Klarinet Archive - Posting 000274.txt from 1997/01

From: "Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.EDU>
Subj: Re: How much opinion vs. how much fact
Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 17:44:24 -0500

> From: MX%"EWOJ@-----.02
> Subj: Re: How much opinion vs. how much fact

> Why is it that we can believe that there is a sonic difference between an A
> and B flat clarinet, when it seems that we cannot accept that there can be a
> difference between a German and a French clarinet and therefore, the sound
> that is made from each?
>
> Dan Leeson states:
> >Clarinetists (in general, all instrumentalists) have no
> business making arbitrary substitution of one pitched
> instrument for another, particularly in the face of an
> explicit request on the part of a composer with an
> unusually good ear, which is what Brahms is reported to
> have. When arbitrary substitutions are made, the impact
> on the sonic palette that the composer hears when s/he
> composes is altered to some unknown degree. And if one
> can substitute an A clarinet for some other pitched
> instrument with impunity, why not a tenor saxophone for
> a clarinet in B-flat, or an English horn for a basset
> horn?

Very easily!! The sound character of a clarinet is derived from
the physics of the instrument. So a longer clarinet (with a
slight bore variation) will sound differently than a shorter
clarinet. And to that extent a B-flat clarinet sounds differently
than an A clarinet just as a bass clarinet sounds differently than
an E-flat soprano clarinet, just much more so.

But the sound character of an instrument is not a function of the
nationality of the player, despite assertions to the contrary.

There may be educational principles that result in German and
French players producing different sound character (such as
a Frenchman playing a French horn or bassoon, as distinct from
a German playing a French horn or bassoon). And this probably
has some affect on the sound character produced but nearly to
the extent that it is reported to have; i.e., where people will
advertise that they are trying to get "the French sound," or
that so-and-so has that "German sound."

Finally this: where the holes are punched onto a cylinder of wood
and where the keys are placed to control mechanisms that cover
and uncover those holes has almost no affect on the sound character.
So a German system B-flat sounds (in my opinion) very much like
a French system B-flat because both cylinders of wood are
essentially the same.

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