feel reliefed that someone that in my opinion has quite a good sound as you, gets that kind of buzzy sound I just couldn’t get rid of with this berg. Mine was untouched. Played out of the box
Glad I traded it!
(do tou want to laugh ? with a 95/ sms 2 grained ebonite berg that had a great sound in the hands of a friend o mine 
OK. Now I understand what you are saying. I thought you were saying I was deceiving. Yes, some of those high baffle mouthpieces have quite the buzz to them. Some people really like that though. I sold that one pretty easily after I put up the sound clip so someone really liked it…………..
Hi Steve… just wanted to add a few lines on this matter. The grained ebonite 6* (95 opening and 2 sms chamber) does an excellent job. It lacks a tad of volume, being so closed (I normally use a 7, but I cannot push too much presently, having had an hernia operation a couple months ago). However, this piece is buzz-free and quite surprisingly it has corrected a strong tendency to be out of pitch on low B and Bb , about a quarter tone higher than normal pitch, especially on Bb (even by dropping my jaw) , of my tenor sax: a 1955 SML rev D standard, rehauled and relacquered. Quite surprisingly I say because I normally use it with a 1980 STM Otto link refaced by Fil Bucci in Italy, and a 7 lebayle metal jazz, and both have larger chambers than the Berg, which I thought would have helped to stay in tune in the lower end. On the contrary this Berg – untouched – delivers a very uniform pitch throughout the whole instrument. Very positive experience indeed. Bottom line: mpcs need to be tried one by one and the matching with an instrument is all but guaranteed.