Klarinet Archive - Posting 000547.txt from 2006/03

From: Joseph Wakeling <joseph.wakeling@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Transposed Parts
Date: Sun, 26 Mar 2006 12:14:33 -0500

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dnleeson wrote:
> Let me make sure I understand. I'll quote and modify your first
> sentence slightly: "arguing that pre-20th century clarinet choice was
> simply dictated by the key OF THE COMPOSITION, that's nonsense."
>
> If you agree that the addition of the capitalized words are what you
> meant, then I'm afraid it is not nonsense at all. It is historical
> fact that composers selected the pitch of the clarinet based ENTIRELY
> on the key of the composition.

No, my argument was meant to be a bit more subtle than that. Your own
statement a little later describes what I was getting at:

> [I]t is reasonable to believe that once that clarinet had been
> selected the composer used its particular character to the music's
> best advantage. And it is also possible to think that the key of the
> composition may have been chose because the composer wanted to use a
> particular clarinet; i.e., Mozart selecting A major for the piano
> concerto K. 488 because he wanted to use A clarinets.

I don't dispute that, in this period, once a key had been selected for a
composition, that dictated the choice of clarinet. I just dispute that
this implies that composers didn't pay attention to character
differences between the instruments, or make use of those character
differences---e.g. by choosing keys that would allow them to select a
certain instrumental character. My feeling is that in an age where
possible instrumentation was so much more strongly dictated by choice of
key, it is unlikely that choice of key wasn't in turn influenced by
desired instrumentation.

I think something of this is borne out by e.g. the Paris Conservatoire's
comments on M=C3=BCller's instrument, which suggested that having only on=
e
"omnitonic" clarinet would deprive composers of colour resources.

What I think is "nonsense" is not that instrumental choice was so
strongly bound to choice of key, but the idea that this implies we
should not worry, in this age of chromatic clarinets, about substituting
one instrument for another.

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