Ehhhhh
Tis a toughie.
Are you sure about the quality?
I've heard that these east-asian brands are cheap, and wont easily be fixed

If it's a Chinese bassoon therein lies a dilema.
From my bassoon teacher (I'm sorry to tell this to you) but most are very bad quality. East Asian bassoons, majority of them, are not good at all, Yamaha is exempt from the category of bad bassoons, but I apologize for the delivery of this news to yourn ear.

No problem.

Foxs are spectacular (201) as well as Moosmann. Schreiber IIRC (maybe it was Kohlert) was bought over by a Chinese Company and thus aren't too great of an idea. Puchner will end up costing more than a Fox if you get one.

Penzel Mueller is great too, however, I still vote for Fox 201.
Hope this helps.

What's all this about Schreiber being bought by a Chinese company?

I know that over recent years there have been lots of changes to the old Boosey & Hawkes group & their successors but I'm sure this is just a rumour. Indeed a couple of years ago a friend of mine got hold of this story & was threatened with court action for spreading it around!

Ian

I was wrong and you are right. I believe it was kohlert.

You went to Johnny Roadhouse to buy a bassoon?? i'm sorry if this comes across as rude at all, but you've gotta expect not to get a brilliant quality bassoon from them - they're more of a general music shop that specialise in guitars - that's why they have a good two floors of guitars and only one for everything else! If you want accessories for your bassoon like... a floor protector if you play with a spike, or a sling, or a seat strap, or anything like that, Johnny Roadhouse will do you, but for something as specialist as a bassoon you need to go to Howarths in London. They will be considerably more expensive than your £750 instrument, but if you want something good then you've got to be prepared to spend a bit. Howarths are a woodwind specialist, they have many instruents that you can try out at varying prices, and you can take your time deciding which is suited to you.

Having said that, £750 for a bassoon, even if it's poor quality, is pretty good for a bassoon i must admit.

A number of reasons why the E plate doesn't close the crook key.

1. The E & crook pads have compressed over time
2. The cork or sleeving has fallen off the arms that connect the E key to the wing joint & from the thumb crook touchpiece to the crook pad key.
3. The arms have become bent - easily done on these Chinese instruments with soft keys.
4. You are not being careful when assembling the instrument & the wing joint is not aligned properly in the it's socket.

Maybe the bassoon needs to be checked over by a competent repairer.

I was shown a new Chinese bassoon recently by a dealer who is thinking of importing the things. I reckon it would need a days work on it to get it working mechanically working satisfactorily before even being able to get an idea of it's musical abilities.

Ian

Sorry Martyn don't follow you there

Ian

Don't worry, that happens to loads of instuments. Just wrap a bit of paper round the right bit and that will help seal everything properly. Dunno how to describe the right bit though :S
I don't understand your second question either.