 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Mario Poirier
Date: 2005-05-10 15:09
Dear friends:
This post is made on behalf of a good friend of mine, an accomplished professional oboist, who just recently started doubling on the clarinet in multi-rig gigs. She finds the clarinet ** very difficult **.
The question on this post should be answered, if possible, from the perspective of an obosit who plays the clarinet rarely. If possible, terminology and concept should be from the oboe world as starting point.
My oboist friend is looking at solutions to the following problems:
Embouchure and reeds. Her mouth is adapted to the oboe embouchure. In particular, clarinet reeds appear very stiff. Mouthpiece opening appears very wide. Would she be better off with an open mouthpiece and weak reeds, or with close mouthpieces and stronger reeds? Would she benefit from using a narrower design for the mouthpiece? What other suggestions would you have to facilitate the development of enough flexibility to make real-time switches painless.
Homogenizing the breaks. It appears that oboes do not experience much pressure differential across breaks. From her perspective, the clarinet feels like 3 different instruments depending on which register she just reached. Any idea on how to facilitate her learning (besides taking advantage of resonance fingerings)?
Voicing: Oboists (and other winds for that matter) voice much less than clarinetists. An idea on how to facilitate voicing for oboist-clarinetists. Are the usual voicing syllables used by clarinetists the same for oboists. Can you voice on a clarinet using oboe voicing (only amplified)?
Articulation: Generically, articulation appears to be similar for oboe and clarinet: pressurize, tongue-on-tip, release with proper voicing, support well, stay light. However, things are not working well at all there for her. There must be something subtlely different between the ways oboist and clarinetists initiate tones, and articulate crisply. Could it be a tongue position problem? Any other idea?
Air support: From her perspective, playing the clarinet offers much less resistance than playing the oboe. She looses her air too quikcly and runs out of steam even in small phrases. Any suggestion to facilitate her transition to this large bore cylindrical pipe?
Again, if possible try to provide answers from the perspective of an accomplished oboist as starting point, in order to make suggestions relevant in the context of her current oboe training.
Many thanks as always.
Mario Poirier
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2005-05-10 18:09
I'll put you in touch w/ Dr. Ed Lacy, a professor of bassoon for many years who happens to be an excellent clarinetist and oboist ...
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Author: stevensfo
Date: 2005-05-10 19:39
The first post I've ever read that makes the oboe sound easy!
>>From her perspective, the clarinet feels like 3 different instruments depending on which register she just reached.
I think this is true of most instruments.
Steve
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Author: diz
Date: 2005-05-10 22:12
Mario - a rare scenario. A good friend of mine who is an oboist also plays clarinet and finds it tough going, too. She asserts that the fingering system on the clarinet is just plain "silly" - recognising the weird nature of the clarinet in overblowing the 12th, however, when I asked her she didn't have such troubles with the embouchure and just learns to "click" between the two.
Without music, the world would be grey, very grey.
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Author: Wes
Date: 2005-05-11 08:15
Interesting! As a person who has played play both instruments as best I can for many years, I would first suggest private lessons with a fine clarinet teacher and, if possible, continue with oboe practice as well.
To me, there is absolutely no conflict between the two instruments, despite the differences. One must study each seriously if one wants to play well, working on the sound, the technique, and the literature. Long tone practice is needed on both. Oboe reed making takes many years to learn and to be proficient but commercial clarinet reeds and mouthpieces are fine. I look on the clarinet as a masterpiece of design but the oboe could be simplified by use of a Boehm system right hand, for example. Don't expect either instrument to change much because both designs are quite established. Actually, the fingering differences are not much of an issue compared to the oboe reed situation.
Tomorrow, I play the oboe in an orchestra in West Los Angeles and the clarinet in a large concert band.
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Author: Bob Phillips
Date: 2005-05-11 14:58
Mario,
I admire your clearly stated questions. My personal experience in double reeds ocurred years ago, when I was "forced" to play bassoon when the clarinet section was overpopulated.
I will address only the question on mouthpieces and reeds.
I think your friend would be well served to experiment with a mouthpiece that has a smaller tip opening and a shorter lay. She should start by checking to be sure that her current "stiff" mouthpiece set up really has a wide opening and/or a long lay. Then, she should try out a mouthpiece that is pretty radically different.
She should also get another ligature so that she can set-up both the old and new mouthpieces and alternate between them.
Grab a bunch of reeds of different strength, say two each from 1-1/2 to 4-1/2 and try them on both mouthpieces.
Pick a reed that is easy to play on her current mouthpiece. Then, she should switch to the new mouthpiece and pick a reed for it.
Then, she should play passages, alternating mouthpieces to see which opening/lay-length combination works best for her --at this stage of her evolution.
This won't provide the final word on mouthpiece selection, but will allow her to see if she can make the clarinet more comfortable to play with her oboe embochure.
It should be possible to muster a half dozen mouthpieces from other players for her to try.
Bob Phillips
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2005-05-11 14:59
Well said Wes - My experience [10years] on oboe/E H, many more on cls, has left me quite conversant with the fingerings, some similar, some quite diff., and regrets that I couldn't make better oboe reeds. I still have memories of trying to be the "haut-bois" [high wood[wind]] in a small symp orch, talk about exposure, it has no rival !!, no "place to hide". Yes, lessons will help. Don
Thanx, Mark, Don
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Author: ohsuzan
Date: 2005-05-11 22:16
Perhaps I should be afraid -- very afraid!-- to even try to comment on this subject. My original instrument was clarinet; however, since I began playing the oboe, I play the clarinet rather infrequently, and can relate to the idea that the clarinet may seem the more difficult of the two instruments.
Mouthpiece and reeds:
You indicate that she already plays enough notes that she can feel the difference in the registers; so just making a tone is not a problem for her. Making the kind of tone she wants is the problem. I personally find the Fobes (San Francisco, Nova, or Debut, depending on your pocketbook)mouthpieces with about a 4 reed to be just about foolproof. (I guess that would be your "close mouthpiece, strong reed" option.) But since your friend is accustomed to a very resistant feel, she might actually do better with a slightly more resistant mouthpiece. I wouldn't use too strong a reed on a more resistant mouthpiece, though --certainly not above a 3 at this point.
Air support:
As your friend is experiencing, you can't count on the resistance from the clarinet to restrain your wind, as you can with the oboe. Can your friend sing at all? The amount of "breath control" required to sing an average legato phrase should be enough to allow her to complete an average-length phrase on the clarinet. As a technical exercise, she could try taking a breath as she would for the oboe, but expel it gently while singing an "Oooo" or other neutral syllable. Try to sustain that tone (not loudly, just evenly) for as long as possible.
Embouchure:
I don't experience a great conflict between oboe and clarinet embouchure. Start with the lips formed as if to whistle. For clarinet, make a somewhat looser whistle shape (like whistling a low tone, rather than a high tone), and insert the tip of the mouthpiece into that "whistle", rolling back the lower lip a little over the lower teeth. Rest (not bite) the upper teeth on the beak of the mouthpiece, and seal the mouthpiece all around with the lips. Note that the teeth are kept open in both oboe and clarinet embouchure.
Voicing:
In my experience, the thing that is similar about clarinet and oboe is that you want to get a nice focused tone that seems to project the entire length of the instrument, but achieving that on the oboe is a much more directive thing than on the clarinet. The syllable I use on clarinet is an "eeee", or perhaps more like an "iiihhh" -- an umlaut, maybe (the oboe is more of an "oooo"). My clarinet "umlaut eeee" is very forward in the mouth, it is directed right down the mouthpiece, but it floats a little more than on the oboe -- doesn't feel quite as "placed", if that makes any sense to you.
Articulation:
Again, it is my impression that, in playing the oboe, one "controls" the reed quite a bit more than one does when playing the clarinet. On the clarinet, the reed and mouthpiece are essentially passive tools that do all the work. Your job is to pretty much stay out of the way -- just act as the air generator and modifier. If you try to manipulate the clarinet reed, you will strangle or otherwise distort the sound.
I see a trend developing in my comments here: on the clarinet, I find that everything is relatively more relaxed, less "determinate" than on the oboe.
Homogenizing the breaks:
Managing the register breaks on the clarinet is largely a matter of learning to support the tone across the breaks -- keep the air going, and get the fingers to respond quickly and accurately. It is quite a bit like learning to go from second-space C to C# or D above it on the oboe, or like learning how to get the tones above high G on the oboe to sound full and sweet. It is something that takes a bit of conscious practice, but it will come in time. I would also remark that the clarinet player perceives the difference in timbre across the registers more markedly than the listener does.
Best wishes to both of you!
Susan
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Author: Mario Poirier
Date: 2005-05-11 23:12
Thank you very much to eveybody for the excellent feedback. This will be much helpful.
One thought occurred to me reading this stuff. Would "double-lipping" be a more natural embouchure technique for an oboist?
Mario Poirier
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Author: ohsuzan
Date: 2005-05-12 01:55
<<Would "double-lipping" be a more natural embouchure technique for an oboist?>>
Mario, that actually crossed my mind as I was writing my note above. I initially learned a double-lip embouchure on the clarinet, and used it for years. You are right, it is somewhat more like an oboe embouchure than the single lip is.
At this point, I prefer single lip, because I can get a better "seal" around the mouthpiece with the lips, and it seems to me I end up with less tension in the embouchure using single lip. But it certainly is an alternative.
Susan
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