 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: rick77
Date: 2012-12-14 02:55
The only thing I'm sure of (other than lowering pitch) is that it makes the clarinet a tiny bit longer.
Sorry..........I just couldn't resist. But in all seriousness, if there are other things that happen I'd like to know about them too.
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Author: Chris P
Date: 2012-12-14 09:47
It doesn't make the pitch lower uniformly over the entire instrument - it will have far more effect in flattening the throat and upper left hand notes compared to the right hand and lowest notes where the flattening effect will be minimal.
Clarinets are built to a specific scale as toneholes are all in fixed positions (just as frets are on a guitar fingerboard), so lengthening or shortening the barrel will put the instrument out of tune with itself unless it is designed to be in tune when played with the barrel pulled out slightly.
Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.
Post Edited (2012-12-14 10:15)
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Author: ruben
Date: 2012-12-14 10:44
Hi there!
Puling out the barrel, I don't know. But what I can assert with certainty is that if you turn the barrel slightly-an eight of a turn, let's say-it effects the response in the altissimo register. You keep turning until the very high notes come out more easily and more evenly and then remember what position the barrel was in. Then you put the barrel in that position every time you assemble the clarinet. The taper/flare in the barrel isn't perfectly even and you are trying to find the optimal position. Let me know if you find that this works. Some would say it is only the placebo effect. It would have to be experimented on with animals!
rubengreenbergparisfrance@gmail.com
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Author: Tony F
Date: 2012-12-14 12:43
It used to be that when the instrument is first assembled at the factory the tester would rotate the barrel and bell while testing to find the best alignment, and then the logos would be incised into the barrel and bell. When the instrument is assembled by the owner, as long as the logos were in line the instrument would be in its optimum alignment. Not sure if this is still done.
Tony F.
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Author: Chris P
Date: 2012-12-14 13:01
I wouldn't have thought so.
Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.
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Author: SteveG_CT
Date: 2012-12-14 14:00
Tony F wrote:
> It used to be that when the instrument is first assembled at
> the factory the tester would rotate the barrel and bell while
> testing to find the best alignment, and then the logos would be
> incised into the barrel and bell. When the instrument is
> assembled by the owner, as long as the logos were in line the
> instrument would be in its optimum alignment. Not sure if this
> is still done.
>
I've heard this as well but I'm not sure if it is true. A while back I was watching the movie "A Song is Born" (1948) that contains a few close-up scenes of Benny Goodman playing. In these scenes it is very clear that he has both the bell and barrel rotated quite a bit off from center (almost 90 degrees in some cases). Maybe he had some ulterior motive for rotating the bell and barrel (perhaps trying to get the Selmer logos more screen time) but I kind of doubt that he would do that if it had a negative effect on the performance of the instrument.
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Author: Alseg
Date: 2012-12-14 14:59
As for pulling out the barrel....greater than 1mm will create enough of a gap between the tenon and the bore/socket that the SONORITY will be altered.
Some ears can detect this (Opperman was notable in this ability), and thus they suggest tuning rings...or better
Non-custom manufacturers no longer seek to line up the logos for optimum sound.
You should seek the right axis for finding the "sweet spot"
yet, another barrel of appropriate size.
disclaimer...I make and sell custom barrels and receive design compensation for a machine tooled model.
Former creator of CUSTOM CLARINET TUNING BARRELS by DR. ALLAN SEGAL
-Where the Sound Matters Most(tm)-
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Author: Bob Phillips
Date: 2012-12-14 16:05
Rotating the barrel is commonly done --to find the mystical "sweet spot" where the clarinet works the best.
One of the reasons for this is that the hole through the barrel is not concentric with the sockets, and the bore of the clarinet upper joint is not concentric with the upper tenon. (How far off your equipment is will vary from not enough to matter to "O, why did I buy this?" )
At some point in the rotation of the barrel relative to the upper joint, the step between the barrel and the upper joint will be minimized, and the set up will play beset.
The same thing, of course, can happen at the mouthpiece-to-barrel joint.
And, the bores of the barrel and the clarinet may not be round. If the wood grain running across the joints (barrel, upper, lower, bell) doesn't run in the same direction for all parts, changes in the along-grain and cross-grain expansion will ovalize the bores in different directions. That may be what causes clarinet "blow-out."
Bob Phillips
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2012-12-14 16:16
We should have a notch on the joints and corresponding markings on the barrel and bell rings so that we can have threads like "my clarinet plays jazziest with the barrel at the 217° mark. What is your preferred setting?". ![[tongue]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie6.gif)
--
Ben
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Author: Alseg
Date: 2012-12-15 02:15
Tux,
To find the sweet spot:
You rotate clockwise or counterclockwise depending on whether you are in the northern or southern hemisphere.
The amount of rotation changes with latitude. Coriolis sound effects
Also, if the more massive part of the barrel is misplaced, the sound waves are distorted outwards...sonic singularity . A little bit of extra mass gives a dark sound, but too much (critical mass) causes the sound not to exit the bore as it reaches the sonic event horizon.
The sound waves are also paired at a distance.....if the waves move away from the clarinet, an equal wave front moves towards it, and this is true if you unpair the waves and move them far away, and the effect is instantaneous, ....and independent of the speed of sound.
If the equal and opposite waves get into phase, they annihilate eachother, an effect utilized by Bose.
We have come a long way from simple Helmholtz equations
Former creator of CUSTOM CLARINET TUNING BARRELS by DR. ALLAN SEGAL
-Where the Sound Matters Most(tm)-
Post Edited (2012-12-15 02:17)
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Author: Chris P
Date: 2012-12-15 12:08
I rotate the middle joint to find the sweet spot between the upper and lower joints. It puts the long Bb out of adjustment completely and I lose the C#/G# as it's a full Boehm, but that's a small sacrifice to pay for tone quality. Not to mention the pain and resulting surgery on my right arm to allow my wrist to bend back on itself so I can still play the RH notes. Again, it's a small price to pay to achieve perfect grain alignment for maximum sonority. I also rotate the bell so it too lines up with the grain - that has vastly improved the response above altissimo C which only dogs can hear.
Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.
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