Klarinet Archive - Posting 000034.txt from 2005/06

From: Tim Roberts <timr@-----.com>
Subj: RE: [kl] Re: Bb versus C Clarinet?
Date: Wed, 01 Jun 2005 19:04:10 -0400

On Wed, 1 Jun 2005 10:26:45 -0700, "dnleeson" <dnleeson@-----.net>
wrote:

>Occasionally, one reaches a point in a discussion that is so very
>relevant to the history of the clarinet, that it is worth
>stopping for a moment to point out that the note below from Tim
>Roberts is exactly such a point.
>
>He is about three steps away from a significant breakthrough in
>his knowledge about WHY the clarinet is a transposing instrument,
>how that came about, and the consequences of that activity.
>

You only noticed this because my understanding is based mostly on words
that you, yourself, wrote, having passed through whatever inefficient
filter is present in my brain.

This whole procession seems so absurdly accidental to me. The earliest
clarinets, as I understand it, lacked keywork for alternate and
cross-fingerings that are necessary for enable rapid fingering in
complicated key signatures on an instrument overblowing on the 12th, in
part because of the difficulty of manufacturing such keywork. Because
of that, we ended up with the early "rule" that clarinet parts could not
be written in more than 2 flats or more than 1 sharp. This rule, in
turn, required that orchestral clarinetists possess multiple clarinets
in multiple keys, in order to accomodate arbitrary key signatures.

Now, those manufacturing difficulties did not last very long in the
history of the clarinet. Albert, Oehler, Boehm, all of these guys had
pretty good general-case solutions. But by that time, performers were
already accustomed to clarinets in multiple keys. And, presumably, at
least one composer must have noticed that clarinets in different keys
had slightly different timbres. At some point, we go from multiple
clarinet keys because of manufacturing problems, to multiple clarinet
keys because of desired tonality.

And so we come to today. For the most part, a player on a modern 17-key
or 18-key clarinet can handle whatever key signature the composer throws
at him. And, because of improvements in manufacturing techniques,
clarinets of different keys sound more and more alike than in the past.
There are those who will assert to the death that a C clarinet always
sounds more (insert colorful adjective here) than a Bb clarinet, which
in turn sounds more (insert different but equally colorful adjective
here) than an A clarinet. I am dubious, but only in private.

So, because of early shortcomings in manufacturing processes, we are
forever left with the legacy of clarinets in multiple keys. It just
doesn't seem to be as neat and centrally-planned as one would like in a
legacy.

Consider the saxophone as a counterexample. Developed a century and a
half later, it came out of the starting blocks with better manufacturing
processes. Because of that, we find saxophones keyed in rather large
steps: soprano Bb, alto Eb, tenor Bb, baritone Eb, bass Bb. Smaller
increments were not necessary, just as smaller increments were not
*necessary* in the clarinets of that day. But by that time, it was too
late.

--
Tim Roberts, timr@-----.com
Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.

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