 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Pigrat
Date: 2013-08-27 00:28
I'm just starting out on bass clarinet after playing clarinet for 4 years. I can read bass clef, just not play it on bass clarinet. In the piece I'm playing, the first note is a 3rd line D in bass clef. Would that be a below the staff D in treble clef? Or am I completely off?
Darlena
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Author: Chris P
Date: 2013-08-27 02:17
It then gets fun when German bass clarinet writing goes into treble clef - you play everything an 8ve higher than what's written!
Basically, German bass clarinet writing sounds a whole tone lower than the written notes, or a minor third lower if it's written for an A bass clarinet (such as you'd find with Wagner).
Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2013-08-27 04:18
3rd line D in bass clef is played as below-the-staff D in treble clef. However, if you're playing, say, a bassoon part, you must read up a step and play E.
Ed P. will know whether actual bass clarinet parts in bass clef are usually, sometimes or seldom transposed.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2013-08-27 13:43
Darlene, check my website, there's all kinds if info on the bass clarinet. There are things you have to know about when the bass clef changes to treble and back. Many composers got it right and some never did. I explain it in my articles. I've never come across an orchestra part in C but there are many in A and many are in A and in the bass cleff. It all depends on the composer. Just about every solo I've come acroos has been written in the treble cleff though there may be some in bass, I just don't know. I've always suggested to my students that they practice the first few, especially the first three, Bach Cello suites and read them as is, don't bother transposing, they're unaccompanied solos. Many players, including myself, have performend them as is. I have some on my website. Glreat music, great bass clef excercise. If you have any questions feel free to contact me directly via my e-mail address.
ESP eddiesclarinet.com
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Author: Chris P
Date: 2013-08-27 14:22
If you play sax, an easy way to transpose concert pitch bass clef parts (bassoon, euphonium, tuba, etc.) is to imagine sax fingerings for the low register on bass clarinet (or the equivalent fingerings for the upper register notes), so bottom line G is played as treble clef E with sax fingering. You then have to think a bit when it goes into the throat notes and upper register though.
Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.
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Author: Pigrat
Date: 2013-08-27 23:56
Oh lucky me xD I'm playing Tod und Verklarung by Strauss >.<
Darlena
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Author: Chris P
Date: 2013-08-28 10:13
I transposed and wrote the entire bass clarinet part out by hand to 'Tod und Verklaerung' the night before playing it in a concert! I really struggled with reading bass clef when it went higher up in the stave - I'm fine with the lower writing and leger lines below the stave, but as soon as it went above the stave my brain broke.
Dukas 'Scorcerer's Apprentice' bass clarinet part is also all written out in bass clef - unusual for a French composer as French bass clarinet writing is normally in treble clef Bb basso just as we know it.
Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2013-08-28 15:08
Chris -
Can you make the Tod und Verklärung part available?
The Dukas looks and sounds easy, but it's a real finger-buster.
Ken Shaw
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Author: DougR
Date: 2013-08-28 15:27
I've been looking for bass and sop. clarinet duos, and this is a perfectly timely thread. In duos involving bassoon (e.g. bassoon/oboe), the bassoon parts (in addition to sinking into the murk WAY below my Eb bass's lower range) usually end up into treble clef and ... I guess it's tenor clef?... so I'll be haunting your website, Ed, and thanks!
When I studied with a local orchestral bass player, he gave me an ancient, much-xeroxed copy of the Pittsburgh Symphony's bass part, hand-written in treble clef, for La Valse. (The music is now available from Kalmus, in a treble-clef edition). I gather there used to be quite an underground-railroad of shared transposed treble-clef bass parts in the symphonic rep being passed from player to player, or teacher to student.
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Author: Chris P
Date: 2013-08-28 15:36
Ken, it was scrawled down in haste and in biro, so may not be all that legible (plus there were several mistakes that were scribbled out and rewritten on top of the wrong notes from what I remember). If you don't mind that and can decipher my dodgy heiroglyphics, then I'll have a look for it and scan it for you.
I've had a look for it where I thought it may have ended up, but no luck. I'll keep searching as I know it's somewhere - I don't tend to throw away stuff I've written out just in case it may come in useful again one day. I did unearth the transposed from A to Bb bass clarinet part to Elgar's 'Pomp and Circumstance No.1' I wrote out, so that's something - but still not what I want.
Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.
Post Edited (2013-08-28 16:15)
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