Klarinet Archive - Posting 000037.txt from 2007/11

From: John Dablin <jdablin@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Legere reeds for alto clarinet?
Date: Mon, 05 Nov 2007 07:32:20 -0500

On Monday 05 November 2007 10:26, Noel Taylor wrote:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kevin Fay [mailto:kevin.fay.home@-----.net]
>
>
> --It should, since the alto clarinet is an instrument that was
> invented to --give excess saxophone players something to do. It
> *started* with the --saxophone mouthpiece/reed in its design.
>
>
> This is quite funny, Kevin, but 'the alto clarinet was invented
> in 1810 by the German clarinetist and instrument maker Iwan
> Muler' - or August Grenser - (so I read) and Adolph hadn't quite
> got round to being born.
>
[ snip ]

I once saw a clip of a 1930's English film where the members of a
dance band rushed on just in time to play their entry, and one of
them was playing an alto clarinet. I mentioned it to an elderly
clarinettist I know, saying I was a bit surprised by this. "Yes" he
said. "That's a famous scene, it was the Henry Hall Orchestra and
Burton Gillis. Bands used to have alto clarinets before they used
saxophones".

He told me he'd done the occasional gig with Burton Gillis in the
early 1950s, a very fine player on both clarinet and sax, he
thought.

John Dablin
Aylesbury UK

------------------------------------------------------------------