Klarinet Archive - Posting 001151.txt from 1998/01

From: Jennifer Rose McKenna <jrm0013@-----.edu>
Subj: Re: Pasquale Cardillo
Date: Tue, 27 Jan 1998 12:30:06 -0500

someone that i know told me this story:
he studied with Mr. Cardillo in the 70's and said that even Mr. Cardillo
had his bad days...but my acquantance told me that he had a lesson with a
friend and they would have to turn away to keep from laughing...because
when he had bad days he had really bad days.
Mr. Cardillo had the same thing happen to him when he studied with the
principle clarinetist of the bso in the 40's.( the name escapes me). he
also had to turn away to keep from laughing.
to all of you who studied with Mr. Cardillo...i hope its not
contagious...heheehee

jennifer mckenna
jrm0013@-----.edu
university of north texas
clarinet concentration/music ed major

On Tue, 27 Jan 1998 00:22:11 -0500 Rob Breen <robert.v.breen@-----.net>
wrote:
> I was lucky enough to study with Pasquale Cardillo at Boston University
> in the '70s and I was saddened to read Jonathan Cohler's post about his
> recent death. Memories of Mr. Cardillo have been at the forefront of
> my thoughts for the past few days, and I offer the following as a
> postscript to Mr. Cohler's and the Boston Globe's fine tributes.
>
> Mr. Cardillo did not seem to me to be a reed fanatic. The only tool I
> ever saw him use on reeds was a large file he carried in his case
> and used to rub the back of a reed on to flatten out a warp. During
> a lesson in his studio at home he showed me a shoebox full of barely
> played rejects and said grinning "Some work, some don't". Fortunately
> for me, he was much more patient with his students.
>
> He didn't like my double lip embouchure, but let me use it as long
> as I followed his advice to "build your embouchure at the center".
> When I finally understood what he meant, it made all the difference.
> Think about it. Isn't the most important part of the embouchure the
> point where it meets the reed? He also quoted a retired collegue
> (Archangeli I think he said) as saying "Your fingers are only as
> good as your embouchure."
>
> He often demonstrated what he expected of me and I was always amazed
> at how flawlessly he could execute the most difficult of technical
> passages. Moreover, his musical instruction to me awesome. He insisted
> that I play with respect to musical detail and after a while it began
> to dawn on me that good playing is so much more than just beautiful
> tone and technical accuracy. The music, not the devil, is in the
> details.
>
> The Globe mentioned his passion for trout fishing, but not golf. He
> hated
> having to work on new music for the BSO in the springtime because it cut
> into his fairway time. A few years ago I wrote to tell him about my
> growing
> family and modest clarinet successes. I mentioned that I had taken up
> golf.
> He was thrilled and advised that I get my wife to play so that she would
> understand the new disease I had aquired.
>
> He told me that he went to New England Conservatory on a scholarship
> which
> required him to do some sort of janitorial work at the school. As he
> put
> it "just like in Gilbert and Sullivan, I polished up the handle on the
> big front door" and then hit the practice room. From there to a 45 year
> career in the BSO. That's world class.
>
>
> --
> Regards,
>
> Rob