Klarinet Archive - Posting 000510.txt from 2001/03
From: Lacy Schroeder <LacyS@-----.org>
Subj: RE: [kl] Performance horror stories (was: embouchure woes)
Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2001 10:38:10 -0500
I have a rather lengthy bass clarinet horror story.....
The Wind Symphony at my school was invited to play at the CBDNA Confrence at
UMKC my freshman year, and we had a full program including David
Gillingham's "Waking Angels." Well, I was second chair soprano, tripling on
e-flat clarinet, and playing bass clarinet on the Gillingham piece (a
one-on-a-part chamber piece).
Wellll....At the morning warm up, I was assembling my bass when the top
joint flipped out of my hand (I still claim that it sprouted legs and
jumped) and landed on the floor. It bent the rod to the register vent. My
teacher was there and couldn't fix it, so we decided that I should use the
bass clarinet of the guy who played it for every other piece (he was a sax
player playing bass and he director opted for me to play bass on the
Gillingham).
So, it was all set. At the performance we played the first three pieces
without a hitch, and then we all went backstage for the minute or two it
took to reset the stage (where I set down my soprano and got the bass and
swapped mouthpieces). The chamber piece went great, and we went backstage
again for the stage reset. Back onto the stage again with my soprano, the
other guy comes out, sans bass, and asks me, "Hey, where's your bass?" I'm
confused at this point, and he went on to say that the lower half of his
bass dropped off, and was completely busted. So, the concert was stalled
while he had to go get the lower half of my horn, and use it with the top
half of his. The rest of the concert went very smoothly, and in the last
piece, we had a very long bass/eefer duet! Ironic, isn't it?
Sorry this was so long, but I hope you find it as funny as I do--now. :)
Lacy S.
-----Original Message-----
From: Neil Leupold [mailto:leupold_1@-----.com]
Subject: [kl] Performance horror stories (was: embouchure woes)
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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