Klarinet Archive - Posting 000685.txt from 2003/07

From: "Lelia Loban" <lelialoban@-----.net>
Subj: [kl] basset horn vs. basset clarinet vs. extended clarinet
Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2003 10:31:36 -0400

The Sunday before last, a dealer outdoors at the Black Angus outdoor flea
market on the main drag through Adamstown, Pennsylvania offered a "genuine
17th century clarinet" (his description in response to my question) for
$1,100. The wood was all boxwood, including the mouthpiece, the mouthpiece
cap and all the bands (no ivory or ebony bands). He'd locked the clarinet
in a glass-topped display case. I didn't ask him to open it, because he
was busy; and also because I didn't trust my knowledge of old clarinets
enough to fork over that kind of money under those circumstances. The
dealer's guesstimate of the date would have been way off, even if this
clarinet were a genuine antique, which I doubt--instinct said, "replica."
The condition looked suspiciously fresh, with a little bit of minor
cracking at the joints that can happen quickly with boxwood. The
instrument looked roughly similar to the 5-key Heinrich Grenser in C from
about 1810 that's farthest to the left on p. 20 of the 1997 reprinted
edition of _The Cambridge Companion to the Clarinet_ (ed. Colin Lawson;
this photo is in Nicholas Shackleton's Chapter 2, "The development of the
clarinet"), except that the one for sale was about the right length for a
modern clarinet in A; the brass keys had a more elongated, rectangular
shape than those on the Grenser; and aside from the banding being all
boxwood, there were also differences in the contours and placement of the
banding.

Assuming it's a replica, I don't know how recent it is, how good it is or
what it's worth, but the dealer may still have this instrument, if
anybody's interested and knowledgable enough not to get suckered. (He's
one of the regulars at Black Angus most Sundays, in the field behind the
shops. He's stout and a bit past middle age, has a slight accent, probably
German, and sets up clear at the back, in the row parallel to and opposite
from the concession stands.) Caveat emptor.

Lelia Loban
E-mail: lelialoban@-----.net
Web site (original music scores as audio or print-out):
http://members.sibeliusmusic.com/LeliaLoban

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