Klarinet Archive - Posting 000066.txt from 1994/02

From: "Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.EDU>
Subj: Re: vibrato
Date: Mon, 7 Feb 1994 21:30:43 -0500

An old friend of my was principle bassoon in the Toronto symphony and
retired from that marvellous orchestra to teach at Ohio State. He was
also interested in the subject of vibrato and how it was achieved on
a bassoon. So he worked in cooperation with a facility in Toronto
that could do motion picture X-ray photographs. The only problem was
that he had to have the pictures taken while lying down.

So he lay on the X-ray table on his back with his bassoon held out
in front of him. It was exactly as if he were playing bassoon but
he was 90 degrees out of phase.

Motion pictures were made during his playing both with vibrato and
without vibrato. I do not know to what extent any of this has
influence on the way vibrato is produced on a clarinet, but in the
case of this individual, his vibrato was being produced by his vocal
chords. The was no jaw involvement, no diaphragm movement. Only
the vocal chords were in motion during his sound production with
vibrato and they ceased to be in motion when he stopped playing with
vibrato.

The results of this research project were shown at the International
Double Reed Society, and a paper was printed on the matter. I mention
this because the several notes that have appeared on the matter of
vibrato on the clarinet made reference to several sources for the
pitch variation form of vibrato. I do not argue with anyone since I
don't really know where my vibrato comes from when I use it (though
I think it to be in my throat), but to point out that it is not
necessarily as clear as all that.

Discounting finger vibrato as suggested for bagpipes, and concentrating
on contemporary clarinets (where the problem exists for most players),
I wonder to what extent pitch change vibrato does or does not have
several different sources or techniques. The jaw is a logical place
to talk about but I find that there are limitations in how fast the
jaw can move. This may also be true with respect to diaphraghm
movements. It is a big muscle and has limited speed capability.

So were does pitch change vibrato come from when executing it?

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Dan Leeson, Los Altos, California
(leeson@-----.edu)
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