Klarinet Archive - Posting 000953.txt from 1998/03

From: Roger Shilcock <roger.shilcock@-----.uk>
Subj: Re: Another peculiar acoustical phenomenon
Date: Mon, 16 Mar 1998 04:08:22 -0500

If you try to get sounds out of a clarinet by banging the fingers down
hard on
the holes, I think you'll find that the pitches are not those you get from
playing the ostensibly corresponding notes normally. It's a while since I
tried this, but I suspect the tube is then behaving as if it is open at
both ends - not surprisingly.
Probably irrelevant - but might be interesting....
Roger Shilcock

On Sun, 15 Mar 1998, Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.edu wrote:

> Date: Sun, 15 Mar 1998 09:00:56 EST
> From: "Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.edu>
> Reply-To: leeson@-----.us
> To: klarinet@-----.us
> Subject: Another peculiar acoustical phenomenon
>
> The recent post of a peculiar acoutical phenomenon reminded me of
> another that I read of, but never corroborated, perhaps 10 years
> ago. It has to do with the very nature of the clarinet's register
> mechanism.
>
> Now every one of us knows that the clarinet family, without exception,
> overblows a 12th, this in contradistinction with many (most, all ??)
> other woodwind instruments that uniformly overblow an octave.
>
> Well, the assertion that I read about (and whose source is no longer
> remembered by me) suggested an experiment that turned the world topsy
> turvy, presuming the phenomenon described really does work as
> proposed.
>
> The suggestion is this: make a cork of the right size to fit into
> the upper end of the clarinet's barrel; i.e., the end into which
> the mouthpiece normally fits. Drill a hole in the center of that
> cork small enough to hold an oboe reed. Then insert such a reed
> and play two notes, one without the register key and one with it.
>
> According to the article I read, the clarinet will overblow an
> octave under these conditions.
>
> Keeping in mind that I never tried the experiment and can neither
> confirm nor deny it, all sorts of peculiar things come to mind
> under the assumption that it is true, and most of these things I
> do not understand. For example, I am under the impression that
> the clarinet overblows a 12th because of an acoustical consideration
> inherent in the instrument itself. But if the proposed experiment
> is true, then the phenomenon that causes the instrument to overblow
> a 12th must also be related in some way to the mouthipiece design
> or else the single reed, or else both.
>
> I can attest to one thing. The reverse is false. For example,
> many years ago a clarinet mouthpiece was made to fit into an
> oboe. It was much smaller than a B-flat mouthpiece but it was a
> single reed, clarinet-type mouthpiece and its purpose was to
> allow some of the many clarinet players in a public school to
> play oboe parts. I was one of the suckers that tried it, and it
> worked fine. The oboe still overblew an octave and I sounded like
> a sick duck.
>
> But if a clarinet mouthpiece in an oboe has no fundamental
> acoustical effect on the registration, it may still be that
> an oboe reed in a clarinet does.
>
> Comments?
>
>
> =======================================
> Dan Leeson, Los Altos, California
> Rosanne Leeson, Los Altos, California
> leeson@-----.edu
> =======================================
>