Klarinet Archive - Posting 000325.txt from 1994/02

From: "Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.EDU>
Subj: Garrett's comments about octave modifications in Mozart
Date: Tue, 22 Feb 1994 11:57:30 -0500

Garrett speaks of how he has made some modifications to the
text of the Mozart concerto to allow him to play certain
passages an octave different from the published text. Garrett
did not say whether he meant and octave up or down in all instances
but I suspect he meant down.

First, I think you are right on the money, Garrett. There are
a number of places in the concerto (and the quintet, K. 581, too)
where today's clarinet cannot achieve the low notes presumably explicitly
requested by Mozart in the autograph score. Which places they
are have to be left up to guesswork because we no longer have
the autograph to confirm this hypothesis.

It is this realization that has led to the basset clarinet movement
now being seen in many recordings of K. 622. And, of course, all
three French clarinet manufacturers make basset clarinets in A and
the leading German manufacturers make them in B-flat too.

But, Garrett, I envision two matters for you to think about:

(1) if you do not have a basset clarinet, how do you manage the
passages that extend below written e? Do you jump up an octave
at those places where you can't go any lower? If so, you may
have traded in one problem for another.

(2) are you aware that there are at least two printed versions of
the concerto that have addressed this issue and presented entirely
new texts of themusic? This would seem to make your work
superfluous (though it is good that you have thought these things
out for yourself). The New Mozart Edition volume that contains the
concerto is one such printing, and an edition done by Alan Hacker
is another.

It is OK to reinvent the wheel if you have a different wheel in
mind, but some people may have done your work for you.

And if you want to see how this all started, there is a paper
dating from the late 1930s called "The Original Text of Mozart's
Clarinet Concerto" that was the first one to focus on the problem.
The author (Dazeley) said, in no uncertain terms, "There is
something very wrong with the text of the Mozart Clarinet concerto
and we have been doing it all wrong for two centuries." [paraphrased
quote] It created quite a stir but it was (and still is) brilliant.

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