Klarinet Archive - Posting 000103.txt from 2010/06

From: "Bill Daniluk" <bdaniluk@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] clarinets in original key
Date: Sun, 06 Jun 2010 12:38:51 -0400

...it would take a special level of obliviousity (or maybe a very dark pit)
to not notice the person sitting next to you changing instruments when *you*
weren't...
BD

-----Original Message-----
From: Forest Aten [mailto:forestaten@-----.com]
Sent: Thursday, June 03, 2010 5:20 PM
To: 'The Klarinet Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [kl] clarinets in original key

Keith

I believe I once told you this story....I can't remember...

Several years ago, the principal clarinet player in the Dallas Opera was
involved in a horrible car accident. She was out of the orchestra,
recovery/rehab for two seasons. She returned....and has been performing for
at least five years since. So where's this story going? :-) I started
playing my C clarinet on all C clarinet parts in the opera orchestra...at
least two years before her accident.
She never noticed. The conductor never noticed. After she returned...it was
at least three years before she looked down and said, "hey, what kind of
clarinet is that, it's short"? I'm thinking, "Uh oh, what now"! Next thing I
hear, "you can't play that thing, it will sound different"...then, "you
can't play C if I don't have one...too". LOL My response to my colleague,
"I've been playing the C clarinet in the orchestra for over five years now".
Her response, "oh". End of story.

I'm still playing the C clarinet on every score calling for the instrument.
I have two wonderful C clarinets. This past season, Ken Krause played
principal clarinet in the orchestra. Don Pasquale has a tough C part and he
(at my
invitation) opted to play the part on one of my C instruments. We had a
great time! He's now shopping....

>From one wimp to another....

Forest

-----Original Message-----
From: Keith Bowen [mailto:keith.bowen@-----.com]
Sent: Wednesday, June 02, 2010 2:54 AM
To: 'The Klarinet Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [kl] clarinets in original key

Quite so.

The argument is overlaid by the feeling that it is macho to transpose and
wimpy to use a clarinet in C (for example).

Keith

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Howe [mailto:arehow@-----.net]
Sent: 02 June 2010 01:58
To: The Klarinet Mailing List
Subject: Re: [kl] clarinets in original key

Why not just own a set of clarinets and play what is requested unless there
is some over arching technical problem? A set of clarinets in A, Bb and C
is no more expensive than an oboe and English horn. And we oboists use the
oboe d'amore for Bach.

Cheers

RH

On May 27, 2010, at 5:51 AM, Colin Touchin wrote:

> Hi Keith - I agree with all you write (and did indeed enjoy your C's
> in the Beethoven 5!). What I was implying in my post was that as the
> thread had been extended (from a useful discussion on using the
> original instrument in D or Eb to using instruments of the appropriate
> timbre/country of origin,
> etc.) there seems a lot we clarinettists talk about that fascinates us
> and genuinely improves and develops our understanding of our
> instrument and its repertoire, but unless all other members of the
> orchestra (chamber ensemble with piano, strings, other) we're in are
> doing the same relative to their history and timbre we run the risk of
> being the only, or one of the few, aiming to play with such an
> approach, which may not aurally ring well with other players and so
> might be less effective as an interpretation (we'd be the ones out of
> step).
> (For example, isn't the wind quintet odd? - flute, oboe and usually
> bassoon use a fair bit of vibrato, but most clarinets and horns don't
> - how could a string ensemble ever work that way?) That's not to say
> we shouldn't consider and develop the lineage of our sounds, but we
> have to be realistic and also 21st-century about this. A present-day
> ensemble is made up of players of modern instruments playing, with
> modern ears and understanding and training, a repertoire that was
> previously played by differently-manufactured instruments - we are
> doing something up-to-date, something only we now can do, and the
> interpretations of conductors and players cannot help but be as
> contemporary as possible, with all the knowledge we have of the past
> and
> all the availability of modern-made instruments in whatever keys.
> But do
> we see/hear trumpeters and hornists with this variety of kit we
> clarinettists like to explore, who have similar numbers of keys to
> play in, transposed or not. Their timbral ranges are inevitably more
> limited nowadays due to the one-tube-with-valves-fits-all music, where
> previously changing tubes for different keys inevitably created
> different timbres in different registers.
> I also agree that using the composer's chosen instrument is better
> than not, because the choice may have been specific for reasons we
> either can fathom out or never will understand. But it's not always
> certain - as I mentioned on the list a few years back, Stravinsky
> allowed clarinettists in the late 30's to play Bb on A or A on Bb to
> help fingering if the player chose in Petroushka (story from Antony
> Baines); yet noone could play his Three Pieces other than on the
> instruments he specified and we all work hard in timbral control to
> prove the value of that distinction..
> What works in the end then is the total sound of the whole ensemble
> - if
> your C's were helpfully enveloped by understanding and responsive
> players our Beethoven 5 would/should have felt/sounded a little
> different from many 20th-century performances both sides of the
> podium. If a conductor or the clarinet section insists in Strauss on
> all the right tunings being employed, the whole orchestra needs to be
> told to listen, to adjust, to make those considerations musically
> valuable in the performance the audience shares (and it would be good
> if we could find out from them who know the repertoire well if they
> noticed a difference, enough of a difference to warrant the use, even
> a better difference from previous accounts!) Of course .. we could all
> simply aim to sound more German in that repertoire whatever tubes we
> blow!! Cheers, Colin.
> _______________________________________________
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> Klarinet@-----.com
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