 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: andrea
Date: 2000-02-08 16:07
i remember the first time i saw my clarinet. when i brought it home in 4th grade i just stared at it and wondered if i would ever learn to use all those keys! i wanted to play the flute, but i couldn't make a sound and got upset. i couldn't make a sound on the clarinet either, but all the girls were playing the flute. i wonder if my excitement and passion would have been as strong for the flute? would i have had the same talent for any instrument, or was i just so darned lucky to pick the clarinet?
was anyone ever in awe at the clarinet or have any special stories to share about the early years of playing?
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Author: mike
Date: 2000-02-08 19:28
That reminds me of a story told by the late Phillip Farkas, of the great Chicago Symphony horn section, about when he was a boy and had just joined the school band as a prospective tuba player. But the bus driver told him that it was too big to carry on the bus, so Farkas pointed at another student who was carrying a French horn and asked if that was too large to carry on the bus. The bus driver said that the horn was ok and the rest is history. Farkas was wondering the same thing: what would have happened if he had pointed to a flute.
Having said that, I think that the number of people who play several instruments at a high level of accomplishment indicates that musicality is something that a person can posses even without having virtuosic technique on a particular (or even any) instrument. So is the passion for music or for a particular instrument? There probably is not a completely general answer. I personally tend to fumble around on several different instruments. I have a particular idea about how I want each of them to SOUND. And it is striving towards this SOUND that drives me to practice.
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Author: Mario
Date: 2000-02-08 20:26
In order to achieve a very high-level of competence in any field, one must have the talent, and one must have the will.
With respect to the mastery of musical instruments, naturally one must have the basic musical talent required to grow to a high level. But it gets more complicated after that.
Different classes of musical instruments have different physical requirements. It is probably fair to say that woodwinds require similar basic physical capabilities. Brass are a differnt classes, string instruments another, piano is different from all the other. Voice is a class of its own.
I believe that people who went far on their instruments are people who had the drive to get there, but also who were lucky enough to access the right instruments for them early enough to bond and to grow. If you chose wrongly, then your body is not in tune with what you are trying to accomplished, you get discouraged, and you give up.
It is why exposing a young child to many options is crucial to see what will stick. It is so sad to see children playing an instrument they obviously do not relate to.
My suggestion to some of my parent friends have often been as follows: Give them a piano, a recorder, some percussions instruments, a small violin, their own voice, a small brass, and see what they enjoy the most playing. They are still young enough not to be affected too much by fads and peer pressure. The results will indicate which class of instrument seem the most suited for them.
After that, expose them to the various options in their "natural" classes, and see what they choose.
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Author: Chloe
Date: 2000-02-08 20:52
The first time I played my clarinet I just knew it was right for me, I had already played piano and viola and it just hadn't felt right. Six years later I still play clarinet, sax as well and have taken up the piano that I deserted at age eight but my clarinet is still the instrument I empathsise most with, it's almost like a part of me.
Chloe
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2000-02-08 21:26
I like all of the above, Chloe's clar choice is also mine, 70 years later after jazz sax and symph. oboe-E H ; Mario's regarding "multiple-choice", its too bad that today's first- band directors ASSIGN certain insts, thats wrong in my book. Good comments also, Mike, I have and play sop. Eb down to bass at different skill levels. My early impressions are lost in antiquity, but I do remember when I took all the keys off my first P M full Boehm, but I survived! Don
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Author: ron
Date: 2000-02-08 22:05
Hi, Andrea -
Good topic! Wonderful comments.
My first inclination, in fourth grade, was to take up the violin. That didn't work out, somehow, I don't remember why, and I ended up with a Conn metal clarinet for Christmas. It stuck. The clarinet has been the main love of my musical life ever since. I've also fooled around with cornet, trombone and tenor banjo. Having worked in a band instrument repair shop a long, long time ago, I had the chance to 'try out' many different horns. I enjoy dabbling at other instruments and I personally believe it's a good thing if you have the opportunity, maybe not for everyone but if you're inclined to have fun with music... why not? Nobody that I'm aware of has died from that.
The clarinet, however, remains my main crush.
ron
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Author: Willie
Date: 2000-02-08 22:15
In sevnth grade I signed up to play drums as I already had a head start because my mom played drums with jazz and swing groups. This became a problem when I decided to jump about six trash cans (Evel Kneivel was our big hero in those days), on a bicycle and ended up with both forearms/hands in casts. I switched to euphonium as I could still wiggle my fingers. I then switched to clarinet when I found toting that big case home on the back of my motor scooter a problem and I,ve been on that ever since.
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Author: Keil
Date: 2000-02-08 22:26
I do, I do.... I originally started on Tenor Saxophone but when i moved to Georgia my freshmen year of high school i fell in love with the clarinet. I was watching my high schools performance of Tame the Perlious Skies and The march of the belgian paratroopers, as well as the performance of Shostakovich's Festive Overture and just watching the clarinets fingers dance over the clarinet totally blew my mind. I was in awe because that was the type of stuff i wanted to do. I later became apart of that wind ensemble and we performed Armenian Dances part 2 by Alfred Reed, for all of you that have played it, you know that there is a 1st clarinet feature in the 2/4 section.
N-e-wayzzz that clarinet feature was mind boggaling, at the time, and i vowed to learn how to play clarinet and here i am.
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Author: Leah
Date: 2000-02-08 22:27
these are all really great stories, and i have one to share as well!
i just this new beginner clarinet for around $30 in 3rd grade. i was so excited to bring it home and play it. after my first day in beginner band, i went home and was planning on playing my mouth piece for 15 minutes, since that was 'what i was supposed to do'. my mom ended up having to come up and stop me, telling me that maybe someother day when i actually had music to play i could play for 15 minutes. i was very psyched, and i am still, even though i don't play just my mouthpiece.
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Author: Dee
Date: 2000-02-08 23:17
I remember that I really wanted to be in band but my folks couldn't afford to buy or rent an instrument. However, my Dad came home one day with a clarinet that a friend had given him. The rest, as they say, is history. I remember that I really enjoyed playing it, including the beginning repetitive drills. In my case, it was sheer chance that I ended up on the clarinet but by a stroke of luck, it was the "right" instrument for me.
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Author: Meredith H
Date: 2000-02-08 23:23
Quite frankly I HATED the clarinet when I first heard it. There was a boy in primary school that played one and his school teacher had him playing with the class all of the time. It was just awful. I, being a typical girl fell in love with the flute but when my mum enquired about getting me some lessons they wanted me to start on the clarinet instead. I was devastated but figured that they knew best so I ended up with the instrument I hated the most. Once I got it, had a few lessons and heard it being played like it should by my amazing teacher I decided I could love the clarinet after all. I have since dabbled with the flute and have found I have no real affinity for it after all, go figure. I have played on the saxaphone, cornet, oboe, flugelhorn before falling in love with the tenor horn as well. I am a two-timer, hope this doesn't offend any clarinet purests but I really couldn't pick between the two if I had to.
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Author: Erin :)
Date: 2000-02-09 01:00
When I first decided that I was going to play an instrument, I was in 2nd grade. I decided right then and there that I was going to be a violin player, and no one was going to change my mind. I got so excited once when an older girl let me play on her violin at the after-school program I went to. But, at that school, you had to be in 5th grade to join band or orchestra. Then when I was in 4th grade (all ready to join orchestra the next year), I moved to another school that didn't begin instumental instruction until the 6th grade, but unfortunately also did not offer a string program. I was not happy. Then 6th grade came around, and I still wanted to play something, so I thought about playing the chimes (I figured it was a single instrument just like anything else). Then I realized that I would have to play that aweful snare drum too, and thought about trumpet. Mom said no way. On the last day to sign up, I circled 'clarinet' on my sheet because that was what my friend played. But I guess I also got lucky, because I love my clarinet. I love it enough to spend just about the whole day with it!! (I'm a music major...) Coincidentally enough, that friend of mine quit playing clarinet 2 weeks after I signed up... But I would still love to learn violin, and also french horn. I go to the University of Georgia, and I think that I may be the only student in the School of Music that can't wait to take those instrumental methods classes!!
Erin
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Author: Frank O'Brien
Date: 2000-02-09 06:54
There was no classical music or jazz in my family. In some respects we did not have time for it and there was only one uncle who lived in a distant state who was musically interested. He was blind and had been trained as a piano tuner.
I heard more music as I got older, but again it was not strong in my invironment. My high school and college was very focused on academic success. I knew one guy who played sax, and I could not figure out why he did it.
One day, years later, I decided I wanted to play the clarinet. I had no focused concern for the kind of music I was interested in. My wife bought me a used Selmer 10S. It took me a week literally to get a sound out of it! I tried sop sax one time, but decided the clar sound was it.
I experience it as the most flexible and expressive sound. I figure in their other lives the violin was a clarinet and the clarinet was a violin.
I have decided that I would focus my time on learning to play jazz. There is wonderful solace in creating a melodic line to answer or support the original melodic line. Harmonic theory associated with jazz is every bit as complex as that associated with classical music - and so there is great intrigue for me there as well.
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Author: Lelia
Date: 2000-02-09 15:24
I've enjoyed reading these reminiscences! Although I completely agree with the person who advised letting kids get to know a variety of instruments and pick the one that seems somehow "right", sometimes things work out okay even if the parents and the band teacher do things "wrong". I've probably told the story too often about how my first choices for school band were drums and trumpet, but the band director (mid-1950s) had fixed ideas that those instruments were not for girls. At first, the clarinet didn't interest me much. I wanted to sit in the middle of the music, *do* it instead of just watching it or sitting to the side on piano (my first instrument), and if clarinet was the only way I could get into the middle of things, then -- okay, clarinet. The sound of it began to appeal to me more and more. What really got me enthusiastic about clarinet was a gift from my aunt. She gave me a recording of Jack Brymer playing the Mozart concerto. Wow! He sure didn't sound like the grade school band! I think giving a kid a few great concerto recordings (the Haydn trumpet concerto really appeals to kids, too, or the Mendelssohn violin concerto, or the Schumann piano concerto) can do a lot to stimulate interest in music in general and help a kid settle on which sound seems most appealing. The neat thing about concerto recordings is that a kid can hear the whole orchestra and *compare* the sound of the solo instrument.
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Author: paul
Date: 2000-02-09 19:53
I had (and still have) a dentally small mouth, too many teeth for it, and a tremendous overbite. That's the cards I was dealt, so be it. The junior high band director took one look at me and said "clarinet", because my overbite fit the clarinet's mouthpiece profile almost perfectly. Of course, it didn't help my cause that my older brothers both had rented clarinets they were ready to give up. Even with that, both my band director and my dentist agreed that my mouth structure creates an embouchure that naturally fits a clarinet (and bass clarinet, or any other single reed instrument) pretty well. After hearing excerpts from Benny Goodman and Woody Herman recordings, I figured my band director and dentist were pretty much on target and I took it from there. My first and lifelong impression of my own beater of a plastic student clarinet was not too good. But, that's all my parents could afford, so I did my best to take care of it and make the best sound out of it that I possibly could.
Now, skip over 20 years. I really liked the intermediate grade clarinet that I had a few years ago. It was a total joy to play. But, I had to sell it to help pay for the premium pro grade clarinet that I have now.
When I opened the case on the absolutely brand new premium horn, the first impression I had with it was "I don't know if I'm going to like this...". The metal tenon caps, the dark unstained wood, and the bright sparkly silver keys in that deep red case looked very intimidating to a mere adult novice. So was the price tag. I felt like I was looking at the engine of a high performance Porsche sports car, contemplating all of the tune ups and oil changes coming up. And, just like a high end sports car, I thought about the price. Ouch! A hell of a lot of money for a luxury like this. After all, the floor demonstrator of the very same horn I played a few days before sure was nice. Really nice. I took the horn to a studio room to check it out on my own, with no sales pressure and away from my wife. Then, I took a deep sigh and put it together to test play it. Okay, so here goes. Chalemeau C in very long breaths, down to low chalemeau E. What a superb tone, even as a totally cold warmup. An easy and long tone C Major scale, in one octave, then two octaves. Up and down only once. So responsive and what a tone! A few slow trills on low chalemeau E to F with LH and RH keys. Exquisite control and instant response for each individual pinky finger, even on that very long pin. Throat Bb. Needs adjustment, but still very nice. Clarion A. Usually a problem, but not here on this horn. ppp to fff dynamics on C Major in one octave. Exquisite tone and fantastic intonation. I used my own Vandoren 5RVLyre mp and a Vandoren V-12 2.5 reed with a standard metal lig for this test session. All in all, I spent no more than 5 minutes of fooling around with the horn. Lightning fast response. Light, yet firm key action. Warmth and strength in tone. Highly predictable intonation. I realized that the initial intimidation feeling had faded and a deeper emotion had surfaced. I didn't care if it looked worse than Medusa or what it cost, I HAD to have it. I've been in lust with it ever since. And yes, my wife does get jealous, but that's another story for another time.
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The Clarinet Pages
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