Klarinet Archive - Posting 000157.txt from 2004/11

From: "Lelia Loban" <lelialoban@-----.net>
Subj: [kl] Balance
Date: Thu, 4 Nov 2004 16:56:51 -0500


Ginny Scarfino wrote,
>Speaking of balance, my clarinet teacher played
>an awesome Eb clarinet. He was also quite proud
>of the volume he could produce (but never louder
>than lovely!). He told me about one time when the
>conductor of the orchestra (a good professional
>orchestra) he played Principal Clarinet in asked to
>him to play his Eb part a little softer because he was
>drowning out the trumpets. I didn't quite know if I
>should believe him or not - although he certainly
>could play loud. However, this past year at one of
>my bassoon lessons, my Bassoon teacher (who is
>Principal Bassoon in the same orchestra as my clarinet
>teacher) told me the very same story about my Clarinet
>teacher drowning out the trumpets on his Eb Clarinet.
>So I guess the story really was true!

I believe that story, especially if the Eb clarinet had notes higher in
pitch than what the trumpets were playing. High pitches tend to carry
farther than lower notes to begin with, and the sound of a well-conditioned
Eb clarinet has a piercing quality. It's like the piccolo that way. (Hmm,
I think Shadow Cat's asleep.... [evil grin] Composers who write program
music and need a hair-raising, unpleasantly shrill, scary sound -- a
fingernails-on-the-blackboard scream with some "beats" in it from
intonation clashes -- try this: Put two piccolos and two Eb clarinets in
unison or octave unison and take them up near the tops of their ranges,
double forte. Instant axe murderer!) To me, balance has less to do with
the inherent qualities of the instruments, and more to do with the
sensitivity of the people playing them -- and also with the conductor *and
the building*.

The room is another member of the ensemble. When my husband's amateur
quartets and trios play in unfamiliar surroundings, they try to get into
the building early enough to do a sound check. They send me and any other
music-playing hangers-on all around the place while they rehearse. There's
more to the room than "live" or "dead" sound.

The most common balance problem they encounter is the cello-eating monster:
the building where high pitched notes carry, but low- pitched notes drop
dead, sometimes at a distance of only a few feet from the group, even
though the group hears a normally balanced quartet sound. In a setting
like that, my husband and the other violinist really have to restrain
themselves. In a band, flute and clarinet players who sit right in front
of the brasses might think they have to blow like the Big Bad Wolf to be
heard at all against that wall of noise hitting from behind, but move a few
feet away, to the conductor's podium and beyond, and the soundscape may
change completely.

Lelia Loban
Bush defeats Kerry. Lies defeat truth. Jingoism defeats patriotism.
Superstition defeats science. Bigotry defeats understanding.
Ignorance defeats reason.

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