Brought to you this hour by

Advertising and Web Hosting on Woodwind.Org!

Klarinet Archive - Posting 000051.txt from 1995/10

From: "Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.EDU>
Subj: Bob Spring's B clarinet
Date: Wed, 4 Oct 1995 12:32:42 -0400

Bob reports find a clarinet that appears to be pitched in B natural.
He read my article in the Clarinet magazine about the existence of such
an instrument ca. 1780-1790 and poses the logical question about what
he has.

I had exactly the same experience. Some kid came to my house with this
beat up instrument and when I played it, it was a half-tone off. I
also thought it might be a clarinet in B and then I had my clarinet
education expanded by some very knowledgeable people.

In the US (and more in the UK) during the early part of this century,
there were two pitches in effect. High and low. The low pitch would
use an ordinary B-flat clarinet. The high pitch required one pitched
about 1/2 tone higher. When one got called to a gig in those days,
the first question asked was, "High pitch or low pitch" and then one knew
which instrument to bring.

All of this stopped by ca. 1930 but by that time there were a great many
such instruments available. They are (or those that are left) are
beginning to pop up every now and then as shown by the remarkable
similarity of Bob's story and mine. And others have told me the same
thing; i.e., people showing up with instruments that are exactly
(or closely) 1/2 tone higher than they should be. And if you measure
them, you will find that they fit in length between a B-flat and a C
instrument (whose lengths are given in Carse and Rendall).

So that is what I think Bob has. A high pitched B-flat instrument.

I wanted to buy two of them to use in those three locations where Mozart
explicitly called for clarinets in B-natural but I could never find two
of them that were well enough in tune.

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