Klarinet Archive - Posting 000254.txt from 1995/02

From: Donald Oehler <dloehler@-----.EDU>
Subj: Re: Simeon Bellison's clarinet
Date: Sun, 12 Feb 1995 11:46:47 -0500

On Sat, 11 Feb 1995, John M. Heard wrote:

> On Feb. 7 Dan Leeson asked if anyone could confirm what kind of clarinet
> SImeon Belison played. I offer the following anecdote for what it is
> worth.
>
> In the summer of 1950 I attended Tanglewood Music Camp and had Simeon
> Bellison for a chamber music coach. In the ww quintet in which I played
> oboe, the clarinet player asked Bellison about his clarinet. He said he
> had heard that Bellison played an Albert system clarinet and why didn't he
> switch to a Boehm system. Bellison replied "yes, he had always played
> Albert system clarinets, and while he realized there were some advantages
> to the Boehm system, he had had good results with his clarinets and at his
> age didn't feel any need to switch".
>
> He played for us on his clarinet, and it was beautiful. I didn't know much
> about the Albert system and had never heard of the Oehler system at the
> time. All I remember is that his clarinet had fewer little finger keys
> than the Boehm system and there were some rollers between them rather like
> the rollers on the bassoon.
>
> Regards,
>
> John M. Heard
> LA TECH University
>
>
> J. M. Heard
>
Okay, for what it's worth department. As I mentioned before, Harold
Freeman, who told me he had studied with Bellison and played in his
famous clarinet choir, offered to show me a set of clarinets that
Bellison had played. He said I would be very interested in seeing them
because they were Oehler clarinets, etc. Another friend of mine and former
student of Bellison, Sidney Forrest, had mentioned on more than one
occassion to me about Bellison's Oehler clarinets. And, if that isn't
enough, try Pamela Weston's book "More clarinet Virtuosi of the Past"
where she states that Bellison played the Oehler system clarinet. I have
seen pictures of Bellison with Oehler clarinets as well. Might it be
that Bellison just felt it easier to say Albert as for so many
clarinetists here anything that isn't Boehm is Albert? Or, and please
take this only the most friendly way, it has been 44 years since your
stay in Tanglewood. Could you have remembered in error?

Well, you got me going on this one. I have always been under the
impression that Bellison used Oehler clarinets as so many other German
style players did. Albert, a Belgian, made his horns really to replace
the old Muller ones and Oehler's replaced the Baermann horn. There is a
set of horns that apparently belong to Bellsion and they are the
instrument museum at the conservatory in Jerusalem. I will somehow check
on this and get back. Thanks for the inof, though.

Yours,
D.Oehler