Klarinet Archive - Posting 000967.txt from 2000/08

From: LeliaLoban@-----.com
Subj: [kl]Which one? (Uh-oh...newby alert!)
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 2000 10:01:33 -0400

I didn't know what "carry all case" meant and speculated it might be a
soft-sided gig bag, which I wouldn't recommend. Dee Hays wrote,
>Generally what is meant by a carry all case is a hard sided case that is
>slightly larger than average. There is more room in the case for reeds,
>etc. There is also a flap inside the top lid to put music.

Thanks, Dee. In that case, I do recommend a carry-all. My old Conn clarinet
came with one of those, back in the 1950s. My first reaction was
consternation (which I hid) when my dad unexpectedly walked in the door with
this clarinet, because my new case was such a conspicuous and unfashionable
green and white. All my friends' cases were black. Still, it's a much better
case than the cramped ones the other clarinetists carried. The one serious
drawback: It was possible to overstuff the music flap, inside the lid, and
put pressure on the clarinet. That case, made of wood with plastic covering,
has made more than a dozen moves, including several across country, and has
held up so well that I still keep my Conn clarinet in it 40 years later.
Modern plastics probably offer the advantages without the weight.

My old case has two compartments for doodads, one along the front and one
down the left side. There's plenty of room for reeds, swab, bore oil, key
oil, marching lyre, spring hook, cork grease, screwdriver, packet of camera
lens tissues for wiping down pads, etc. If the parts compartments don't have
lids, a nice addition to such a case is a small fabric bag, all soft
construction, with Velcro or strings rather than hardware to close it. It's
for keeping track of loose metal items, such as spring hook and screwdriver,
that your daughter wouldn't want rattling around loose in the case where they
could scratch up the clarinet.

This situation, in which the school arranges with a store to recommend only
one choice of beginner clarinet, reminds me a lot of how my dad went out and
bought me a Conn Director despite the band teacher pushing another brand.
Dad taught me two things about individualism with that move. By example, he
taught me (and not just that once!) to think for myself. He also taught me
that individualism has a price and it's not always the one you expect to pay.
My band director didn't punish me for coming to school with the "wrong"
clarinet, as my parents feared he might; but the clarinet punished me by
*being* the wrong clarinet. Not only did the case look different, but the
clarinet sounded different from what the other kids played.

My dad didn't know anything about clarinets, and in his eagerness to buy me a
better instrument than the junk the school pushed, he made a mistake. He
remembered, from when he bought himself a second-hand bugle and taught
himself to play it during the Depression, that the Conn company had a great
reputation. He didn't know that the founder died, the company went through a
major labor strike after WWII, the family sold the company name, and the new
owners started making inferior instruments. For less money, he could have
bought a much better clarinet. Too bad he didn't have a list such as this
one to steer him away from that choice.

My classmates and I all played bad instruments, but mine was differently bad,
with the intonation problems in different places from the conformists'
clarinets. Often, the instructions that helped my classmates improve their
intonation weren't much use to me. In the long run, that was good for me. I
learned to cope and I learned to figure out a problem instead of just blindly
obeying what the teacher said to do. In a way, I was even perversely pleased
to be the weirdo with the big green and white case. I liked being an oddball
better than I would have liked being a lemming. (It's possible that owning
the weirdo clarinet helped me stick with band as a matter of pride, even
though I'd started out disgruntled because the band director pushed me onto
the clarinet when I'd begged to play trumpet or drums.) But many kids don't
perceive their choices that way, and would rather be *neither* oddball nor
lemming! They'd prefer to fit in quietly while perhaps thinking a subversive
thought or six in private.

IMHO, it wouldn't hurt to discuss with your daughter how she feels about her
clarinet fitting in with what the other kids play, and find out whether
she'll have any company on a nonconformist instrument, before you decide.
Maybe several parents could get together *with* the band director (trying to
avoid an Us vs. Them scenario) and agree on an alternative instrument, so
that your daughter won't be the only one playing that choice. Anyway, if
she's had a role in the decision, IMHO she will feel more committed to the
instrument.

I also think that buying a youngster a student-quality plastic clarinet,
saving the enticement of "graduating" to a better wooden clarinet for later,
gives an incentive to practice well and *earn* the upgrade. Acquiring a new
instrument can become a significant rite of passage for the older and more
serious student who decides to continue with music.

Lelia

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