Klarinet Archive - Posting 000150.txt from 2004/07

From: "Karl Krelove" <karlkrelove@-----.net>
Subj: RE: [kl] Bumblebee
Date: Mon, 5 Jul 2004 09:46:41 -0400

My first reaction when I read C.C. Lin's question was similar to everyone
else's so far - do something else instead, and I agree. The original
composition wasn't meant to be played as a solo piece for clarinet or any
other single instrument.

Then Gary's response prompted another question: Gary, you seem to have a
particular version in mind, and I wondered if there is one that anyone
considers a "standard" arrangement of this basically orchestral piece? Time
was editors would include some version of Bumblebee in practically every
collection of short solos for intermediate or advanced students they
published. I've seen it in several keys, the key choice making the piece
either eminently playable or nearly impossible. Sometimes rests are written
in (for breaths) while the piano accompaniment fills in, and sometimes the
thing looks like a Rafael Mendez arrangement (*requiring* circular breathing
to play all the way through). Mendez did a recording of it, didn't he?

There are so many different arrangements in print (or maybe out-of-print by
now) that I wonder what anyone means when they want to play or teach "Flight
of the Bumblebee."

C.C., out of curiosity what arrangement were you planning to use?

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Gary Truesdail [mailto:gir@-----.net]
> (snip) In bumblebee you get only 2 or
> if you are really good at catching a fast abdominal breath on the second
> page, 3 breaths to complete the thing and that is if you can play it
> fast enough.
>
>

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