 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Clarinetist
Date: 2005-05-14 12:39
Hi guys!
Our schools chambermusic group will start practice Stravinsky´s the Soldier´s tale on the spring. Any information about this piece? Is it a tough piece for the clarinet? If someone has played it, I would be more than happy to hear your opinions about it!
Thanks
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Author: GBK
Date: 2005-05-14 14:29
Know some secure G6 and G#6 fingerings on the A clarinet...GBK
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2005-05-14 20:46
Well, the most important thing to say about it is that it's a masterpiece. You'll be totally delighted by playing it, especially if you do it as part of a production with actors and dancers.
There are some tricky technical things in it, sure; but most of the difficulty is both general and rhythmic. It's worthwhile listening to it with a score, so that you can get used to how what you hear is written down, and how your bits fit in.
Also, it's one of those pieces where the conductor needs to do less rather than more. (I remember playing it once with a director who had rather a poor sense of what was required rhythmically, and the difficulties in one or two passages were best resolved by persuading him to stop conducting for a few bars -- which, to his credit, he was willing to do.)
Get to know it, is the best advice.
Tony
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Author: RodRubber
Date: 2005-05-15 05:01
I would suggest studying the entire score, and not just the clarinet part, and hopefully there is no conductor, as in my experience, they are the ones usually screwing it up
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Author: SueSmith
Date: 2005-05-15 05:03
RodRubber wrote:
> I would suggest studying the entire score, and not just the
> clarinet part, and hopefully there is no conductor, as in my
> experience, they are the ones usually screwing it up
>
ITA -
Study the score and mark your part, notating the other players. It will save your butt big time!
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2005-05-15 21:04
Sue Smith wrote:
"Study the score and mark your part, notating the other players. It will save your butt big time!"
I'd rather say that knowing the score will enhance your appreciation and performance of a major masterpiece.
I don't know that writing other people's parts into your own is necessarily useful. You're better off being able to imagine the whole piece at every point, because you got to know it properly previously.
Tony
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Author: SueSmith
Date: 2005-05-15 21:32
Tony Pay wrote:
> Sue Smith wrote:
>
> "Study the score and mark your part, notating the other
> players. It will save your butt big time!"
>
> I'd rather say that knowing the score will enhance your
> appreciation and performance of a major masterpiece.
>
> I don't know that writing other people's parts into your own is
> necessarily useful. You're better off being able to imagine
> the whole piece at every point, because you got to know it
> properly previously.
>
> Tony
Knowing the score...yes. We all agree with that. If you've played L'histoire, you know the entrances are tricky...and using rhythmical notation in certain places can help. Obviously, you don't copy the entire score into your part...
I do the same in orchestral parts...such as Brahms 3, 1st mvt and most of my chamber music. Once you have rehearsed and performed a work, it becomes second nature...but while you are studying a work for the first time...especially some of the tricky counting in Stravinsky if you haven't played his works before...marking your own part to indicate violin comes in here, this rhythm...is a good safety net. If, you mess up the counting, or the conductor gets off - at least you have another option to help you find your place.
Also, its a better way to study the score...at least for me. I find I learn more thoroughly by copying essentials from the score into my parts than just sitting back and reading through the score. I equate it to studying any subject in school. For the average person, taking notes while reading the text makes one retain the information more so than just reading straight through the text without taking notes.
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Author: Robert Moody
Date: 2005-05-15 21:47
Wow! I've been out a few days but it is absolutely wonderful to see Tony posting here. Maybe he's been here all along, but I look forward to see more of his insightful...and witty posts.
On the topic:
The full version is easier, technically, than the trio version for Clarinet, Violin and Piano. After you play this, and invariably fall in love with it, I would suggest finding a hotshot violinist and pianist and tackling the trio. Really great stuff.
Will there be a narrator for your performance? If there is, don't get caught up in the reading (one person, multiple roles). I got caught once doing that.
The original is tough and you really need to have your part cold so as not to add to the difficulty of the ensemble stuff. I guess, along with all the other advice, I would strongly reitterate that you really, REALLY spend time listening to the piece and practicing YOUR notes and rhythms so you are ready in as many circumstances as possible...depending on what the conductor and ensemble throws at you. (I am assuming there will be a conductor since you all are in a school setting. Seems like too big of an opportunity for conductors to miss.)
Opinion about the piece? Absolutely wonderful. If you love Stravinsky, you will adore this piece. That is my opinion.
Good luck to you.
Robert Moody
http://www.musix4me.com
Free Clarinet Lessons and Digital Library!
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2005-05-15 22:05
SueSmith wrote: [snip]
OK, I don't disagree with that, and I do it to some extent myself.
Another (I think) useful thing to say is that the rhythms in Stravinsky always break down into groups of either two quavers or three quavers. (So, a five-eight bar can be two plus three, or three plus two; a seven-eight bar is two plus two plus three, or two plus three plus two, or....)
A helpful notation is to write these groupings above the bar, using a square missing the bottom side for a 'two', and a triangle for a 'three'. (We always called the two a 'house', and the three a 'triangle'; so that a query, "How are you beating that seven-eight bar?" to the conductor might have the response: "I'm doing house, triangle, house.")
This explicit notation helps a lot in the Stravinsky, especially if you're following a conductor.
And of course, in more complex music, it's absolutely essential.
Tony
Post Edited (2005-05-15 22:14)
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Author: sgp1010
Date: 2005-05-16 06:09
The opening section fortissimo's where the clarinet sits on top of the entire ensemble banging out top A's, G#'s and F#'s is truly sublime writing for the A clarinet...difficult to blend (easy to play too sharp), but great fun nevertheless!
If you and your colleagues can nail the rhythms in the King's March then the rest is (relatively) easy (except if you are the violinist)!
SGP
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2005-05-16 14:53
How's this for stress on a high school student:
I had a 11th grade student who in one weekend had to perform Bartok Contrasts for a Claude Franck Masterclass, and the next day the Stravinsky Trio on the Radio in a live broadcast for the Settlement Music School.
now that's rough!
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2005-05-16 17:07
Stravinsky uses types of instruments in pairs -- violin/bass, trumpet/trombone, clarinet/bassoon. You have to study the bassoon part particularly hard, since the two of you play together a lot.
This is one of the early jazz-influenced pieces, but you can't play anything with a "swing." Stravinsky insisted that his music should be played exactly as he wrote it. On the other hand, the piece is filled with dances, which are part of the standard "classical" expression, and you need to have a dance "feel" almost throughout.
Bernstein made an excellent recording at Tanglewood with Boston symphony players, which has been reissued. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00002EPMO/qid=1116262728/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/002-7764452-6447206?v=glance&s=classical.
My favorite is an ancient Westminster Lab Series LP, long out of print, with an ad hoc ensemble calling itself Ars Nova, with Stanley Drucker (at, maybe, age 14) on clarinet.
Ken Shaw
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