Like a lot of clarinet founders (Backun, Selmer, Uebel), Yuan Gao is a clarinet player. He started kind of late, at 13, but only three years later he won China's National Clarinet Competition. Daaaaaamnnn. He did some of his later studies in Boston, and founded Royal Global in Boston in 2007.

Here's the thing about Royal Global: yes, the instruments are made in China, but not in the way you might be thinking. Gao built his own factory, he sources Grenadilla directly from Africa, runs his own sawmill (which is nuts, actually), seasons wood naturally for 7–10 years (like Uebel — no kilns), and controls the whole pipeline. Contrary to what you might read on Facebook, his designs stay in-house — he doesn't farm out production to some OEM that also makes fifteen other brands. Then, when they get to the US, they get hand-finished by Brian Corbin (and then set up by us).

The MAX uses "ECO wood" — Royal's term for recaptured Grenadilla powder generated when milling their wood clarinets, then mixed with a little carbon fiber for strength and some synthetic resin to hold it all together. It's Royal's answer to Buffet's GreenLine: it captures most of the acoustic properties of wood but is virtually immune to cracking. Aimed at students and outdoor players who want wood-like response without wood's frailty.

Even though the MAX is considered a "student clarinet" (mainly because of price), it centers really well — one of the better intonation profiles in the "entry" tier, with clean articulation, neutral tonality, consistency across registers. One anomaly I found when testing: 3-finger C drops a lot from pp to ff, so be mindful. (See all of the data in the Dashboard)

Compared to the Alpha, the MAX is darker, has a tighter scale, but slightly slower articulation. That said, I like it better than the Alpha, to be honest.

Resistance: 5/10, Medium

Playing the MAX has a terrific feel. It's got a middle-of-the-road sound, darker than the Alpha. With its medium resistance, you will have a balance of tonal flexibility and center to the sound that holds its core.

In general, more resistance in a clarinet design usually keeps the louder dynamic ranges from spreading; the clarinet "holds its core" and focus, but will provide a smaller dynamic range (on both ends, loud and soft) and smaller color palette. A less resistant clarinet typically provides a much wider tonal palette to choose from, but will require more control from the player to control pitch and sound consistency.

When listening for how a clarinet responds to added air pressure and embouchure control, listen to the Weber example (wide dynamic range and color range), then the Berlioz excerpt (wide dynamic range, but narrow color range), and finally the Gershwin excerpt (narrow dynamic range and narrow color range). You will hear how these clarinets respond — for better or worse! — to my input as a clarinet player.