Klarinet Archive - Posting 000900.txt from 2000/10

From: Neil Leupold <leupold_1@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Breathing & fundamentals
Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2000 22:30:53 -0400

--- Patricia Smith <pattiesmith@-----.net> wrote:

> Neil, great post on breathing...in my book, it's akeeper...

Frankly, I think the additional point you made was much more valuable in
terms of a general philosophy:

> i find that I need to play a few long tones with my metronome (quarter note
> = 60) to set my embouchure and breathing before I begin to do my tuner work
> for the day. You need to be breathing correctly and have your embouchure set
> correctly to know where your pitch really is, rather than pinch your lips and
> play around with the air in order to put the needle where you want it. it is
> important to play on pitch - but at the expense of good habits, it is just not
> proper playing at all.

A comment I made to Mr. Schneider in France (the golf analogy), with respect to
whether or not he should emulate his friends' choices of barrel, does not apply
to fundamental clarinet technique. The defining characteristic of the world's
great clarinetists is not that they can play with technical grace and musical
depth during a given performance. Rather, being able to produce those world-
class results every time they pick up the instrument is what sets these people
apart. Consistency is the name of the game. Much like in science, if you can-
not reproduce an outcome reliably, those results are not considered valid, al-
though this notion does not carry over seamlessly to the music world. A single
world-class performance is discretely worthy and entirely valid. The player
might not get hired elsewhere, however, if (s)he hasn't yet developed a repu-
tation for being able to play that way consistently.

The point here is that without a solid and well-defined foundation of technique
and musicianship, it is not possible to rise to a very high level of performance.
A high performance level has consistency baked into it. Since the clarinet has been
around for 300 years, plenty of people have already figured out what works and what
doesn't, and they too started by developing a toolbox of fundamentals and building
upward and outward from there. Patricia is on the mark when she indicates the ne-
cessity to activate one's operating foundation before attempting to explore other
elements of technique. Many students find themselves frustrated in the learning
process precisely because they neglect to properly prime their bodies and minds
before jumping into more sophisticated exercises and music. I've witnessed a very
good conservatory player or two go backward in their performance level over the
course of a year, precisely because they discontinued a proper warm-up as part
of their opening daily regimen. Breath support technique is just one element
of this issue -- albeit the absolute most important, in my opinion, since it
literally affects and facilitates all other areas of clarinet technique.

Many people were surprised, way back when, to learn that Jascha Heifetz ran
slowly through his scales every single day as the start to his own practice
regimen, even (perhaps especially) at the height of his abilities. Here was
a man who defined an entire generation of violin playing and was the paradigm
of technical perfection. He was once filmed running slowly through a thorny
passage of a violin concerto (the Weniawski, I think). His actual perform-
ance was also filmed. The performance video was then slowed down and com-
pared to the video of his practice session. The two were indistinguishable.

-- Neil

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