Klarinet Archive - Posting 001130.txt from 2000/02

From: Tony@-----.uk (Tony Pay)
Subj: [kl] Toys
Date: Tue, 29 Feb 2000 01:23:36 -0500

On Mon, 28 Feb 2000 13:36:57 -0500, BEresman@-----.com said:

> At 10:18 PM 2/27/2000 -0500, Bryan Cholfin wrote:
>
> > With two-screw type metal ligatures, is there a consensus about how
> > much to tighten the screws? I've read a recommendation to leave the
> > bottom a little less tight than the top. And it seems like if I make
> > it _too_ tight it deadens the reponse.
>
> And then Bill Hausmann wrote:
>
> > I was taught just the opposite - tighten down the bottom screw and
> > leave the top one only barely tight. That doesn't make it right, of
> > course, but there it is for your evaluation.
>
> To which i reply despairingly: It's too much to decide! I have to
> decide what brand of clarinet to buy, and which make of mouthpiece to
> use, and the best reed (for me, of course, not anyone else)--or
> perhaps i should make them...Now i have to decide which screw to
> tighten first, and most! And using string won't help--as Mr. Galper
> says:
>
> > I remember going to fishing tackle shops to try to find similar
> > string. Sometimes I came close.
>
> > By the way, can you imagine what e-mail messages at the beginning of
> > the 18th century would be like?
>
> > " I use this and this string."
>
> > "No, mine is better. It gives me the harmonics I want."
>
> > And so on...
>
> I think i'm getting a headache...

The point about all of this -- which I have to say, characterises quite
clearly one problem of this list -- is that there may be people here who
think that there are sensible, definite answers to questions about, for
example, what ligature you should use, and so on. This in contrast to
information about what's available to try, and personal experience,
which can of course very worth hearing.

(Brent is perhaps not one of these -- I can't quite judge from his post,
which may be humorous in intent.)

The only way you can have answers to such things is relative to a
context (a hierarchy of contexts, actually) in which you can *recognise*
whether the result you obtain is satisfactory or not. If you don't have
at least some of that context, then *all of the content* is useless to
you. And discussions about different reeds, ligatures, clarinets and so
on without that context are meaningless, being just a way of
encountering other posters in varying modes.

When I first began to learn about programming computers, I taught myself
the computer language LOGO. (Though this language is mostly known for
its turtle graphics, it's actually quite powerful, being a dialect of
LISP. I wrote myself a simple accounts program in it, for example.)
And, reading books about LOGO, where the advantages/disadvantages of its
data structures compared with, say, PASCAL, were discussed, I found
myself starting to have opinions of my own.

But when I talked about that sort of thing to programmer friends, in my
enthusiastic way, I noticed that they tended to glaze over a bit.
Finally, someone who was really talented told me, look, I do pretty much
the same thing in any language I happen to be using. The issue of which
language is the most convenient is something that is interesting in its
way, but it isn't fundamental. What's required is to have a feel for
the structure of the problem you're trying to solve.

So then I realised that I had been taking the whole thing too seriously;
and moreover, taking it too seriously in a way that prevented me from
seeing what being *really* serious about it would actually involve.

The problem is that you fall in love with the toys.

Nothing wrong with that, of course -- but you should expect some others
to glaze over, as my friends did with me, if you go on about it too
much. And if you start laying down the law, they may try to set you
straight, particularly when you seem to be drawing the young and/or
innocent into your way of thinking.

Tony
--
_________ Tony Pay
|ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
| |ay Oxford OX2 6RE www.gmn.com/artists/welcome.asp
tel/fax 01865 553339

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