Klarinet Archive - Posting 000446.txt from 2001/03

From: Neil Leupold <leupold_1@-----.com>
Subj: [kl] Performance horror stories (was: embouchure woes)
Date: Sun, 18 Mar 2001 00:09:19 -0500

--- Jim Hobby <jhobby@-----.net> wrote:

> External stress can cause -- or at least help cause embouchure stress.
> During my senior recital, just as I was ready to start with the Weber
> Concertino, my Ab key (literally) fell off the clarinet, onto stage. I had
> to duck off and fix it. 50-some minutes later, I ended with the Arnold
> Sonatina, and was tired enough that I had a couple of top register "skwaks".
> Never had any problems in rehearsals, so I think the embarassment of my
> clarinet falling apart in front of the audience had something to do with it.
> <g>

I'm sorry, but I had to laugh at the Ab key story, although there was
certainly nothing funny about it at the time, I'm sure. The mental
imagery, in combination with my enormous sympathy, made it humorous. I
remember being in the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra, just about
to walk on stage at Davies Symphony Hall for a concert, when the entire
lower half of my bass clarinet literally disengaged and dropped to the
floor. I'd apparently greased it more thoroughly than I thought and
stupidly carried it by the top joint alone. With five minutes before
the downbeat, I rushed into a practice room, put the instrument back
together, and discovered that nothing would speak below middle C.
I proceeded to bend keys and pad arms all over the damned place in
order to make those notes speak. The notes came out for the concert,
but it felt like I was blowing into a mouthpiece with a foot-wide tip
opening, the leaks were so severe. Needless to say, the lower notes
of the instrument were not in tune and were fuzzy as hell. I'm sure
Clark had fun putting Humpty Dumpty back together again later than
week...

Just last night, I attended a chamber recital at the Brooklyn Academy of
Music (BAM), featuring the principal players of the Brooklyn Phil. Steve
Hartman, principal clarinet, was taking his bows after finishing the Intro-
duction and Allegro for Harp by Ravel, when the bottom half of his *soprano*
clarinet...disengaged and fell to the floor! I went into partial shock at
that moment, watching him bend down, pick it up, and walk off stage (very
quickly). I found out afterward that he had been very lucky -- no damage.
He came out & closed the recital with Messiaen's Quartet for the End of
Time. Who knows what kind of mental stress he must have been experienc-
ing while making his way through the Abyss of the Birds, beyond the chal-
lenges of the movement itself!

~ Neil

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