Klarinet Archive - Posting 000557.txt from 2002/09

From: Daniel Leeson <leeson0@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] My attempt to formalize my unstructured ideas
Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2002 13:35:26 -0400

Anthony Wakefield wrote:
>
> Composers are a different kind of musician from performers. Composers are
> designers, whereas performers are artisans. The composers supply the
> "drawings", the performers "dig the holes, and erect the scaffolding". I
> believe that music [and art - look at the renovation in the `70`s (?) of
> the Sistine Chapel ceiling] is not quite so sacrosanct as to be left
> "untouched", if it can be seen to be adjusted, to make it "work".
> Notice I use the word "adjusted" as opposed to "altered". The player who
> said that he plays Petruchka on the A, said that he plays
> it <not> because "it sounds better", but because it lies better under the
> fingers. There lies the all important difference.

This is an excellent perspective. But the essence of it is represents
what you think Ed Maury meant. Ed explicitly stated that "It sounds
better." Maybe he didn't mean that. Maybe you're right and he meant
something else. But that is what he said.

And the importance of the distinction between what you said and what Ed
said is the very essence of the problem.

We do these things with no standard of why we do them. A third party
could just as well have said, "I'm poor and can only afford one clarinet
so that I why I do what I do."

In the final analysis, after everyone has laid out their perspective
about why they do what they do, they all translate into a statement that
is equivalent to saying: "I don't think that what the composer has
requested is binding on me."

And maybe you are right, but not when you said, "It lies better under
the fingers" and Ed says, "It sounds better," and someone else says,
"Because it is better in tune," and someone else says, "Because my
instrument got too cold," and someone else says, ...

In the words of Thoreau, "Simplify, simplify." I'm simple minded and
presume that the composer will tell me what to do in this respect. It is
the ultimate simplification.

By the way, I don't perceive us as artisans and composers as designers,
but one holy war at a time. That notion is for another date.

> No non-musican will hear any difference at all in the nuance of sound
> character between the A and the Bb clarinet.

How many non-musicians have you tested to allow you to come to that
conclusion? These free-wheeling conclusions about what some portion of
the world knows and doesn't know are offered as blinding epiphanies of
discovery. But they obscure the facts because they are easy statements
to make and no one can contradict you. But that does not mean (1) that
they have anything to do with the subject, or (2) that they have any
validity at all.

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