Klarinet Archive - Posting 000741.txt from 1999/02

From: David Blumberg <reedman@-----.com>
Subj: [kl] re: Baermann Etudes soon to be custom accompaniments
Date: Thu, 18 Feb 1999 13:10:24 -0500

Sorry this reply has not been sooner, but I took quite ill over the last
few days.
I will compare, as an example, the articulation differences of etude (or
piece) number 10 of the Carl Fischer (Carl Baermann's Complete Celebrated
Method For the Clarinet, rev. by Gustave Langenus - second division) and
David Hite (as publ. in "Melodious and Progressive Studies Book 1)
editions against the Johann Andre (Baermann Klarinettenschule, Erster
Teil, Opus 63, Ed. 502B) edition, which, as explained in an earlier
posting, is highly likely to be Baermann's original intention, as far as
musical text and articulations are concerned.
Piece 10 (Hite 1): In bars 1, 5, 6, 9, 52 Langenus and Hite omit the
staccato on the last eighth note (which is the last note of a slur). In
German romantic music these notes (end of slur with staccato dot) would
be portato tongued (with a very delicate tongue) as opposed to being
slurred and shortened as would be the case in 20th century music. In
bars 19-21 the original text has slurs over groups of 3 eighth notes, the
last note of each group also having a staccato. These would be
interpreted as described above. Both Hite and Langenus seemed to have
realized this to a certain extent. Langenus places slurs over the first
two notes of each group of three, with a staccato over the second note.
Additionally he places a slur over all three notes of each group (above
the aforementioned articulations with a staccato over the third note.
This is confusing and contradictory with regard to how the 2nd and 3rd
eighth notes are to be handled in regard to articulation. Hite comes
closer by slurring the first two notes of each group of three and
indicating nothing over the third. But this is only approximately the
same (and Baermann was never "approximate" when it came to
articulation!). A careful player will differentiate in both tongue and
airstream between the two.
Similar omissions and changes as those described above are present in
almost all the other pieces. For this reason it is certainly advised to
use the Andre edition. Piano accompaniments are also available, making
performance of these fine pieces possible.
If what I wrote is not clear or if additional comparison in other pieces
is requested please let me know.
Don Christensen

=============================================

Thanks Don for your info, I had asked the Andre question as I am at the
final stages of negotiating with John Cipolla (another Rico Concert Artist)
who recorded the Baermann Opus 63, and 64 on Music Minus One. I plan to
release the Baermann Op 63, and 64 etudes as individual Custom Tempo Piano
Accompaniments on CD using Johns piano files (we got the legal OK from Irv
at Music Minus One). I needed to get the Piano scores so that I could know
exactly what the piano was doing, and what measure. I recall that David
Niethammer a while ago posted a kudos for John's MMO work, but stated that
he would have liked to have his own tempos. That will soon be possible.

David Blumberg - My Tempo Accompaniments for Woodwind Players (150+ pieces,
Demos)
reedman@-----.com
http://www.sneezy.org/david_blumberg/
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