 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: beejay
Date: 2001-06-13 14:13
I've just worked through the 161 mechanical exercises by Klose, and very enjoyable they were. I concentrated more on playing them regularly than fast. But does anyone have an idea of what speed I should be aiming for? And should I now go on and do the 600 or more exercises that follow, or can anyone suggest something more fruitful? They look pretty dry to me.
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Author: Ed
Date: 2001-06-13 17:47
I like to have students work them at two different speeds. I believe the next set is in sixteenth notes. Play them at eighth note=60, then quarter note. Listen for a full tone in all ranges. Aim for perfectly smooth intervals, no bumps, no notes accented (especially due to range or metric grouping). Use a mirror to watch that there is no movement on embouchure or throat. Keep fingers very close to the instrument. Use a mirror here as well to watch for any sloppy movement. The key here is to develop complete control, mechanically, acoustically over the instrument so that your have great technique. They key to learning to play fast is being able to play slow. Once you have absolute control, you can play musically and phrase everything exactly as you wish to do, not being influenced by difficulty on the instrument. Do not underestimate the value of these exercises!
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Author: Dee
Date: 2001-06-13 19:02
I also believe that these mechanical exercises are invaluable. Each exercise should be practiced until it is smooth and regular. Then increase the speed and practice again until it is smooth and regular. Keep on in this fashion until you "hit the wall." However it is *very important* that each incremental step be smooth and regular before you go to the next speed. These exercises cover just about any "awkward" fingering combination that might ever occur, including slides. Even as an amateur musician, I've run into several occasions where I was thankful that I had practiced such slides.
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Author: Ken Shaw
Date: 2001-06-13 20:51
Beejay -
Dee raises a particularly important point. When you have learned to play an exercise slowly and worked up a few degrees in speed, there's an almost irresistible temptation to jump up to a fast speed -- say 16ths at 120 or 132 -- just to hear how it "should" sound.
Very often, you find you can get through at the fast speed and think you've mastered it. THIS IS A TRAP AND AN ILLUSION. You're only "faking" it, even if you happen to make no mistakes. You can prove this by dropping down to a speed on the metronome 2 or 3 settings faster than you had worked up to. At some tempo - usually between 70 and 80 - your fingers will get clumsy. You simply *must* work up slowly, at all tempos. In fact, you need to search out the very worst, most clumsy tempos and work like crazy on them until the exercise is perfect at all tempos.
Everyone learns how to fake it, and this is one of the essential skills. It lets you be comfortable while sight-reading, and when you run into a passage that's a little bit beyond you, it lets you drop notes and get back in.
However, for honing the basic tools of your technique - scales, arpeggios, technical exercises - you can't afford that luxury. If you practice "faster than perfect," all you learn is how to make mistakes.
Even the best players go back to the basics all the time. I once listened to the great violinist David Oistrakh warm up. He started dead slow on scales and spent half an hour gradually moving up to blinding speed. I've read exactly the same story about Rachmaninoff and Harold Wright.
Never faster than perfect.
Ken Shaw
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Author: John Gould
Date: 2001-06-13 22:53
Amen to all these comments about speed and accuracy. For what it's worth, I've also noticed that you can learn new material much better if you practice things in small, frequent doses. Playing the clarinet has a physical as well as an intellectual (and spritual) side to it, and frequent re-visits to the same material (utilizing the advice given already here) will ensure that you are fresh, etc.
The Working Clarinetist, by Peter Hadcock (available from Van Cott information services here on Sneezy under sponsors) has some good advice as well. He recommends playing a couple of measures (no more than that, just the parts giving you trouble) using a hop-scotch jumping forward and backward in tempo method. Well worth adding to your library, and the advice on practicing alone is worth it. Good luck.
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Author: beejay
Date: 2001-06-14 05:19
Many thanks for all the good advice. I can definitely see the value in the 161 mechanical exercises and the 45 studies in the second book. But what about the 633 "practical and daily exercises" in the first book of Klose? I'm trying to work out a practice regime that will cover the basics and at the same time lift my technique to a higher level. So far that means a combination of material from Klose and Baermann. My teacher insists on plenty of scales in all keys, and doesn't mind what I use otherwise.
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The Clarinet Pages
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