Klarinet Archive - Posting 000574.txt from 2006/03

From: "dnleeson" <dnleeson@-----.net>
Subj: RE: [kl] Transposed Parts
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2006 10:48:42 -0500

Joe, it is an interesting subject for someone's doctoral
dissertation, but my gut feel is that more than 50% of all
orchestral music written up to around 1825 called for C clarinet.
Some of that repertoire has contemporary parts printed for
clarinets in B-flat and/or A without a statement that the parts
were originally in C, which may have an impact on my estimated
50%.

As a general rule, any piece of music up to 1825 that was written
in the keys of C, F, or G concert, were almost certainly for a C
clarinet (if a clarinet was included at all). Any piece of music
in the key of B-flat or E-flat was written for a B-flat clarinet.
And any piece of music in D or A was written for a clarinet in A.
And while the following statistic is very small, it is
instructive. Any music written in B major or otherwise requiring
four or more sharps in the concert key was written for a clarinet
in B-natural.

There are probably exceptions, to be sure, but that's the general
rule.

Dan Leeson
DNLeeson@-----.net

-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph H. Fasel [mailto:jhf@-----.gov]
Sent: Monday, March 27, 2006 7:37 AM
To: klarinet@-----.org
Subject: RE: [kl] Transposed Parts

I wouldn't say the call for C clarinets in the orchestral
literature is
"slight". Since I've gotten my C, I've been surprised at how
often I'm
using it in my (amateur) orchestra. More often than not, at
least one
piece on the program calls for clarinets in C.

Cheers,
--Joe

On Sat, 2006-03-25 at 20:15, Doug Potter wrote:
> What I'm trying to say is that we do what we can with what we
have. I'm
> happy to know that C clarinets exist - and can even imagine
that it be nice
> to own one. But given no one pays me to play (and so can't
fire me) and the
> slight call for C clarinet parts, I can't justify to myself the
purchase of
> a C clarinet on the household budget. If I had a C clarinet, I
would
> certainly use it to play the sections that called for it. I'm
sure I
> remember someone on this list saying almost exactly this same
thing -
> although that may have been about an A clarinet.
--
Joseph H. Fasel, Ph.D. email: jhf@-----.gov
Systems Planning and Analysis phone: +1 505 667 7158
University of California fax: +1 505 667 2960
Los Alamos National Laboratory D-2 MS F609; Los Alamos, NM
87545

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