Klarinet Archive - Posting 000237.txt from 2000/06

From: Mark Thiel <thielm@-----.com>
Subj: [kl] ezy.K.622 Reconstruction
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 10:04:30 -0400

alf.horberg wrote:
>When Eric Hoeprich the first time showed me the reconstruction of the =

>"Riga-Stadler" basset-clarinet, he had made a discovery that if he =
>closed the vent hole on the knee joint of the pointed bell, put there =

>for tuning the low C, he could play a perfect low B natural.

Cool. Extra notes are always nice to have. The current Buffet basses
are
similarly equipped with padless vent holes on the bell. When I
bought a new 1193, I of course took my left sock and shoe off to
stop it up. I was disappointed to find that it only lowered the low
C by about 30 cents. I was also rather surprised since it certainly
looks like stopping it up makes the air/sound waves/etc. travel
quite a bit farther, but such is the nature of bells I guess.

It's funny how everyone always just has to have one more note than
what he's got. I'm familiar with this feeling since I used to have
to stick a chunk of 1 1/4" PVC pipe in the bell of my Bundy bass
to get the low concert C's which Bach perversely wrote in his
"Six Suites for Unaccompanied Bass Clarinet".

I had hoped that having a low-C bass would enable me to sit
in band without having the bassoonists sneering at me
("Hey buddy -- you call yourself a low woodwind, huh?
Well play this then!), but it seems that even bassoonists
are not immune from this musical one-downsmanship.
I've seen extensions that enable bassoons to get a low A
in catalogs (and really they just need a used toilet paper roll)
--- if the bassoonist in my bands learn about
this I'll need to do some more complicated plumbing --
get some extra length AND plug up that funny vent.

Mark Thiel

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