 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Tim P
Date: 2003-04-10 13:05
I was wondering why or how people ended up playing the clarinet. Out of all the instruments out there how did you end up playing the stick?
To start the thread I offer why I play the clarinet.
When I was in 5th grade the school had a band-recruiting fair. Where they had students and parents come. The band director and the local music store demonstrated different instruments and then had kids sign up. They also had a huge selection of used and new instruments to sell. There was a long line at for trumpets, sax and drums. But I can still hear the clarinet that I heard that night. I thought it sounded Sooooo COOL and I knew that I wanted to make that sound. I loved the sound. My parents loved the price. So it was a done deal. Boy was I surprised when I got home and tried to reproduce the sound.
I played through high school. Then with USMC, marriage, college, jobs, kids it spent 30 years in the closet.
This year in January I heard a clarinet solo piece on the local classical music station. It was beautiful and it struck me hard. I realized that I really missed that sound. I have once again start playing and I found that I still love the sound of a clarinet. What great sounding instrument. (even with me playing)
How about you??
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Author: hans
Date: 2003-04-10 13:41
It's not much of a story, but since you asked.....
First the How: When I started high school (in 1959) my older sister was in the school band, which had cool uniforms, so I joined too. There was not much choice of instruments so the band director assigned me to clarinet. It was a one-piece metal instrument and the C#/G# was broken off (I didn't notice for quite a while) but I had fun with it. Near the end of the school year my parents bought me a new plastic student clarinet. The band director was a professional clarinet player and listening to him play was very inspiring.
The following year, we moved to another town where the school band director also happened to be a professional clarinet and sax player. More inspiration followed, as he introduced me to the sax and invited me to play in his professional dance band.
The Why: I think the tone is wonderful and I never get tired of listening to it, especially Artie Shaw's recordings. The great range is nice too.
Hans
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2003-04-10 15:16
Similarly to Tim's start, 6th grade opportunity, least costly inst, [depths of depression!], listened to Schubert's Marche Militaire record frequently at school, my father and aunts sang, one played piano, parents could afford 50 c per week for lessons, bot teacher's F B cl later! he played it in "silent" theaters! Jr High band teacher really encouraged some of us, much fun! Worked in gro. stores to earn money for alto sax, started playing "jazz" , listened on radio to "big bands", BG and GM in partic. Had summer 5 piece dance band job in Sault St Marie, MI, during taking Engr. at MSC [later U. Went to work in OK, no playing for a couple years, started again for dance band, conc band and symp orch. "Graduated" to oboe/EH and big cls, still enjoy playing sop, bass, alto cls and saxes, as car license says, "70 [+] Years of Woodwinds. Keep lovin' it. Don
Thanx, Mark, Don
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Author: williamainsworth
Date: 2003-04-10 15:18
I saw "The Benny Goodman Story" and loved the sound. I bought a Selmer series nine with HS* mouthpiece and got through the Rubank basic study book. But I was on shift work with occasional overtime and my children demanded a lot of attention and I gave it up. I never sell anything so it sat idle until I loaned it to a friend's son to play in high school. Thankfully he took good care of it. Then I retired and we had a small band at our church so I thought that now that I had the time ... Then the band ceased to exist and eventually I joined a concert band. My ambition is to be a reasonably competant third clarinet player. Anyway I love my clarinet.
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Author: William
Date: 2003-04-10 15:45
I started playing the clarinet--summer of third grade going into fourth--because it looked complicated (and interesting). My interest was further "tweeked" upon seeing the BG Story as a highschool freshman. Steve Allen made playing "the stick" seem so effortless--and for him it was!!! Benny was dubbing all his "stuff". Anyway, my childhood persception of the clarinet has proven true over the years--it was a complicated instrument and has been most interesting (and a lot of fun) to play. Although I wish someone had warned me about reeds........(GRRR)
But often, while disassembling my clarinets after the gig--usually being the last person to leave the stage--I wonder about my Dad, who back at that summer 3d grade parents beginning band metting, said, "Son, how about the trumpet?"
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Author: MC
Date: 2003-04-10 16:51
I started playing the clarinet in the fifth grade. I actually wanted to play the Alphorn, and for some reason had convinced myself that it was really called a clarinet. So, I told my parents that the clarinet was THE instrument for me. I’ll admit that I was terribly disappointed when we went to the music store and the owner (who happened to be clarinet and sax player) pulled out this relatively short instrument with no curve at the bottom – it didn’t even reach the ground! I was too embarrassed to admit that this wasn’t at all the instrument I had in mind, so here I am -- over 30 years later -- still playing the clarinet. Never did get that Alphorn… :-)
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Author: Todd W.
Date: 2003-04-10 17:19
MC--
I love that story! Truly funny (although not to you at the time).
However, it's not too late; go for it. Or how about bass clarinet: relatively long, curve at the bottom, reaches the ground?
Todd W.
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2003-04-10 17:24
In my case, it was simple ---- my older brother had started playing clarinet and quit, and since I wanted to play something, I inherited his clarinet.
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Author: snjshipley
Date: 2003-04-10 18:00
Started about the 6th grade because the band director said I didn't have 'a mouth for the trumpet'. It was also easier to carry it to/from my rural grade school (2 mi away). That was 50 years ago. I quit playing after high school.
I experienced a severe stroke 5 years ago. I picked up a clarinet again to work my right arm and fingers. Now, after 2 years I have the strength to hold the clarinet for more than 5 minutes, cover the holes, and I sound less like a ' strangled chicken' than when I started on this recovery.
Love the way it sounds.....play mostly swing/pop/dixieland on a Selmer 9 and Leblanc LL.
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Author: Sandra F.
Date: 2003-04-10 18:24
Do you believe that I loved the clarinet because my mother played it?! She picked it up again after many years when I was attending music school. It is most like the voice in sound, and I just loved it.
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Author: ron b
Date: 2003-04-10 18:50
Pretty simple, Tim, actually. At a very early age I had a persistent desire to play an instrument. When I was around nine years old, still during the post-Great-Depression era, violins were quite a bit more expensive than clarinets. I believe good ones still are.
"Besides", the salesman said, "one could play a clarinet in both band and orchestra." So, to shorten a long and boring story, that's exactly what I did...
And that's why I'm where I am today; explaining to you why I play the clarinet instead of the violin, both of us pretending that you really need to know :]
I have no profound second thoughts on the matter, nothing more to add. I love my clarinet and it loves me in return. My clarinet and I have travelled the world far and wide, seen things and done things and met people I never would have been able to had we not teamed up... ever so many years ago.
Pretty simple, actually.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2003-04-10 19:28
Cork grease and bore oil. Delicious! ...GBK
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Author: jez
Date: 2003-04-10 19:52
When I was 12 there was a record that was popular and I wanted to be able to sound like it. Of course it was "Stranger on the Shore" played by Mr. Acker Bilk.
I still can sound like that but don't choose to do so often.
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Author: Vic
Date: 2003-04-10 21:35
Well, I really hated our cat.
But actually, my story is similar to several of those above. As a baby boomer kid back in the early fifties I got started listening to my parents old 78s (for the younger readers those were a primitive form of sound communication device played on something called a phonograph) and fell in love with the sound of Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw. They also had a lot of Glenn Miller and Tommy Dorsey, but the clarinet was so much cooler than the trombone! Then, in the fifth grade, they started a beginning band and offered lessons. Unfortunately, even after 46 years I still can't sound like Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw. If I loosen my embouchure a ridiculous amount, I can simulate Aker Bilk. Pardon me, Mister Aker Bilk. Of course I had a 38-year layoff and have only been back into it for about a year and a half now. I kick myself for ever having given it up in the first place. But I'm now in a community band, taking lessons again, and having the time of my life. There are no cats in our house to torture, but one can't have everythin
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Author: diz
Date: 2003-04-10 22:21
I was playing recorder in primary school (whatever that is in the US) and used to memorize all my pieces ... mainly because they were appallingly simple and also because I had "talent" ... anyway, a clarinet was thrust in my direction (and, later, a viola) and I ended up playing both professionally.
I own an E flat clarinet which I aim at my neighbour's dog when it barks. I just fire off a few clarion notes fortissimo and that shut's the mongrel up.
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Author: jbutler ★2017
Date: 2003-04-10 22:36
Studied saxophone. Sax prof (university) told me if I wanted to earn money in the business I needed to learn to double. Made me take flute and clarinet lessons also as a performance minor. First playing jobs in musicals. First job (sub)was a G&S (Iolanthe [sic]). Found it to be a gas. Later that season played Lil' Abner as a fill in. Word got out that I was a clarinet player (misinformed) but I started to get the clarinet gigs. Stopped the gigs when wife and kids came along, but still teach and play.
jbutler
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Author: Aussie Nick
Date: 2003-04-10 23:07
I went to a school in year 5 that catered for grades 5 up to senior. It was compulsary for all grade 5's to learn an instrument for the year. In the 1st half of grade 5, I got into trouble with the head of music for refusing to turn up to my violin lessons. I hated it and the teacher. The head of department also happened to be the clarinet teacher. She said "why don't you give the clarinet a go," and since dad had an old wooden boosey and hawkes one at home from when he was young, I did just that! That teacher turned out to be like my 2nd mother. We were and still are very close, and if it wasn't for her patience with me, I wouldn't have continued.
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Author: Hank Lehrer
Date: 2003-04-11 01:07
Hi,
Actually, I started on the clarinet in the 7th grade. I did very poorly in the 8th grade and it looked like Carl Marca and I (we alternated between last chair 3rd clarinet and next to last chair) were doomed. He played accordian though so he had something to do musically.
My mother was a bit alarmed about the news that I would not probably be in the HS band and talked to Mr.Montgomery. He got me a sax, gave me some lessons, and I never looked back. Went on to Interlochen within a year and completed a music degree and taught fo many, many years.
I went back to the clarinet in college and later with a new perspective, really began to play pretty well. My college professor insisted that I learn flute and the double reeds as well - he was really a visionary.
I find the clarinet to be very challenging and truly enjoy concert band work: I still work shows and gigs on sax. I think I spend more time in practice on the clarinet.
Thanks, mom!
HRL
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Author: Carol Dutcher
Date: 2003-04-11 01:30
My dad was the band director in a small town in Minnesota. First he gave me a tonette for Christmas. After I could play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, he fixed me up with a clarinet. I think I was 9. He also repaired all the instruments so the clarinet was made from three different others. I used it through grade school and high school. I really loved playing it and then he started me on alto sax and oboe, whatever the little band needed. A while back I asked him what ever happened to that great little old clarinet he made, and he said he had given it to a promising student that didn't have a horn. Somewhere out there, it is still being played!
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Author: Fred
Date: 2003-04-11 01:38
It just sorta fit . . . at least both I and the band director thought so.
More interesting question for me is: Why do I play clarinet now? I'm not a pro - my only outlet for playing is our church orchestra. Before that, I "rested" for about 20+ years (no, I didn't count it out . . . I just came back in when it felt right!) I forgot one of the main reasons I enjoyed playing - IT'S THE PEOPLE!! Wonderful, crazy, twisted people that share a unique gift. There's nothing like a group of musicians!!
As you can tell from many of my posts (Ex: reply to the recent post on Intonation), I don't take myself (or life) very seriously. I am a living example of the line:
Little Boy to Mom: "When I grow up, I wanna be a musician."
Mom to Little Boy: "Well, you know, honey . . . you can't do both."
So now I'm back playing clarinet . . . and learning alto sax . . . and tenor sax . . . and looking for a soprano sax. Life is grand when you get old enough to buy your own toys!
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Author: Pam H.
Date: 2003-04-11 02:25
Great story Fred!
I inherited mom's clarinet way back in the 5th grade band days. Somewhere along the line fell in love with making music and turned into a real band geek by high school mixing in bass clarinet and trombone (marching and jazz band for itty bitty school district).
I got away from it pretty much except for singing for the last 20 years then started attending a church that had an orchestra. It only took a few years of sitting there wondering if I could do that again 'till I signed up for private lessons for the first time in my life and got in the church orchestra.
I've played in the church orchestra for around 3 years now, and the weird addiction for learning new instruments every now and again is back too. I added piano around 2 years back, flute and just bought a sax. A big part of the enjoyment is not just the music but the people I've met too. At least musicians understand this crazy addiction. Other people probably just shake their heads. I don't care. I love music. Clarinet is really my favorite instrument now. There is so much you can express with the clarinet. I think it's beautiful.
It is nice being able to buy my own toys!
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Author: leonardA
Date: 2003-04-11 02:50
I picked up the sax again last summer after a 40 year layoff. It's coming back pretty well. Then in December I decided that I wanted to do what I should have done in the first place...learn the clarinet, so that I could double. I still love the sax, but I find that as I go along I'm also developing a real love for the clarinet. It has such a wide variety of sounds, and I especially like the lower register. It's much more difficult to go from sax to clarinet than vice versa, but I'm making progress, and I know that I just need to be patient. This board has really been helpful to me and I really enjoy it. I am glad to be part of this community of people who love the clarinet.
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Author: JamesE
Date: 2003-04-11 03:03
I started as a freshman at college. For some reason my first roommate, whom I did not know too well, decided he wanted to be in the band, so I went with him to visit the band instructor. The man looked at me and said, “you should play the clarinet.” My roommate got an Eb horn and I have been thanking my lucky stars ever since. Bear in mind that this was in at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks in 1954. The “band” had about 15 members. I think he was short on clarinets.
I can’t even remember what I started on, some plastic something the school had I think, but I do remember using an old plastic reed. I guess I did ok as my folks took pity on my later that year and got me a wood E&S Master Model that I still have.
I finally finished up with a degree in Music Education, one of the first two to ever graduate from that school.
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Author: SusanB
Date: 2003-04-11 03:19
Why clarinet? Several reasons! I learned how to play the recorder in 4th grade. The clarinet looked similar to the recorder, so it felt sorta familiar. Second, my younger sister played clarinet and gave it up, so I took it up.
I got a really late start compared to some of you. I never took band when I was in grade school or junior high. I was really shy and I was picked on by other kids, so I avoided large group situations. When I was a sophomore in high school, we lived in a smaller town and the band was small, about 20 people. I went to one of their concerts, and when I heard the music, I decided I wanted to be a part of that. So I picked up the clarinet my sister had abandoned (a school owned clunker of a Bundy). I started from scratch, not knowing note fingerings or how to make the reed work. I took lessons from the band teacher over the summer, and by the next fall (my junior year), I was playing 3rd clarinet in the band. I practiced all the time...just loved playing the music. After my parents saw that I was serious about it, we made a trip to another small town close by, and I picked out a student level clarinet. I tried out for all state my senior year, and I actually got in, playing 2nd clarinet. I have loved the clarinet since I first touched it. It has a great sound and range.
I played some tenor sax too, in the pep band. I would like to do that again. I have to pay off my clarinet toys first.
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Author: Eric T
Date: 2003-04-11 03:24
When I was in second grade, my parents took me to a music store, to choose an instrument, because they thought that learning an instrument was an important part of my education. The store owner was a great musician, and could play all of the instruments well. For me, there was no question at all--the clarinet sounded liquid and cool, and I couldn't get enough of the sound. I played in school band and took lessons, picked up sax, flute, guitar, piano, et al in later years, but still love the sound of the clarinet best.
After a 20 year hiatus to raise a family and have a career, I'm back at it, playing in a wind quintet, an orchestra, and whatever ad hoc gigs come up. Playing instruments is a great way to be with people.
Eric Toews
et
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Author: R13A
Date: 2003-04-11 05:10
how do I play the clarinet ?...........hmmmmmm, not well any more but i have oodles of fun ![[happy]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smiley12.gif)
why ?????? hmmmmmm..as a distraction to dealing with 2 parents in nursing homes and hospice, I LOVE it !, a form of physical therapy for my disability.
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Author: Liesel
Date: 2003-04-11 05:20
Like most 4th graders, I wanted to play the drums. My parents said no, so I held out for a year and asked again in 5th grade. Again, they said no. I decided that I would give up on my hope of playing the drums and play the cello. They actually laughed at me because it was so big for a little girl, and my mother really wanted me to play the flute. I didn't like the sound of the flute though, so I decided on the clarinet. I suppose it was a bit of a compromise. But now I'm a music ed major in college, and I have to admit, although I was pretty annoyed in 5th grade, today I'm glad I play the clarinet instead of the drums, or the cello for that matter.
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Author: sfalexi
Date: 2003-04-11 07:25
For me it was a little different. Only in the fact that I came to a crossroads and went down clarinet road instead of being a cellist.
In 3rd grade I began the clarinet. The music teacher came around and showed us the different instruments and I thought it looked cool. Also in the third grade, I started violin. I advanced in violin fairly quickly (for a third grader) and she said she need a good cellist so she started me on cello. In the meantime I've been playing clarinet. I played both instruments up until the 8th grade. A few years on both. I was pretty good for my age (I presume) on both, but when I transferred to a new town and a new school system, they told me I couldn't do both anymore. I had to pick one or the other. The orchestra in this new town was very poor compared to my old town. In 7th grade we were playing pieces that I had played already in 4th grade and I felt like I wouldn't improve much in that sorta environment, however the band was a little better. So I dropped cello and stuck with the clarinet. And now I'm back after a LONG two year haitus (went to a college without any woodwind sections and you're not allowed to have private teachers - long story, wierd college).
Although I admit, I do miss the cello every now and then and wish I had been allowed to progress with both instead of being forced to choose one or the other.
Alexi
US Army Japan Band
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Author: Ralph G
Date: 2003-04-11 13:51
I thought the kids in 6th grade band looked so cool carrying their Signet 100 cases around. I just had to have one. Got one the next year. Wasn't until I opened it I realized there was something inside.t
________________
Artistic talent is a gift from God and whoever discovers it in himself has a certain obligation: to know that he cannot waste this talent, but must develop it.
- Pope John Paul II
Post Edited (2003-04-11 14:59)
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Author: msloss
Date: 2003-04-11 14:28
In retrospect, girls. That's right, girls. Oh yeah, I got picked on for playing the sissy instrument in elementary school. Flute section, clarinet section, double reeds -- all girls, except for me. Got my @ss kicked a few times on the playground for playing the geek instrument.
And then time passed. In high school, brass -- all guys; percussion -- all guys. Woodwinds? All girls, except for me. Sissy, huh? Got a steady girlfriend who later became my wife out of it. When last I saw one of my playground friends from elementary school who didn't think clarinet was so cool, he was single and serving me a sandwich at Quizno's.
Oh yeah, and I got to play a bunch of music and study at Northwestern and make money n' stuff.
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Author: Domingo
Date: 2003-04-11 16:40
HAHAHA, msloss
I was called a Faggot (not the German word for Basson) b/c of it. Unfortunantly, I still get laughed at. My freind does this intimidation of me where he flutters his eyebrows like a girl, makes a stupid face, puckering his lips and face, and twittles his fingers as he wobbles his head. Today, (dont know how old you are), its kind of a general idea, b/c most of the male clarinet palyers ive seen, are a bit too feminine., or maybe its me, i dunno. I constantly have to tell people when they ask what instrument i play that "Yes I do play the Clarinet, and NO, im not gay!"...........I think its kind of funny, but I dont regret palying clarinet............ Also, I play it because I couldnt play Tuba at all... I starded in 6th. and played till 9th. Just wasnt ment for it I guess, but would of saved me alot of embarrasment...................Well thats the end of that tid bit, but I still enjoy it very much today.....
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Author: Ralph G
Date: 2003-04-11 16:53
I know I've been out of high school too long when I completely forget that the clarinet is a "girlie" instrument.
In the groups I play in now, the majority of clarinetists are guys. Beer-drinkin'-type guys at that. Tell some of them that they're a "German bassoon" and you'd better hope you have your dentist on speed dial.o
________________
Artistic talent is a gift from God and whoever discovers it in himself has a certain obligation: to know that he cannot waste this talent, but must develop it.
- Pope John Paul II
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Author: Vic
Date: 2003-04-11 20:08
This has actually become quite interesting. I grew up deep in redneck territory in the fifties, and even there the clarinet was never considered a "sissy" instrument. I'd never heard of that until today. I seem to recall that in high school band the gender mix in the clarinet section was about fifty-fifty. The flute was a "sissy" instrument back there/then, but not the clarinet. I'm guessing because in those days all the famous players seemed to be male. Perhaps my memory is just faulty and/or any derision suffered back then just went over my head, which is entirely possible, since I certainly wasn't the sharpest tack in the box. And my current experience is pretty much the same as Ralph G's. No German bassoons whatsoever.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
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Author: msloss
Date: 2003-04-11 21:23
In Colorado in the late 70's and early 80's, the music programs were already dying, and sports completely dominated the public school educational environment. My best friend growing up was picked on mercilessly for being in the band (percussionist), and that was playing the "cool" instruments. Of course, now he is a Major in the Air Force and ain't nobody pickin' no more. The jock culture wasn't particularly kind to us artistic folk, especially if you didn't carry an instrument case large enough to do bodily harm to your tormentor. I wanted to play trumpet or trombone for that reason. I know, I know, what on earth for? A shame really, because that kind of environment probably kept some potentially very talented boys away from getting involved in music.
I didn't meet another male clarinetist (other than my teachers and the DSO members) until all state band and orchestra. Didn't meet my first male flautist until music camp in Chicago. Who knew?
The plus of course is that I never had a chauvinist thought in my head about women in music. I was surrounded (hooray for me!). Just a few bruises and busted lips to show for it (no, not from the women... mostly).
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Author: lyn
Date: 2003-04-11 22:38
My mom made me. She said "someday you can play the saxophone!" @@ (What can I say, she liked the big bands... the chintzy ones, not the good ones like Basie...) So, one day I played sax - in Marching band LOL.
What I wanted was to play the flute (and now I do LOL). Not that I don't like the clarinet, but it took me a while to like it, let alone love it. I have always had to work my tail off on clarinet, and I'm more of a natural on the flute. So I always knew I would never force my kid to play something he didn't want to play.
My son plays trumpet. Thank Goodness. Because I don't need a third person complaining about reeds in the house!!!!!! (Dh is also a clarinetist.)
lyn
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Author: jim lande
Date: 2003-04-12 05:46
It is the closest I can come to purring like a cat. And when I play the eefer, I can sound like a cat fight, too.
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Author: Bob Schwab
Date: 2003-04-12 15:07
This is an interesting thread.
Well for me, I started playing the piano when I was in the second grade. I probably would have enjoyed it but my parents put a lot of pressure on me to become the next VanCliburn or Liberace, and since they were paying for my lessons I had better produce or else. I remember tearfully declaring that I wanted to quit the piano when I was in the fourth grade. I liked making music, I just didn't like the beatings whenever... no need to go into details, They weren't musicians and didn't understand some things. I still liked music though. My church had an excellent music program and I had been in the choir since as far back as I can remember. So, when I reached the fifth grade I jumped at the chance to learn to play an instrument that my parents didn't have to shell out ("waste") any money on.
During that time I liked to listen to Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue (yeah, I was an odd kid). I'm sure a number of you already know where I'm going with this. I used to listen to it often on our reel-to-reel with the headphones on. I LOVED the clarinet intro! It was the coolest sounding instrument I ever heard, well, next to being in the choir loft with the pipe organ playing behind me (those bass notes just shook through your body. So powerful. I digress). That's the main reason I picked the clarinet. It was a neat sounding instrument, and quite frankly, I thought it looked like you'd expect something musical to look. Classic.
To this day, (please don't get upset, this is just me personally) I can't understand why some prefer something like the sax to the clarinet. I think the clarinet is a much more expressionate instrument. It can sound sassy (Pierre Dewey La Fountaine), and/or it can sound rich and full-bodied (Jon Manasse). Saxes are harsh. Sorry, they may work for the ladies, but that's because they just don't know any better. I'm half kidding: half.
Besides, there are some instruments that we just take to more than others. I seem to be able to relate to woodwinds and keyboard type instruments. I've tried brass and stringed instruments and it's' like trying to write left-handed (I'm a rightie). But give me a woodwind and somehow it just seems easier to figure out.
So, after a twenty plus year layoff (I joined the service and did twenty years in the Air Force) I decided to pick up the clarinet again just over a year ago. I'm loving it. Some things you don't realize how much you miss until you become reaquainted with them. I'm surprised how quickly a lot of it came back.
Thanks for reading. Take care.
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Author: David Peacham
Date: 2003-04-12 20:43
My earliest memories of classical concerts are hearing Jack Brymer play K622 when I was eight or nine.
Wanted to play the clarinet.
Ended up playing the ("French") horn instead.
Borrowed a clarinet for a couple of months when I was eighteen. Bought one when I was 43, still playing today (two years on.....)
-----------
If there are so many people on this board unwilling or unable to have a civil and balanced discussion about important issues, then I shan't bother to post here any more.
To the great relief of many of you, no doubt.
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Author: Denny G
Date: 2003-04-13 14:44
I started when I was 9 years old. My grade school worked out an agreement with the local university to have grad music educators teach band lessons. I wanted to play like Benny Goodman. My parents bought me a used Veto Resotone (this was in 1970). It still plays fine. I was detoured by the saxophone in high school and that instrument's allure in college bar bands, but I am a clarinet player first and always. I always go back to it. Nice topic.
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Author: Sue
Date: 2003-04-13 19:36
I started in elementary school and had played all the way through high school. Music has always been an important part of my live and I have always loved to watch movie musicals with all the singing and dancing, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, just to mention a few!. Yes, I guess I was one of those "weird kids". I used to think to be a studio musican would be the best job in the world, you get to play wonderful music , more of a group effort than a boring desk job.
I used (I say used to because I've begun playing again after 25 odd years) have the most rich mellow sound and I loved playing because of that and being able to express myself without having to use words it is such a rewarding experiance.
I remember in high school a professional came to help out the section and he noticed my tone and looked at the roof of my mouth and mentioned that the roof of my mouth was perfect for playing the clarinet, high enough to allow the air to move over the reed at the best angle!. Well I'm turning 45 this summer, never did become a studio musician like I dreamed instead having a boring desk job. I'm currently playing again in my local community band which I enjoy its so rewarding being able to play as part of a group again!. I don't put pressure on my kids (a nine and eleven years old) to become any particular profession but I do expose (just due to listening for my own pleasure) them to the wonderful world of music with all the variety and styles and hope that they will carry with them the joy of music thruout their lives just as it has enriched my own life.
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Author: bob49t
Date: 2003-04-14 05:55
Coming for a family of amateur musicians (mum piano and dad violin/viola), I started music in the primary school choir, then a more challenging local community choir.
At senior school, every month, those who were interested in music from all over Dundee, Angus and Fife were taken by the busload to fill the Caird Hall in Dundee. This was to the Scottish National Orchestra afternoon childrens' concerts. Sadly this facility has been withdrawn and the (now named Royal SNO) does not provide these regular concerts. They played concerts which always featured different principals of the orchestra showing off their particular instruments.
On one of these occasions, I was entranced by Keith Pearson playing the Weber Concertino and I was hooked. 2 weeks later mum and dad took me to Largs music store in Dundee and they bought me a sonorite B & H Regent for £20 7s 6d (1963 before decimalisation in 1971) This I played until swapping it for a timber nameless wonder, then on to a pair of Evette and Schaeffer models.
Subsequently I bought a pair of Peter Eaton early models and now a pair of Elites by him. After attending the NE of Scotland Music School in Aberdeen, Clarsax was formed - a quartet (as you might imagine) doubling clars and saxes. I added a sop sax for this group. The ammo has increased to a lovely Keilwerth alto, a recent Buffet bass, and a superb Amati Eb which was recently purchased in Prague. This little beauty will maim at 40 paces.
Surprisingly and to my delight I get to play all of these instruments on a regular basis. Possibly because of my range of instruments (and not my expertise) I'm asked to double in bands. I do solo/chamber recitals and I play clarinet in our local regional orchestra and guest with others on other instruments.
I feel I've been incredibly lucky in keeping what could have been a profession, a hobby and which has provided me with so many thrills and so much satisfaction. Let's hope when the time comes to gracefully retire, my musical friends will tell me in no uncertain terms ! I've really been so privileged to play with so many wonderful amateur and professional musicians over many years.
Sounds like I'm thinking of stopping, but there's no time for that ! - back to bass part in William Grant Still Symphony No 1 (if you don't know it, I rate it with Rach 2 for orchestration and thrills - clips can be heard on internet).
It's been of great interest to work through this thread and to read other "posters'" stories. Well done Tim P ! I suspect it's not closed yet.
BobT
Post Edited (2003-04-14 06:59)
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Author: Molliweide
Date: 2003-04-15 17:21
I play the clarinet because we found one under my cousin Peggy's bed.
I did the placement for band but my parents where too poor to rent me an instrument. Now I was really pissed off about this and would tell anyone who listened in my family about this injustice. One of these people being my aunt Shirley. She remembered that my cousin Peggy played viola and she might have one some where. So we went over to her trailer what what we found under her bed was no viola. Got myself a nice little Normandy Clarinet.
So I started band in the 6th grade with good Mr. Bender at the public school while I attened the Catholic school two blocks away. Monday and Wednesday mornings walking over to the public school. After Christmas I went to band class and Mr. Bender wasn't there. He had quit - no more band. About 6 weeks later I starting seeing kids on the bus with instruments and get suspicious. So I show up again on Monday...no band. Then Tuesday.....bingo. They had changed days on me and never notified my little parochial school. They had no clue who I was, had never heard of this little Catholic school two blocks away. I just thank my sixth grade teacher for letting me run two blocks away from school on a hunch.
Why do I play Bass Clarinet.
Because Joan Schroeder made me. I was too loud and was given the choice of Bass Clarinet or Oboe.
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Author: Alphie
Date: 2003-04-15 22:29
Started at the age of 7 after playing recorder for one year. They say I showed some musical talant from the age of 2. Started clarinet basically because the music teacher in my little home town could teach clarinet and I was too small for trumpet. Played with the local band from the age of 8 and continued with that until 16 via keyboard, bass and guitar in a few rock bands in the 70th. Won a few local competitions between 10 and 13.
First exposed to classical music at 12. After a few summer courses I started to study clarinet at two different conservatories from 16 to 21 and from 22 to 27 with one year break working in a symphony orchestra. Freelancing doing orchestra subs, chamber music, opera, theatre, musicals, a lot of early clarinet, studio, many recordings with each. Ended finally up in the Philharmonic orchestra where I work now.
Being adopted I learned at age 24 that my biological father is a clarinet player too. Want to believe I have it from him since my parents are not very musical but very lovely parents and people.
Alphie
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Author: Rick Williams
Date: 2003-04-16 03:06
About the 5th grade in school a guy came in shoved several mouthpieces in all our faces and if you could make a sound, that is what you played..Took all of 15 seconds. Sad but true.
RW
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Author: susieray
Date: 2004-03-05 18:29
Playing the clarinet is therapy for all of us, disability or not. ;-)
I didn't even begin playing until I was an 11th grader; played tenor recorder up until then and wanted to switch to something LOUDER cuz I'm deaf. So my dad bought me a clarinet and paid for private lessons, which was the best thing he ever did!!!!
I played that thing for six hours a day, til my lip bled but I wanted to do it right, doggone it. Made it into state honor band two years in a row, played tenot sax in the jazz band too....then promptly quit playing after HS.
Didn't pick it up again for 25 years (six years ago)...have lots of regrets
for not having stuck with it, but there's no going back and doing it over so I'm just doin the best I can at making up for lost time and having a BLAST!!!
sue
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Author: Michael G
Date: 2004-03-05 19:31
I play the clarinet because I must. I have an inner need to play music through the voice of the clarinet
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Author: Brenda
Date: 2004-03-06 01:58
Besides the piano, the clarinet was the only one of several instruments in our house that I could play decently. Over the years I've fallen in love with the richness and purity of its sound.
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Author: John O'Janpa
Date: 2004-03-06 03:07
Our school band director taught band from 5th grade through senior high.
The band was highly thought of in our small town composed mostly of recent european immigrants. Lots of people spoke Finnish or Hungarian.
Most of the fifth grade boys wanted to be drummers so the director let us all buy drumsticks and do the "ma ma pa pa" thing. Then he began steering most of us toward different instruments based on mouth configurations, and I'm sure which slots needed to be filled to round out the high school (7th-12th grade) band.
I switched from drums to saxophone. After playing sax for a year the director declared that some of us sax players would be good clarinetists, so I switched to the clarinet in the 6th grade.
I still play sax sometimes because it works better with rock and roll. In the music corner of our den we have a piano, three guitars, an alto sax, tenor sax,
trombone (youngest son's), five Bb clarinets, two eefers, a bass clarinet (newest addition), and a flute. Most of these gather quite a bit of dust, but I do play clarinet in a college wind symphony and in a church orchestra and love doing it. My main instrument is still the 1955 Selmer Signet Special that my parents bought new for me in the sixth grade.
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Author: panda
Date: 2004-03-06 10:36
From the age of 4 i played descant recorder then progressed to the treble, tenor then bass recorder but even from the age of 4 i wanted to play the clarinet but because of lack of money i couldn't afford one. Now at the age of 27 i own my own beautiful clarinet. Even though I've only been playing for six weeks when I play it feels like my whole body is making the sound of this fine and wonderous instrument. Now i have finally have a clarinet in my life i will never let it go.
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Author: lycfmtkl
Date: 2004-03-06 14:20
Some years ago I played the flute. I was required to play the solo flute in the concerto for flute , harp and orchestra K299 by mozart with my orchestra. I bought a CD with the concerto K299 to listen in order to improve my playing.
The same CD contains the clarinet concerto K622. After listening to the K622, I fell in love in the clarinet. Subsequently I started to double on the clarinet.
(Forgive my English if you don't understand)
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Author: deepriver27
Date: 2004-03-06 15:23
I play the clarinet because I enjoy punishment. I considered the trumpet, but figured that dealing with reeds, ligatures, and a nightmarish throat register would be so much more fun.
I also thought that the possibilities of sharing my musical ability with an audience would be so much more diminished than if, for example, I took up the guitar. After all, what is the clarinetist's equivalent of a Jimi Hendrix? What rock bands feature a reed man who can do a 3 octave chromatic in 2.8 seconds?
OK - well I'll tell you what I really love about the instrument. I've played sax, guitar, I've sung and played drums. But something just happens to me on a clarinet. I can't explain it.
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Author: atl4413
Date: 2004-03-06 19:04
My story isn't that much different than a few that have already been posted.
My oldest sister got her clarinet when I was in 5th grade; played for two months and quit. It was sitting around, I was forbidden to touch it.....you know how the rest goes.
In 6th grade, I heard (for the first time) Rhapsody in Blue and even at this young age, it moved me to tears. I love the sound of the clarinet and to this day, when I hear one beautifully played, I cry.... I'm such a softy...
Still listening, learning, trying to play and loving it, 21 years later....
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Author: Alyra
Date: 2004-03-07 09:59
I got accepted into a high school that had a high focus on music, and thus, wanted to play an instrument.
My mum did not have much money and the school ran out of instruments - so I spent term 1 doing not much and ended up in the choir - though to be honest, i"m not that talented a singer. I still was going and bugging the music people every week though for them to find me a woodwind instrument to play - oboe, bassoon, anything.
Term 2 came around, and my mum died of cancer. I ended up living at my father/stepmothers place and had to go to a different school - and forgot about music.
It wasn't until year 9 that a friend was playing clarinet and urged me into it - and I started playing on one of the school's old selmers. Then the school got a brand new Bass Clarinet - I was lucky enough to be able to have it and use it - and played it in Concert Band until I left home in year 11 and ran away interstate.
Haven't played since - until December last year, Dec 2003. Bought a Buffet and have started playing and enjoying thorougly. 5 years of break but it's all coming back bit by bit. Have joined the local concert band and truely remembering how much I love playing an instrument.
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Author: tenorchick
Date: 2004-03-07 18:25
I started playing clarinet summer before 5th grade, and at the time i was the typical girl who wanted to play flute, clarinet, or oboe. For some reason i already knew at the age of 10 that i wanted to be in my high school's marching band, so i nixed the idea of the oboe pretty fast. (The thought of learning another instrument in a few years for marching band didn't occur to me at the time, and it's ironic because i actually march tenor sax now, lol). I tried to play my friend's flute one time and pretty much no sound came out, so i was down to the clarinet. A high school girl at my church gave private lessons, so i started with her summer before 5th grade, and here i am almost 6 years later, still loving it as much as i ever did.
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Author: Rick Williams
Date: 2004-03-07 21:48
When I was in the sixth or seventh grade a fellow from a music store came to the school and shoved various mouth pieces in our faces and told us to blow. I managed to get a sound out of a clarinet MP, hence that was what I was told to play. Took about 30 seconds and I had nothing to say about it.
That's the story.
RW
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Author: Brad
Date: 2004-03-08 17:47
In 7th grade I wanted to take woodshop but the class was full. My best friend at the time coerced me into taking Begining Winds instead. When they were giving out instruments I was looking at the Trumpet but they ran out by the time they got to me. All they had left were Clarinets, and the rest is history. I have been playing for 30 years now. I often wonder if I would still be playing the Trumpet.
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Author: Topher
Date: 2004-03-09 23:10
I started the clarinet because (get this) all my friends weren't playing it. I was a non-conformist from the start. I also considered flute because my dad has always loved the sound of the flute, so it was really the only instrument I knew the sound of well. Unfortunately I couldn't get the slightest sound out of the flute, so clarinet it was!
The bass came into the mix when, in the 4th grade beginners' band, our director talked of other instruments he wanted people to switch to, and he mentioned the bass. While our school did not own one at the time I was instantly obsessed, and convinced my parents to get me a Selmer USA student model, with the promise that I would play at least until seventh grade. Sometime I think they regret that purchase, as I have lost interest in engineering, the field my dad wanted me to go into.
As for the earlier comments about male clarinet players, I will say that I make sure to act extra gay around anyone who accuses me of playing a feminine instrument. A good friend of mine, who plays ALL woodwinds at a professional-or at least college-level, is also a very skilled dancer, and more or less flaunts his femininity. He dresses like Jonny Depp, skips often, dances like fiend at the slightest music, and will speak with a phony lisp whenever necessary. The result is that obnoxious macho musclemen are afraid to come near him, and girls think he is the cutest thing since week-old puppies. Not bad.
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Author: jim lande
Date: 2004-03-10 03:57
When I was in fourth grade (1960) the school sent a note home announcing that there would be music lessons two or three days a week. I wanted to play trumpet. My mother signed a note and a few days later I was called to the office. Someone who I never saw again examined my mouth and informed me that I was best suited to playing clarinet. We had loaner instruments at first -- metal clarinets.
I have no idea what you look for in a kid's mouth. I do remember this scawny little kid lugging a french horn case. In retrospect, the clarinet was not so bad.
(Just noticed that I replied to this post a year ago and gave a completely different answer. Hmmmm)
"......especially if you didn't carry an instrument case large enough to do bodily harm to your tormentor. "
I have very fond memories of playing an alto clarinet in middle & high school. The case was three feet long. I used that thing like a wrecking ball. Anyone on the bus who heckled me learned to sit in the window seats.
Post Edited (2004-03-10 04:18)
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Author: Sam W.
Date: 2004-03-10 05:02
I just started in January.
I'm 34.
I've never really played an instrument before.
I have been a fan of jazz for some years and have been trying and trying to expand my knowledge of music and then suddenly last year I just realized ... I had to play the stuff. It was sort of a strange experience, coming to this realization, that I wanted to be inside the music and feel what it was like to make something with other musicians. I have always loved the sound of the clarinet.
At about this time, last fall, I was visiting a friend and she picked up a green case she had on her bedroom floor. "Here, take this," she said. She had no idea I was thinking of someday trying to play.
It was a 30 year old Selmer Bundy she had picked up at a tag sale. I tried to politely refuse it but I was shaking. This sounds so silly now, but I still can't believe it. It needed repair and she said I could keep it on the condition that I learned to play it. So I got it fixed.
I work nights at a newspaper and I convinced a work-mate friend to pick up the trumpet. Now, when I have closed down the wire photos of all the death, mayhem and sheer silliness in the world and after the press rolls, we play together. We've made it through our first lesson book, learning to read music as we go.
My husband watched me play at home and went out and bought an alto saxophone. The friend who gave me the clarinet is a French horn player but she has a trumbone. We all get together once a week and play together. I can't explain how much I enjoy it.
But I guess I don't have to.
-Sam
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Author: ohsuzan
Date: 2004-03-10 12:50
Good question.
I always hated the clarinet: the sound, the feel, the sloppy wet slobber of it all. And I'm too young to remember when Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw and Woody Herman were major gods in the musical firmament, so my social experience of being a clarinetist has been on a par with, say, having to wear the ill-fitting and unflattering clothes my mother made for me when I was a kid. Totally uncool. I would have been incredulous if someone had told me, forty years ago (when I sold my clarinet to buy contact lenses), that today I would own three of them and pretty much live for the opportunity to play.
My first clarinet was one of those old metal jobbies that my folks bought because it was cheap. And yes, they went through the apparently requisite steps of having some band instrument expert check out my hands and teeth and whatever to assess my suitability for the instrument. Does anyone still do that?
I hated that instrument. But within months, I was playing first chair -- which I did in every band I was ever in. Soon, I was playing a borrowed high-end Selmer with a crack behind the octave key -- it was actually a very good horn. But we had to give it back when we moved (again), so they got me the cheapest wood instrument they could find. I still don't know the name of it, but it was awful. Playing it on any given day required first sitting down with a screwdriver and checking to see what had come loose since the last time. The keys bent. The springs popped out. The bell cracked. But still, I played it every day of my life until I was 19 and and away from home and could get rid of it.
In the mid-seventies, for no apparent reason, I picked up a barely-playable Buffet with a serial number that indicates it was made in 1926. With repadding, it turned out to be a wonderful instrument -- still the nicest-playing of my three, but wofefully out of tune. I hung on to it all through my marriage-and-child-rearing years, playing almost not at all, but not quite never.
Ten years ago, it dawned on me that I was 1) not getting any younger; 2) interested in doing something musical that I had a chance of being good at. And for better or worse, my obvious choice was to resume playing clarinet.
So I got a new R-13 and started taking lessons, and promptly went nowhere at all.
Fast forward to the present, past widowhood and a second marriage and a move to a town where there is a community band and, by the by, a clown band. I figured, how bad could it be? and started playing (with the old Buffet) in the clown band last year (I dress as Wendy, a la the fast-food chain icon).
That went pretty well, until one of the trombonists heard me warming up and did a double-take and started telling everybody that I was a pretty good clarinetist. Music to my tired old ears! And just the motivation I needed to start really working at it again.
And do you know what? This time, I don't hate it. And I have started playing Benny Goodman in addition to Mozart. And I am grateful that I can be in my community concert band and maybe soon the local big band, and that there is at least one thing in this world that I am still good at.
We grow too soon old, and too late smart. My grandmother used to say that.
Susan Kundert
Coshocton, Ohio
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Author: claclaws
Date: 2004-03-11 12:10
Nice thread. Really enjoyed reading (I read all the postings..it was 36 page-long on on my msword doc.)
I hold a clarinet in my hand for the first time when I was 25. Now I'm 35. Put the instrument in the closet for the last 9 years and back on the clarinet lesson for the past 6 months, overcame some bouts of depression (as a matter of fact, started clarinet during the therapy..). Now I can't be happier in terms of everyday life+work thanks to the music...My wish is to be able to play in an ensemble performance some day.
Lucy Lee Jang
Post Edited (2004-03-11 12:16)
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Author: Rev. Avery
Date: 2004-03-11 12:17
Thanks for the post claclaws! That's pretty cool. Plus, you should get some sort of award for reading all the posts to this topic! 
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Author: PatB
Date: 2004-03-12 12:43
Because I don't know how to play anything else.
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Author: voggorb
Date: 2007-05-27 22:57
Fun thread!
I wanted to play sax in fourth grade, but you had to play the clarinet for 1 year first, and after that you were allowed to switch to sax. So I started playing the clarinet... and never quit!
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Author: samohan245
Date: 2007-05-28 01:05
well it all started in 5th grade....
the schools musical instrument suppler had demo of all the instruments u could play.
trumpet, nah too load and might sore lips
flute, sterotyped and said only girls play that
drums, mom would never let me
sax, i wanted to play this one maybe even be a jazz musician
clarinet, wow i love this sound!!!! so mellow and beautiful!!
down to saxophone or clarinet... only thing is money
luckily my uncles are conductors for wealthy towns and had accumulated instruments over the years of their teaching.
at the top of my list was clarinet once i heard it i was hypnotized. i said "do u have a clarinet?"
my uncle "yes"
my response "yes!!!!!"
i couldn't wait to play it and turns out that i loved it so much that i became top clarinetist at my school keeping my first chair every year.
i am now in the 7th grade i play Bb clarinet Bb bass clarinet and i ma part 2 other bands the fitchburg state college band and the high school marching band
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Author: Katelyn
Date: 2007-05-28 01:38
My whole family played brass back three generations. So my parents took me to the fifth grade band clinic, and I tried the basic four out. The director said I sounded great on trumpet, and I couldn't get the clarinet to play. Later, all of us fifth graders were taken to the eighth grade concert, and I heard their first chair clarinetist make her instrument sing. One thing lead to another, and after two years I had my director spending a week trying to get me to switch to oboe. I said, "No thanks, sir, but I think I'll just stick with what I'm good at."
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Author: MichaelR
Date: 2007-05-28 03:00
My parents couldn't (wouldn't?) afford any instrument. Then I was hanging out with my friends after band class and the director heard my story. Would you like to play tuba? We can't afford it. Don't worry! You can use the school's instrument and I'll give you lessons for free. Imagine a sixth grader carrying a tuba home - over a mile - to practice over the weekend. Three cheers for the Illinois school system! Four years later we moved to a small town in Idaho and the repertoire shifted from the William Tell Overture to Paint Your Wagon.
I quit band in tenth grade.
Thirty years later, at 48, I'm still missing music. The clarinet is the best sounding instrument I know. I talk wistfully with my wife about maybe starting to play clarinet, this was sometime is late summer early fall, "Yeah right, like you need _another_ hobby," she challenges. I sheepishly agree. Christmas morning there's a clarinet waiting for me. The 'nuther hobby comment was because she'd heard me say this before and had already bought the clarinet. She didn't need me going out and buying one for myself!
That was a year and a half ago. I've been enjoying clarinet ever since.
So I play from deferred gratification.
--
Michael of Portland, OR
Be Appropriate and Follow Your Curiosity
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Author: old999
Date: 2007-05-28 03:19
I just started the clarinet 18 months ago as a retirement project (I'm 67). I hadn't touched any instrument in about 40 years - at that time I took flute lessons for a few years after trying to do it myself for two more years. Before that it was violin from 3rd grade to 8th. I wanted to play a trumpet, but my father played vioin and piano and insisted that all us kids play one or the other. I fixed him by quitting.
As a violinist in the high school orchestra I used to snicker at the squeaks coming from the clarinet section. Now I understand. They still drive me crazy, but at least I understand. (BTW - the clarinet had a large following - male and female - in those days. The violin was the sissy instrument. I was one of only three males playing it in the orchestra.)
I chose the clarinet this time around because of its expressive capabilities. That's another area where I'm "breaking ranks" with my father. I'm getting into jazz and just started playing with a community band. Dad was strictly classical.
I just added an alto sax to my repertoire and plan to continue lessons on both. One thing for sure - I love playing the clarinet. More so than any other instrument (we'll see about the sax). It really feels as though I'm making the sounds myself, and I love being able to bend the notes (sorry , Dad).
Speaking of recorder, the clarinet is like playing alto and descant recorder at the same time.
Al
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Author: bill28099
Date: 2007-05-28 03:26
Because I still had the Buffet of my childhood in the closet, a fingering chart and Baermann III + Rose 32. Because I promised myself at 60 that I could play as well at 65 as I did at 17, fat chance. I wish I had taken up the oboe in my old age but I would have had to buy one first, so I'm stuck with the clarinet and now after 3+ years am buried in clarinets of every variety and key. I've got an oboe now and could switch but can't find a good reed.
A great teacher gives you answers to questions
you don't even know you should ask.
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Author: Dano
Date: 2007-05-28 03:45
At age 7 I started playing trumpet. I loved it and would rather play trumpet more than any other activity that a normal 7 year old would want to do. By the time I was 9 or 10, I realized that my dad was nuts over Artie Shaw. I would sit with him and listen to records that he valued so much for hours and hours. He had stacks and stacks of Shaw and Goodman albums that I now have. I guess listening to Artie Shaw with my father and seeing how nice things were when he had that music on was what made me stay with the clarinet. When I started to play pro, I could always look out into an audience and see him smiling like he did when he listened to Artie Shaw back when I was 10 years old. It has always calmed me down to see him out there. I have always played for him. No matter where or when I played. He was always the encouragment and the pat on the back that I needed when I thought about not playing clarinet anymore when I was a hippy teenager. That was 40 years ago and I still get the same feeling when I hear Shaw play.
My Dad died last Friday, the 18th and I played several pieces on clarinet at the service. It was recorded and listening to it, I believe it's the best I have ever played in 40 years. I know it's a little off topic but that is why I play clarinet.
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2007-05-28 04:16
Why do I play clarinet?? It's all about the money- endless cash flow!!
:) :D
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Author: ClarinetTex
Date: 2007-05-28 06:53
Dano, my condolences for your loss. I'm glad you got to play for your father. I play because I like the sound.
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Author: EuGeneSee
Date: 2007-05-28 17:42
I, too loved to listen to the old Shaw and Goodman records Mom & Dad played when I was a pup. So, I started on clarinet at school about 1955 and played until 1962 when I gave up school band to go out for football (at 6'2" and 145 lbs THAT was a joke!).
Last year I pulled the old B&H (which had turned olive green) out of storage, noodled with it a little, and decided to play again. Now I am still a lousy beginner-level player with a house full of clarinets.
My teacher tells me to stop wasting so much time scrounging through yard sales, local auction sales, and that on-line unmentionable place and start practicing more, or I will never get out of the level 1 book!! Eu
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2007-05-28 17:51
I started (well...) with a plastic Albert which I bought in a whim when Dah Missus and the kids were out of town. The minute I had it in my snout I was caught hook, line and sinker. (I quickly replaced it with a wooden Martin Busine when I found out that no one around here was using Alberts...)
Found a teacher and 18 months later I joined a community band.
Much of where I am now I owe to this BBoard. Really.
--
Ben
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Author: Mike Clarinet
Date: 2007-05-29 15:21
Why Clarinet?
A certain feline legging it up a tree in Peter and the Wolf. Always made me laugh when I was small. Still can't play it.
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Author: jmcgann
Date: 2007-05-29 15:45
As a lifelong guitarist/mandolinist, I couldn't stand not trying a wind instrument that has such a large range of notes and dynamics and the potential for such expression in a variety of idioms. Last summer I thought "If not now, when!?!?"
How hard could it be? Just learn where the notes are, get the fingerings, and off you go, right?
BBWWAAAAHHH HAHHAHHAH!
Thoroughly enjoying the many struggles in an effort to gain competency.
Also, to echo David Spiegelthal:
Quote:
Am crazy.
www.johnmcgann.com
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Author: BobD
Date: 2007-05-30 11:30
The musician-salesman told my parents that I had the wrong mouth for a trumpet....which was my desire. But he just happened to have a good deal on a clarinet......$5 a month and a summer of free lessons. He was a trombone player. No, I'm not kidding this time.
Bob Draznik
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Author: Philcoman
Date: 2007-05-31 20:16
Thanks for asking this question! obviously it's a topic that people want to share. My own story -- at the age of 40, after 26 years as a guitar player, I was sitting on the couch flipping through the TV channels when I can upon "The Benny Goodman Story" (a mediocre movie featuring some terrific music!). Something clicked. I had loved Benny Goodman ever since I was a kid, and seeing the movie rekindled a long-forgotten desire to play the clarinet, a desire I had abandoned in high school because I was under the impression that guys who played guitar had better luck with girls (BTW, as Humphry Bogart would have said, "I was misinformed").
Call it a mid-life crisis or whatever, but I announced to my wife right then that I was going to learn to play the clarinet. I've never been happier -- I love the challenges and the rewards, and my experience is that clarinet players are the most generous and gregarious of all musicians.
"If you want to do something, you do it, and handle the obstacles as they come." --Benny Goodman
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Author: gwie
Date: 2007-05-31 20:42
When I was in fifth grade, the school director yanked me out of violin sectionals because I was annoying the other kids (having studied violin privately for five years prior to joining my school ensembles, I was playing Bach and Mozart concertos while the others were learning how to rosin their bows and hold the instrument up), and threw me into beginning woodwinds.
Looking at the different instruments, the clarinet appealed to me because of it's range...I received a school-owned Yamaha instrument, and a sixth grader showed me how to put it together, put on the reed, and blow into it. For some reason, I stuck with it all the way through junior high, high school, college, and eventually it ended up being my primary instrument in grad school!
While I love the violin and continue to play numerous chamber music and orchestra performances on it, clarinet has a special meaning for me, as it was an instrument I chose for myself to learn (as opposed to being handed the other instrument and told "you're going to learn this!".
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Author: A1tissimo
Date: 2007-06-04 21:38
To be honest, I picked the clarinet way back in fourth grade because I thought it looked cool, with all the keys, and the different parts... Nowadays I love it because it's extremely versatile, from the enormous range to all the different styles that the clarinet is capable of.
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Author: DrH2O
Date: 2007-06-05 01:57
Because learning the clarinet as a 40-something year-old total novice (except for recorder in 4th grade) is easier than trying to figure out my 14 year-old son!
Learnng to play is something I can control - him I can't!
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Author: Pablo
Date: 2007-06-05 03:39
The first time: My cool friend across the street played clarinet, and the cello seemed dull. After about 3 years (8th grade) I stopped because the clarinet seemed incredibly dull too...
This time: Actually, I'm trying to resist starting again, since I don't want to start something half-heartedly. I'm waiting to see if I really, really want to. I've also been completely spoiled by listening to two incredible clarinetists, and I don't want to start playing and find I can't come anywhere close to the beauty of their tones.
Why now?
I heard Ricardo Morales live with the Philadelphia Orchestra last weekend as one of the four wind players in the Mozart Sinfonia Concertante. I was astonished at how beautiful his tone was, and how he made his instrument sing the lines so deliciously.
Then I came home and found Eddie Daniel's album "Beautiful Love" on iTunes. Once again, I'm totally enchanted and intoxicated.
I didn't know the clarinet could be this musical! Even if I decide not to start playing again, I've found some wonderful music to listen to.
What do you think? Can a decent musician (piano, choral singing) learn to make beautiful notes relatively quickly, even while learning the basics?
Pablo
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Author: nesrala
Date: 2007-06-06 01:30
I started because my then-boyfriend (now-husband) played trumpet and baritone in a German brass band. The band would play a four hour gig. I'd drink through it and aimlessly carry on conversation with the rest of the "band widows" watching their sig-ots on stage. Then he'd get off the stage with the rest of the band and THEY'D be ready to drink and party for another four hours . . . at which point I was ready to be taken home. Figured since I had the dirndl and had played oboe, bassoon and piano (none of which are terribly useful or desireable in a German brass band), I'd pickup an instrument and at least stand a chance of standing at the end of the night. In my sometimes less-than-logical mind, the clarinet at least had the fingers running in the same direction as the oboe and bassoon . . . and since I'd never pickedup a brass instrument other than to tote a case . . .
Walked into the music store one day to very specifically buy some kind of clear goo in a bottle for his trumpet valves, walked out with medium-grade wooden Yamaha . . . figured if I was going to squeak and sqawk for a while I may as well make them sound a little pretty with wood squeaks over plastic.
It's been 3 years of playing and I couldn't love it more.
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Author: kfrank1
Date: 2007-06-06 07:20
The only reason I picked up clarinet was my sax teacher made me do it! His reasoning was that if you are a pro the more strings you have to your bow the better. He also had me pick up the flute. If it wasn't for him I would probably just be playing sax, and perhaps dabbling on flute. Now I am a doubler and after twenty years just got a bass clarinet last year. Now that is a cool instrument!
For me it's a bit of a double edged sword. Sometimes I wish I had just concentrated on sax so I wouldn't feel pressured trying to fit everything into my practice routine after my day job (I never became a pro). But when I think about quitting I feel like I've gone past the point of no return. It would be a bit of a waste to give up now after all that work. I might as well just stay the course. Anyway I like to think that playing clarinet helps my sax playing.
I play jazz and jazz clarinet is not common these days. Basically what I do is mainly play sax but then play one or two tunes on clarinet and flute just for variation. Last weekend I took my alto sax and clarinet to a private jam session, but ended up playing the whole time on clarinet. It was both challenging and enjoyable. The big band that I am in has started getting some dance music charts including Benny Goodman tunes. I am the only clarinet player in the sax section so I get to play it. Hooray, after twenty years I finally get the chance to play clarinet in a big band!:)
Post Edited (2007-06-06 07:23)
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