 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Tom
Date: 2003-01-18 11:08
Hi!
I've been trying to work on my tone lately, but I don't know if I've been doing it right. I've been doing about an hour each day of long notes, slow arpeggios and volume changes (dim to niente etc.), as well as other practice.
While I know this will improve my cheek muscles (they sometimes puff out), I don't see how it will give me the tone I want, and how to change it.
I thought my tone was quite good, but I heard a recording of myself and hated most of it.
I would really appreciate some thoughts, advice and feedback.
Thanks in advance,
Tom Jackson.
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Author: Morrigan
Date: 2003-01-18 12:06
I not only like to physically work on it, but mentally work on it. I'm big on visualising your tone. Listen to other sounds, ANY sounds, as long as you like them. Visualise them. Visualise the sound you want. Close your eyes, and play the sound you see in your mind's eye. You'll be surprised what comes out!
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Author: Dee
Date: 2003-01-18 12:50
Unless you have very good equipment and knowledge of mic placement and so on, the clarinet tends to sound quite distorted on a recording. This may be part of the problem.
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Author: Tom
Date: 2003-01-18 13:52
Morrigan:
Thanks, I'll go and try that now. I'm practicing in a really nasty acoustic to try and make me work harder - but it's really getting me down! Oh well. What are some of your favourite sounds?
Dee:
Dee, the recording was done in my music college's main recital hall by music technology students, using a brand new sony studio. So, I think I'm the problem rather than it, but thanks!
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Author: Karel
Date: 2003-01-18 14:18
I agree with Dee. I was very dissapointed when I first heard myself on a recording madeon a portable tape recorder. Then my teacher recorded me on some fancy school equipment, and I did not want to believe the difference. So don't get despondent, others hear you sound almost as good as you hear yourself.
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Author: Meighan Stoops
Date: 2003-01-18 14:48
I think long tones are a good idea but an hour sounds excessive. They wear you out more quickly than just about everything else. It's easy to get bogged down with a single concept. It seems to me you'd to better to really focus in on whose sound you like, analyze what they have that seems to be lacking in your own. This brings to mind the "best recording" thread in which hat and sloss expounded on regular doses of hearing Marcellus' sound. Do you hear a sound you love on a regular basis? A teacher or fellow student/colleague? It's very important.
It won't change overnight so be patient with yourself. I wouldn't look for results for a while; it's a very subtle thing. I'd do 20 minutes a day tops. You can do a lot more with a lot less time. THink of all the scales, arpeggios, repertoire you have to get to.
Stoops
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Author: William
Date: 2003-01-18 14:51
When I was a relative beginning clarinetist, I was having tonal quality concerns, and what I did was "zero in" on the sound of one register on my Bundy clarinet that I thought was good, and then tried to get the other registes to emualte the same tonal qualities. I think I started with top line F and then proceeded downward with long tones, one note at a time at the start of each day's practice. Gradually, over a long period of time, the "other" registers qualities improved. I think the real improvement was: 1) in mental effort to make the clarinet sound good; and 2) in the strength and reconfiguration of my embouchure. I was not taking lessons as yet, I pretty much did this on my own.
Santy Runyon, the mouthpiece maker and former great Chicago pit orchestral WW doubler, said that he used a flute warm up that lasted for "about twenty minutes and drove the rest of the pit nuts." Before the show, he would warm up his flute by playing a series of long tones, just "one to the next", downward (chromatically) and try to make the sonority of each tone match. He stressed the importance of breath support and listening in our informal chat a few years ago at a Chicago Mid-West B & O Clinic.
Also, it was interesting to hear Larry Combs (a clarinetist you may have heard of) suggest an excercise, similar to the above, for use in warm ups. Play some long notes starting (example) with open G, then up to D, G, and then back down, to D, G, D and low G. Play all tones as long tones (5 seconds or so) and--the important part--make the sonorities of each tone match. He also stressed this excercise as useful in developing steady, even breath support.
The bottom line is: take time to listen to yourself--as well as others--to improve your tone, embouchure and breath support. They are all related and the process--what ever you do--takes a little time during each practice session over a long period of time. No "over night" solutions here, you've "got to earn it." And listen to performances of other great clarinetists to help develop a firm mental concept of quality (what you like and what you want). Good luck--keep listening and you will find (and hear) success.
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Author: charlene
Date: 2003-01-18 15:45
Hope you don't mind an amateur butting in, but (in addition the the fine advise covered above) I've been able to get over my "tone plateau" by relaxing after practice and inprovising. It seems easier to get a good tone to flow out as part of the melody I'm hearing in my head - just a part of the complete package.
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Author: Keil
Date: 2003-01-18 16:21
For me the best way to develop a good tone is to come up with some tangible concept of what i wanted my tone to sound like. First, i selected recordings of players who's tones i've admired and wanted to emulate. 2ndly, before i began any practice session i would mentally visualize/conceptualize/audiate and set out to achieve the sound i wanted to achieve. Once i was able to get close to the sound i wanted i began fooling around with equipment like mouthpieces, reedes, ligatures. They each play a very key role in tone production so i would look at things and try them trying to see which setups better facilitated the tone i wanted. In other words got me closer to the sound i liked. Some people i like to listen to are Harold Wright, Robert Marcellus, Frank Kowalsky, Deborah Bish, Joze Kotar, Jon Manasse, Ethan Sloane... they each help contribute to some aspect of my sound and tone. Another thing to remember is that you play on a WIND instrument, not an AIR instrument. I think many instrumentalist forget the difference between the two. Wind is simply air with force and direction behind it. Air is a more stagnant phase. Make sure you keep your air moving THROUGH the instrument. I try to visualize blowing through the instrument down to the floor as oppose to at the instrument. These should help you work toward getting a tone you would like. I hope this helps.
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Author: ginny
Date: 2003-01-18 19:25
Some how its seems like a poor use of practice unless you know very specifically what muscles you are training. My music experience has pointed toward relaxation of none involved muscles, good technic (tongue position, lip, throat and support) rather than 'pumping iron' to get good results on instruments.
I assume you have a good teacher. In my experience, on a number of instruments, my tone would SUDDENLY improve when I understood a more favorable technique! Then I needed to reinforce my body's memory of the new technique, over and over and over.
I could also spend time hunting for better technique, but when doing this (reinventing the wheel really) I did not think of it as practicing technique. I intentionally experiment occasionally, looking for better sounds. Doing this for an hour each day would mean I had not found anything
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Author: Morrigan
Date: 2003-01-19 03:56
Just a few more suggestions.
Make the practise of scales and technical work VERY slow. Use this as meditation (someone else from this board taught me this many months ago). Really relax. Don't analyse yourself; just be submerged in your own little world on reaxing to this sound you're making.
Also, LISTEN more. To anything and everything. Listen to the wind, to traffic, to singers, to loud grunge bands, and to relaxation tapes. All kinds of things really! Be prepared to be able to hear what sounds there sounds are made up of. For example, when I play my clarinet now, I'm not listening to or judging my overall tone. I'm listening to subtle harmonics and certain wavelengths in my sound. Making sure these are consistent, your average listener in the audience will hear the overall sound. What you hear and what your audience hears are different things. Get used to not liking your sound.
Call upon your experience with listening to these various sounds I mentioned earlier to listen to your own sounds. You will soon be able to listen to other clarinetists around you and derive things you love about their sound and mix them in with yours.
For example, in concert band, I generally get more out of listening to the 3rd clarinet than I do from the 1st's. I don't know why, but there are things I love about any and every clarinettists sound. Every individual sounds so different to the other, it's hard to say what sounds good and what doesn't. Go with what YOU feel is a good sound. It doesn't have to be great! Just be comfortable with it.
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Author: Synonymous Botch
Date: 2003-01-19 17:43
Your recording will suffer from selective reinforcement of some frequencies, so the 'balance' on playback may be off.
You'll notice in music videos that the vocalist may have a different mic from the percussionist or other instrumentalists....
each has it's strengths and weaknesses.
You won't have a tape everywhere you go, so learning to hear yourself may be more useful in the long and immediate term.
Find a reasonably resonant room, and face a corner.
Try your long tones again.
I strive to hear the sound 'bloom' and fill the room.
When my playing becomes edgy or strident, the room doesn't ring with the sound for long.
When my playing becomes tubby or diffuse, I can't hear the attack of each note. I look for that 'sweet spot' between the two.
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Author: Liquorice
Date: 2003-01-19 21:13
It took me a long time to find my sound. All of the usual comments regarding having a clear concept of the tone you want to produce are useful- but only up to a point. For example, I may have a very clear idea that I want to sound like Karl Leister, but if I don't know how to produce that kind of sound technically, the clearest tonal concept won't get me there!
Practising long notes for hours can give you control over the sound, but won't necessarily help you to produce the type of sound you want.
You need to compare the sound you want with the sound you are getting. If you could describe the difference between the two, it might be possible to give some advice about what to do to get closer to the sound you want. But it is also difficult to do this in writing. A good teacher, who can explain principles of tone production, would be the best help.
It took me years to find someone who could explain to me how to get "my" sound. And guess what- he was an oboe player!!!
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Author: Liquorice
Date: 2003-01-19 21:16
I wrote: "A good teacher, who can explain principles of tone production, would be the best help".
Just to clarify- I mean TAKING LESSONS with a good teacher. Only in person can the teacher see and hear what you could do to improve your tone.
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Author: David Sapadin
Date: 2003-01-20 04:19
Here it is in a nutshell,(at least to me) lol
Dont take to much bottom lip, use pressure from the sides of your mouth instead of vertical pressure with your teeth. Dont bite. Find a reed that has a little bit of resistance. (shouldn't feel easy blowing) You need something to push the air against. And last but not least.......you need to support......ALOT!!!!!!!!!! That is usually the biggest problem with the sound. Most people compensate for a lack of support by biting. If you are not feeling your stomach muscles at work when you play, you will never have the sound you are wanting to have. My last piece of advice is that if you have a dark mouthpiece you cant try to change the qualities of the mouthpiece by altering the embouchure and the same goes with having a light sounding mouthpiece and trying to make it produce a dark, chocolatey sound. Cant make a M13 sound like a pyne or vice versa.
Dave Sapadin
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