Klarinet Archive - Posting 000108.txt from 2000/11

From: alevin@-----. Levin)
Subj: Re: [kl] What is it? (Masochism)
Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2000 11:29:20 -0500

Tony:

Just as a matter of pride: I didn't name the Symphonie Fantastique
because I had one of those embarassing lapses of spelling memory that
plague those of us who have reached 50(+). Still, Lelia was more specific
so she gets the chicken entrails as first prize.
My computer is at my office - not at home with my music.

Allen
>> In previous e-mails Allen Levin suggested Berlioz; Leila Loban
>> narrowed it down to the "witches sabbath" part from his "Symphonie
>> Fantastique".
>
>Quite right.
>
>By the way, Lelia, I had a go at finding 'Fantastique' by Marvin Kaye,
>but it doesn't even show up as having gone out of print here -- no
>record of it whatever at Blackwells or Waterstones.
>
>I'll try Bibliofind, etc.
>
>[snip]
>
>> "Right period, wrong pitch" suggests that either Tony has a higher
>> pitch 19th century Eb clarinet which needs to be flattened to Eb or
>> even D. Playing a sopranino clarinet is difficult enough; I imagine
>> that playing a period instrument unnaturally tuned would be
>> horrendously difficult.
>
>Unfortunately almost every original instrument is 'unnaturally tuned',
>in the sense that we don't really know what pitch it was designed to
>play at.
>
>The way we talk about it is, will it go at 435? -- or 438?
>
>In this concert, we'd agreed to play at 435 because the bassoons have
>recently found a good pair of instruments that won't go higher.
>
>This Eb clarinet, a Simiot of around Berlioz's time, was designed to go
>quite a lot higher, I think. It's missing a mouthpiece, and a more
>modern style mouthpiece that isn't really what would have been used in
>the period puts it at around 438. Hence the dangling of a cord through
>the instrument, and filling in some holes.
>
>But that bit of it was OK. The intonation of an instrument with such a
>cord through it is really surprisingly good, and the sound is changed
>only a little. And I'm sure that in those days people had to do that
>sort of thing if they travelled and played with different orchestras,
>or different organs.
>
>So what finally went wrong today, apart from what I was having to
>extemporise with the faulty keywork (oversized sleeves, worn threads,
>pads not closing properly) was that a crack opened in the top joint that
>meant that the instrument wouldn't have been reliable enough on tour to
>Spain and Germany. Plus that the keywork needed more time for me to get
>used to -- everything is very close together, and it was too easy to
>touch the wrong key by mistake, and stop the right note (or indeed,
>*anything*) from coming out.
>
>Fortunately my good friend Lesley Schatzberger was willing to help out,
>and is sending her own instrument by courier to London from York
>tomorrow. I'll have an hour with that before the rehearsal.
>
>She says it knows the piece. I'll let you know!
>
>Tony
>--
> _________ Tony Pay
> |ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
> | |ay Oxford OX2 6RE GMN family artist: www.gmn.com
> tel/fax 01865 553339
>
>... Insanity doesn't just run in my family; it practically gallops
>
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