 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: HTW
Date: 2000-03-02 00:21
I'm starting to work on the first mov of the Weber Grand Duo, and it's a piece that I don't have a lot of experience with. What tempo would you recommend?
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Author: Dee
Date: 2000-03-02 01:07
Perhaps half note = 120 bpm. You will no doubt receive a variety of opinions but this is what I like.
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Author: Hiroshi
Date: 2000-03-02 07:22
This is a standard clarinet piece. You can listen to CDs by many respected clarinettists. My favorites are Harold Wright,Jonathan Cohler,and Charles Nedich.
Charles Neidich plays this piece with a old style clarinet(tuned to present A=440Hz) with a piano-forte. It is totally different from contemporary clarinets tones.
By the way,did you read Jonathan Cohler's liner notes available here?
<A HREF=http://www.sneezy.org/clarinet/Study/VonWeber.html>Cohler liner note on GDC</A>
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Author: Hiroshi
Date: 2000-03-02 07:26
This is a standard clarinet piece. You can listen to CDs by many respected clarinettists. My favorites are Harold Wright,Jonathan Cohler,and Charles Nedich.
Charles Neidich plays this piece with an old style clarinet(perhaps a remake tuned to present A=440Hz) with a piano-forte. It is totally different from contemporary clarinets tones.As to tempo I think this piece needs freeness, agogics.
By the way,did you read Jonathan Cohler's liner notes available here?
<A HREF=http://www.sneezy.org/clarinet/Study/VonWeber.html>Cohler liner note on GDC</A>
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2000-03-02 11:51
Another <i>very</i> nice rendition of the Grand Duo is by Haken Rosengren on the Nytorp label (you can find their Web site in the Resources->Retail section).
Ob. disclosure: I received both Nytorp CDs as comps.
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Author: Ken Shaw
Date: 2000-03-03 17:37
HTW wrote:
-------------------------------
I'm starting to work on the first mov of the Weber Grand Duo, and it's a piece that I don't have a lot of experience with. What tempo would you recommend?
HTW -
Weber wrote the Grand Duo Concertante to use on a joint tour he made with Heinrich Baermann. He did not call it a sonata, because he wrote it with completely equal parts for clarinet and piano. Weber was one of the great piano virtuosos, just as Baermann was, along with Hermstedt, the greatest clarinet virtuoso of the age. (Hermstedt had the faster fingers; Baermann had a better tone and deeper musicianship.)
Also, the piece is not a "Duo" but a "Grand Duo" -- that is, it calls for virtuosic display and a big personality.
You cannot learn the Grand Duo satisfactorily buy practicing only the clarinet part. The melodic lines are constantly passed back and forth by the clarinet and piano in unexpected and surprising ways, which reminds me of nothing so much as the Globetrotters basketball routines. Before you start, listen carefully to a recording. My favorite, after many years, is still the recording by Reginald Kell on a Decca LP. Forget about the vibrato and listen to the lusty joie de vivre, plus the incredible staccato. I heard a great radio broadcast several years ago by Michael Webster with his father, Beveridge Webster, who was a world-famous virtuoso pianist. With two players that strong, the performance was thrilling.
To do the Grand Duo right, you need the best pianist in town, and you need to believe that you're the best clarinetist in town. There's a lot of showing off, and you have to feel good doing it.
As to a metronome tempo, you can't fix it exactly. Dee's suggestion of 120 is fine. In the excited sections, you will naturally move a little faster -- maybe 126. You can go a little slower in the more relaxed sections. In fact, I like to take the first movement at an average tempo of 116, which leaves more time to let the phrases "snap the whip" and be more exciting.
Have fun. It's a great piece, and one of the most exciting in the repertoire.
Ken Shaw
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Author: HTW
Date: 2000-03-04 02:24
I've been having a lot of fun learning it in the last few days. My enthusiasm for new pieces usually damps down a little after a while, but this time it's not. It's funny- at first the 120 suggestion intimidated me a little, but then I found myself working at that speed and maybe a little faster. It's wild! I love it, especially that firecracker ending.
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Author: Dee
Date: 2000-03-04 03:02
Just wait until you get to the third movement. IMHO, it's even more fun.
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Author: Iceland clarinet
Date: 2006-10-23 09:22
Why are people here so much against vibrato in clarinet playing? Nothing can let me change my opinion on vibrato. I love it and my favourite clarinetists Gervase de Peyer and Reginald Kell used it very beautifully. But for me some clarinetists don't use vibrato very well and that's a shame. Then you shouldn't use it if you can't use it tastefully.
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