Klarinet Archive - Posting 000074.txt from 2002/11

From: Daniel Leeson <leeson0@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Re: reverse Mozart
Date: Fri, 1 Nov 2002 20:04:01 -0500

Karl Krelove wrote:
> And then the string players put their bows down and told Mozart to forget
> about pieces in B and F-sharp major if he wanted them to play - not to
> mention the bassoonists and oboists. Hence, one could guess, the death of
> the B-natural clarinet.
>
> What were the two pieces Mozart used the B (or H?) clarinet in? Would the
> clarinet have been necessarily the only woodwind to play in such a piece
> (were the flutes, oboes and bassoons of the time equally limited or nearly
> so in their chromatic ranges)?
>
> Karl Krelove
>

Clarinets in B-natural appear in both Cosi fan tutti and Idomeneo. In
the former, Fiordiligi's aria "Per pieta" and in the latter, the chorus
"Placido e il mar," Elettra's aria "Soavi Zeffira," and Ilia's aria
"Zeffiretti lusinghieri." In the volume of Idomeneo published as part
of the Neue Mozart Ausgabe series, the editor, Daniel Heartz substituted
clarinets in A though he acknowledges Mozart's prescription of clarinets
in B-natural in the forward. In Cosi, the NMA volume has the B-natural
clarinets right in the score though I doubt if anyone has ever played
them on those instruments in the last 100 years at least.

The instruments were invariably used when the key signature of the work
was more than 3 sharps and, even in the face of this, Mozart still
wanted clarinets. I suspect that the character of the instruments was
more like a clarinet in C than like one in B-flat. In fact, it fits in
between the two instruments, of course.

But what makes you think that the string players would have objected to
their use in Mozart's time. Even considering that you had your tongue
in your cheek when you wrote that line, THEY would have not have had a
problem with the instrument. It was the clarinet player where the
problem lay.

Dan Leeson

>
>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Daniel Leeson [mailto:leeson0@-----.net]
>>
>>
>>I know of no such effort, though the high-pitched clarinet in B-flat
>>that was in use in the first half of the 20th century came very close to
>>being a clarinet in B-natural. Mozart used the instrumnent only twice
>>and its theoretical purpose was to permit facilitation for concert keys
>>in more than 3 sharps.

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