Klarinet Archive - Posting 000861.txt from 2002/03
From: "Kevin Fay" <kevinfay@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] on the subject of a player's sound...
Date: Sat, 30 Mar 2002 14:28:54 -0500
Kelly posted:
<<<Kevin,
Isn't this contradictory? If others tell you they can hear a difference, how
is it different? You said other people hear a different sound. If they hear
a difference in the sound of the Buffet R-13s you had before, and the Yamaha
CEs you have now, (assuning your mouthpiece was the same, etc..) wouldn't
this disprove the theory that you sound the same on all clarinets, as long
as the mouthpiece is the same?>>>
Contradictory, no. Unclear, certainly.
The first part of my post was to poke a little fun at Dan Leeson - I saw his
pooh-poohing of Kelly's affection for the Selmer 10-G a little at odds with
the shameless lust he showed us all this summer over his new Fox bassett
horn. (An aside - I saw it at ClarinetFest; it is indeed a cutie. Wish I
had had the gumption to try it out.)
I believe that instruments do matter. That's why I shelled out a pile of
hard-earned bucks the last year to get a pair of new Yamahas CEs - but
equipment matters only so much. Playing clarinet originates from the brain,
not the mouth. If you can't hear the sound you want in your head, you can't
make it with any horn, no matter how much money you spend.
I also agree with Stanley Hasty's observation that the farther from your
brain, the less important the equipment is. I think the choice of
mouthpiece is *far* more important than the clarinet underneath it. (It
irks me to see kids with shiny new Buffets getting a stinky sound becuase
they didn't bother to upgrade their mouthpiece first.) There's no stating
which is the "best," though, becuase you have different teeth than I do. I
play Greg Smith mouthpieces; while I urge you to try them, I can't say that
they're "better" than what you're using if yours works. For every
mouthpiece ever sold, there's someone using it to good effect. One of my
good friends hs a drawer full of custom mouthpieces, but now plays on a B-45
with plastic reeds exclusively - and he sounds great. Who's to say which is
"better"?
Dan is quite right, I think, in that our obsession over equipment is
overdone. Certainly a bad instrument can make you sound terrible. (Evil
clarinet players will be forced to play Heimers and Regents in Satan's
Symphony for eternity - that's the group with banjos and accordians,
together). When you're talking about artist-level instruments properly
cared for, though, it's a matter of preference, nothing more.
My Yamahas have a scale that's closer to just temperment than my old
Buffets, so I find it easier to adjust pitch in the orchestra, the tone a
little more even from note to note, and - don't hit me Dan, 'cuz I don't
have a better word - darker. The differences are perceptible, as people
have noticed, just rather small in the grand scheme of things. In a recent
post, OTOH, Tony Pay stated that he rather liked the tendency of Buffets or
period clarinets to have one note pop out over another, as it adds another
dimension to his performance. (Apologies if I didn't state this exactly
right, Tony). Sean Osborn recently waxed poetic on his new Selmer
Signatures. I tried them at length at the ClarinetFest this summer, and
could easily live with them. I've also heard him play Buffets, though, and
I've got to tell you it didn't suck.
A particular clarinet may be a smidgen easier for you to sound exactly the
way you want than another. All of the marketing hype and debate revolves
around that smidgen. But we must not forget that the smidgen is way less
important than things like good embouchure and proper articulation.
The differences between good clarinets are really subtle. When I shopped
for a new Bb last summer, I tried dozens of horns; while I finally ended
choosing one, I could have been happy with any one of a number of brands.
Lots and lots and lots of people swear by the Buffet R-13 (and a good number
AT them).
. . . and all of this ignores the real deal - once you have the sound you
want, what do you do with it?
kjf
(the proud owner of several equally-ineffective sets of golf clubs)
Chat with friends online, try MSN Messenger: http://messenger.msn.com
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