Klarinet Archive - Posting 000455.txt from 2005/08

From: "Margaret Thornhill" <clarinetstudio@-----.net>
Subj: [kl] Timbre and Pitch ( clarinet ensembles)
Date: Thu, 25 Aug 2005 21:04:02 -0400

Sarah Elbaz and Diane Karius raise pointed issues about intonation and
clarinet ensembles in their recent posts: Sarah finds that listening is the
main rehearsal issue with her youthful clarinet choir but that it fixes
their intonation; Diane found that normal strategies of listening did not
entirely fix intonation issues with a trio of mature clarinetists. This
caused me to think again about the symbiotic relationship between Timbre and
Pitch and how these two concepts are often intertwined in the player's ear.

I think we can agree that ensembles of like instruments--all clarinets (or
all oboes--imagine!)-- have a peculiar richness and intensity of sonority
that makes it much harder for players to discriminate tone from pitch than
when playing in a mixed ensemble.

In a group formed from the studio of a particular teacher, matching tone
color as well as pitch is likely to be a desirable outcome for the group,
and relatively easy to achieve, even with younger musicians. In a group
comprised of older, more experienced players who trained with different
teachers there's a tremendous range of tonal palette from the outset. With
such an ensemble, it's much easier to be distracted from hearing differences
in intonation because we are also perceiving a "color" match--or non match--
and this may interfere with our ability to discriminate how to fix the
intonation problem, or even to hear it as a separate entity.

The Los Angeles Clarinet Choir, which I formed in June, is a group of
accomplished adult players aged 23-62 (?). All but two of the ten people in
this group already have a degree in clarinet or are working on one. Many of
the members of this group are also members of this list and play with
numerous local performing ensembles other than the choir.

Now, one of the features of this group is that there are a variety of tone
colors amongst the players. No two people play with the same setup. No two
people sound exactly alike. We have former students of many different
teachers: Ramon Kireilis, David Niethamer, Helen Castro, Fred Kowalski,
Michael Sullivan, to name a few. We also, for this first concert, have tried
a rotating seating with soprano clarinets playing different parts in
different works (a la Emerson String Quartet.) Complicating matters more, we
are attempting to pick and choose when a work demands that stand partners
attempt to sound like "one clarinet" in terms of timbre, and when it is more
desirable *musically* that their individual tone colors be preserved (in
very contrapuntal pieces, for example, or a work with many solos in all
parts, where preserving the range of color is perhaps closer to the origins
of the work), creating performance issues much more typical of chamber music
than of, say, the clarinet section of a symphonic or military band, where
blend is the order of the day. All this puts a tremendous burden on the
intonation, which I must say, the group is tackling admirably, as we attempt
to close in on our goal.

PS
By the way, if you are in Southern California, come and hear the them
September 18. (Announcement to follow.)

Margaret Thornhill
http://www.margaretthornhill.com/ClarinetChoir.html

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