Klarinet Archive - Posting 000590.txt from 2002/01

From: Dan Leeson <leeson0@-----.net>
Subj: [kl] Bassethorn
Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 13:00:40 -0500

I left out of my original note one of the more (perhaps the most)
important element in the selection of a basset horn, namely the key
arrangement for the notes below low e. I state unequivocally that no
one, including the maker of my new instrument, has completely solved the
problem of getting around down there. The basic problem is that almost
every note from low e-flat down to low c has a need to be played with
two different fingerings, namely one in one pinky and the other in the
other pinky (or to some degree the thumb). But alternative fingerings
are necessary for every one of those notes, with the single exception
being the low d-flat/c-shapr. As far as I have been able to determine,
nothing in the literature requires that note to be playable on either
side of the instrument.

Not a single person to whom I spoke on this subject (at Selmer) had any
idea of what the literature required one to play on a basset horn. They
were engineers and instrument makers, not clarinet players and certainly
not people who had played the basset horn literature.

If you want to examine the critical elements of the literature that give
rise to problems in the lowest register, examine the basset horn part of
Strauss' Frau Ohne Schatten, Mozart's alternate aria from Figaro, "Al
desio" (2nd basset horn part only), and either of the two Mendelssohn
concertpieces, both of which have low passagework that is either very
difficult or simply impossible on today's basset horns.

Selmer and Buffet thought they solved the problem by providing three
thumb keys, but the fact is that one cannot get around very fast if
those are the ONLY fingerings for low C, C-sharp, and D. The Le Blanc
has its problems, too, and presents its own set of difficulties.

I once had a long correspondence with Selmer about their low note
insufficiencies, and got the impression from them that they thought me
to be a nut case. Their posture seemed to be that if you can play the
note at all, then there cannot be much of a problem. But the difficult
lay in going from note to note, not in playing any single one. Buffet
was just as obstinate.

I speak here only of the Boehm system basset horns, not those made in a
German system. And if you intend to play only the Mozart Requiem, you
don't have any concerns since it never uses the lowest notes on the
instrument in either the first or the second parts. Even the Gran
Partitta uses the low notes only in the 2nd basset horn and there is not
a significant problem there.

DNL
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**Dan Leeson **
**leeson0@-----.net **
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