Klarinet Archive - Posting 000315.txt from 2004/10

From: "Keith" <100012.1302@-----.com>
Subj: [kl] RE: klarinet Digest 10 Oct 2004 08:14:59 -0000 Issue 5570
Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 04:52:57 -0400

I'd disagree. I do think the description is useful. Of course there is only
one fundamental and many higher partials (and Bill's post implied nothing
else). What he is describing is the general shape of the spectrum. It is
perfectly valid to give a general description of the way it is skewed
towards higher frequencies. This is what I understood him to be saying, and
it gives me a better idea of what the sound is like than any number of vague
adjectives. I can hear such differences, and use them in my playing. For
example in selection of a ligature. For example, my only complaint about
Legere reeds is their shortage of high frequency vibration (and I've seena
spectrum shown by Guy Legere), which I find is countered by a very light
metal ligature (Spriggs floating rail).

And yes, I'm a scientist and familiar with spectra and Fourier analysis.

Keith Bowen

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Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 02:32:37 EDT
To: klarinet@-----.org
From: Elgenubi@-----.com
Subject: Re: Selmer St. Louis
Message-ID: <1f1.2c1e8bee.2e9a3185@-----.com>

Bill, apololgies! I want to comment on a term you used, but still say I
understand your main point. If you say that you find Selmers and Buffets to
sound different in your hands, of course I believe you. I respect your
experience in music and the music business and always read your posts
carefully. But, in talking about clarinet sounds you said, "I find that
Selmers have more fundamental and Buffets more higher partials."

I've heard many people use these words, when trying to describe something
they hear in a clarinet sound. I think these terms are even less useful
than 'dark' and 'bright' and 'warm' . Whereas 'dark' and 'bright' have at
least emotional weight, 'fundamental' and 'partial' have defined scientific
meanings that makes this kind of usage worthless. The 'fundamental' of a
tone is a simple sine wave, and anyone who's heard a sine wave generator
would never describe any clarinet as sounding anything like it. Any
clarinet sound has many, many higher partials, which vary much depending on
all the characteristics we know about; register, volume, and one million
other factors like brand of clarinet and personal concept of sound,
etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.
There might be some value in talking about amounts of even and odd partials
in a clarinet sound. I won't try here; it's complex and probably not useful
in the context of "what does the St. Louis Clarinet sound like?"

Dan is pretty rigorous in challenging the use of subjective terms to
describe clarinet sound. This is usually appropriate. I wish there were
words we could use to communicate how we perceived a clarinet as sounding;
but we haven't found them yet on this list. I don't think 'fundamentals and
higher partials'
do the job. (For anyone who has not read this list for very long, the
discussion of 'dark' goes back to the very beginning.)

Reference: the U of New South Wales website with their spectra of clarinet
sounds.
http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/music/clarinet/
The many spectra shown there of all the notes a clarinet can play appear as
complex jagged lines. A sound consisting of only a fundamental would
consist of a single peak.
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