Klarinet Archive - Posting 000845.txt from 2002/10

From: "WILLIAM SEMPLE" <wsemple@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] This thing on my front door
Date: Wed, 30 Oct 2002 23:03:02 -0500

That some regressive analyses fail to produce useful information does not
make the regressive analysis a useless tool. Certainly, general conclusions
are reached by regressive analyses, just as they are by all sorts of
research process: e.g., high cholesterol can lead to clogged arteries. The
fact that high cholesterol does not in all cases should not eviscerate the
general observation.

Is it useful to make the relatively simplistic, intuitively arrived
conclusion that in order of importance, a player's embouchure (etc.) is the
most important contributor to sound, followed by the reed, the mouthpiece,
the barrel, and then the instrument?

Yes, because in general it is true, your "exceptions" notwithstanding. Take
a great player, and have them throw their favorite set-up on a Bundy. I bet
the sound is pretty good. But take a beginner and have them play a Buffet
Prestige, and I would venture that the sound would be pretty bad.

The sound introduced into the horn is shaped by the embouchure, mouthpiece,
and reed. No matter what kind of horn is attached, the horn cannot correct
sonic errors that occur at the outset. The reed cannot correct deficiencies
of the embouchure; the mouthpiece cannot correct the deficiency of the reed.
The instrument cannot correct the deficiency of the mouthpiece.

A lousy reed will not work on a great or any mouthpiece; yet a great reed
can work on a lousy mouthpiece. Given a well formed embouchure, great reed,
and great mouthpiece, then most any instrument will play, and perhaps play
very well.

I think the observation is useful, scientific precision aside, because it
places the emphasis were it should be, on the production of the sound at the
source, which is clearly an interplay of the embouchure, reed, and
mouthpiece. What happens after that IS of less importance in terms of which
of these various elements contribute to the sound.

The barrel has a major impact on the sound, but I think as a variable is
less important that the instrument itself. So maybe I would put the barrel
last. But maybe, with further regressive analyses, I would find that it is
more important than the instrument, and stick it back into the queue.

It makes logical sense to me that the quality of the sound introduced into
the top joint of an instrument cannot be improved with regard to its
inherent characteristics, and that what the instrument itself does is to
realize the full potential of a sound column that ALREADY EXISTS.

Accordingly, a student should concern him or herself with learning how to
play by developing a sound embouchure, learning how to select good reeds,
and using a mouthpiece that responds -- than buying Selmers or LeBlancs.

No amount of sophistry will convince me otherwise. And I think this applies
to players at all levels. That does not mean that the instrument is
unimportant, just less important, in the scheme of things, than in getting
the reed to vibrate properly.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tony Pay" <Tony@-----.uk>
Subject: Re: [kl] This thing on my front door

> On Wed, 30 Oct 2002 18:14:01 -0700, wsemple@-----.com said:
>
> > No, the point is not a real one. There is absolutely no relationship,
> > except the barest logical construct, between a lock and a key and the
> > chain that leads to far more complex result.
> >
> > In the case of the key and lock, the result is opening a door. In the
> > case of the clarinet, the result is sound, which conditioned on many
> > more variables.
> >
> > By your analogy, no one would need to spend time doing regressive
> > analyses to single out variables in a complex economic equation and
> > researchers could all go home.
>
> Quite a lot of those regressive analyses capture very little information
> that is useful in dealing with a particular situation in the world. And
> even in cases where they do capture something useful, the result is
> never expressed in such a simplistic way as saying that this variable is
> 'more important' than that one. Because in a complex system, 'it all
> depends'.
>
> Isolating the relevant difficulty -- dividing up the whole phenomenon --
> is of course very often the most useful way of proceeding. So if
> someone's clarinet has a crack across a tonehole that they don't know
> about, then what I might think of as a wonderful reed/mouthpiece setup
> won't help them play; and if you have some experience of how an almost
> invisible hairline crack can make an instrument completely unworkable,
> then your advice and your expertise in how to go about dealing with it
> is clearly very important.
>
> But just as clearly, if a clarinet player has a defective
> reed/mouthpiece setup, then the best and most airtight clarinet in the
> world won't help them. There, what you know about reeds and mouthpieces
> will count.
>
> What that shows is that any *general* assessment of the relative
> importance of the variables 'reed/mouthpiece' and 'clarinet' is doomed
> to failure. The lock/key example is similar: the importance ratio 'lock
> to key' is 100% if the lock is rusted up, and 0% if the key is the wrong
> one. And how useful would it be to take a nationwide survey of people's
> most common problems with their front doors?
>
> Of course there are many interacting variables in clarinet playing --
> don't I know it! -- and the situation is usually much more complicated
> than the example I gave above. But that makes remarks about the
> relative importance of those variables even less meaningful than in the
> simple case.
>
> What we need is not a general 'theory of importance', but a degree of
> expertise in the flexible application of basic principles, both
> scientific and artistic, to individual problems.
>
> Tony
> --
> _________ Tony Pay
> |ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
> | |ay Oxford OX2 6RE http://classicalplus.gmn.com/artists
> tel/fax 01865 553339
>
> ... Psychoceramics: The study of crackpots.
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
>

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