 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: ResourcefulHedgehog
Date: 2025-07-12 18:32
Sorry if this is a stupid question, but I just received the part distribution for an orchestra I'm joining. On some of the pieces, I'm listed as "assistant clarinet" rather than with an actual part number. I'm confused which part this means I should practice- I assume it is clarinet 2?
For both the pieces where I am listed as "assistant clarinet" there is already one person on clarinet 1, one person on clarinet 2, and a bass clarinet. To make it even more confusing, when other people are listed as "assistant clarinet" in different pieces, they have been given an actual named part, so it says "assistant clarinet 1" or "assistant clarinet 2", whereas mine just says assistant clarinet.
Does this mean I am just supposed to assist whichever part is needed? So I have to practice both parts?? ![[huh]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie11.gif)
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Author: Ed
Date: 2025-07-12 18:42
Why not just ask the librarian or manager (or whomever is in charge of the group). Anyone here have make a guess, but there is only one way to know for sure.
You may be afraid to ask and look stupid, but that is far better than to show up unprepared and to look stupid for sure.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2025-07-13 06:54
ResourcefulHedgehog wrote:
> Sorry if this is a stupid question, but I just received the
> part distribution for an orchestra I'm joining. On some of the
> pieces, I'm listed as "assistant clarinet" rather than with an
> actual part number. I'm confused which part this means I should
> practice- I assume it is clarinet 2?
I would assume you're supposed to "assist" on the first part, playing only the louder passages (usually anything mezzo-forte or above) to keep the principal player from tiring. If fatigue is a concern, it would ordinarily be more with the 1st part than the 2nd.
Back in the early to mid-20th century (maybe earlier - I wasn't around to know) major orchestras had four-member wind sections *under contract.* If there were only two parts, management (sometimes the music director himself) not liking to pay contracted players for not playing, there would be an "assistant first" (who also played Eb clarinet) and an "assistant" second (who also played bass clarinet) - to double each part to thicken the orchestral sound in loud passages and let the principal players rest during "tutti" passages. Most orchestras seem by now to have dropped the practice. I think the last Philadelphia Orchestra music director to have used "assistants" for all the woodwind sections was Eugene Ormandy (who retired in 1980).
The one instrument that the Philadelphia Orchestra still, for some reason, uses an "assistant" for is French Horn.
Karl
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Author: ISM
Date: 2025-07-13 08:24
Karl,
That’s interesting. I had no idea. Thanks for sharing.
Imre
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Author: donald
Date: 2025-07-15 12:45
In Horn land I think they call it "bumper horn", and this person helps the principal rest their lips for the important solos.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2025-07-15 20:59
donald wrote:
> In Horn land I think they call it "bumper horn", and this
> person helps the principal rest their lips for the important
> solos.
So, is it that French horn is so much more strenuous than the other woodwinds (or brass), or that good French horn principals are rare and need coddling? ![[wink]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie3.gif)
Karl
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Author: Claudia Zornow
Date: 2025-07-16 02:29
Before my community orchestra performed Beethoven's Ninth Symphony last June, I watched several YouTube videos in which three clarinetists were obviously present, including one with Riccardo Muti conducting the Chicago Symphony and one with Leonard Bernstein conducting the 1989 Berlin Celebration Concert (with Stanley Drucker). There are only two clarinet parts, so I'm assuming one player served as an assistant in each case.
I could have used an assistant myself -- that is the most demanding orchestral piece I've ever played in terms of sheer endurance!
Claudia
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Author: kdk
Date: 2025-07-16 16:57
Claudia Zornow wrote:
> Before my community orchestra performed Beethoven's Ninth
> Symphony last June, I watched several YouTube videos in which
> three clarinetists were obviously present, including one with
> Riccardo Muti conducting the Chicago Symphony and one with
> Leonard Bernstein conducting the 1989 Berlin Celebration
> Concert (with Stanley Drucker). There are only two clarinet
> parts, so I'm assuming one player served as an assistant in
> each case.
>
Could have been. Back in Eugene Ormandy's tenure as Music Director, there would have been four - two on each part. In major symphonies at least in the U.S., all four are under contract and being paid anyway. Maybe ironically, Muti, when he took over Ormandy's position as Music Director of Philadelphia, stopped the practice of doubling the wind parts. Maybe Beethoven's 9th is a special case for some principal clarinetists - mostly because of the Adagio 3rd movement. I've played it without an assistant more than once, but in per-service orchestras that didn't hire extra players if there weren't extra parts. I'm pretty sure Drucker, probably many times, handled the part by himself during his 1,000 year reign in the NY Philharmonic.
Karl
Karl
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Author: donald
Date: 2025-07-16 17:26
Karl, with brass instruments you have to remember that their actual lips are physically doing the job of the reed- vibrating to make the sound. While no one plays high notes like "The Lip", if he overdoes it and gets fatigued on the day of a concert or halfway through a concert the results can range from precarious to disastrous. Like singers, the brass players will often "mark their part" (spare the voice during rehearsal) on same-day rehearsals.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2025-07-17 06:11
donald wrote:
> Karl, with brass instruments you have to remember that their
> actual lips are physically doing the job of the reed- vibrating
> to make the sound.
Absolutely. But the only brass player who gets an assistant in the Phila Orch or any orchestra I play in is the French Horn principal. I get that hornists play higher in the partial series than other standard brass, and maybe that explains the need. I really don't know - I don't play horn.
Karl
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