 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Clarinetgirl06
Date: 2006-07-08 18:49
So, I was practicing last night and I noticed something in my playing. I could feel the bore resonate, if you will, in my hands. Maybe vibrate could be a better word? I hope I'm getting the picture across.
Lately, a lot of things I think are starting to click together in my playing such as support, embouchure, and air. Now, since those are starting to come together, I feel this resonance in my hands. Not a resonance like the keys are too loose or anything.
I used to feel this off and on in my playing this whole past year, but now it seems like it's becoming permenant.
Is this a good thing and can anyone explain what is going on?
Post Edited (2006-07-08 18:53)
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Author: vjoet
Date: 2006-07-08 19:15
It kinda sounds like you've made a big break-through.
My thinking about it is this:
1. It is immediately before you begin playing you remind yourself of the details of the playing (perfectly precise finger coordination, full resonant tone, etc).
2. When you play, you think only of the sounds being made, and/or the feel of making those sounds. You hush any self-instruction WHILE you are playing.
In my (amateur) experience, and I believe in the experience of others, when you can do this dependably, you make the greatest possible strides in your practice sessions.
(Your feeling the vibrating airwaves in your fingers, and consciously paying attention to that means you're not giving yourself instruction as you are playing -- a very counter-productive practice.)
vJoe
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Author: Clarinetgirl06
Date: 2006-07-08 19:38
I'm slightly confused. In point 2 you say that you hush self-instruction WHILE you are playing, and then you say that if I pay attention to the airwaves that I'm not giving myself instruction while I'm playing. It seems to me that you think points 1 and 2 are good things, but then in the last paragraph you point out non-self instruction as bad.
Am I just getting confused? Am I not understanding?
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Author: Vytas
Date: 2006-07-08 19:45
Carrie,
Congratulations! You haven't lost your senses yet. Some people on this board claim that the material clarinet is made from doesn't vibrate. Most of these people also have potatoes in their ears. Coincidence? Go Figure!
Vytas Krass
Professional clarinet technician
Custom clarinet mouthpiece maker
Former professional clarinet player
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2006-07-08 19:56
Vytas,
I'm afraid you persist in misunderstanding. Of course the wall of the clarinet vibrates, but it is a very thick, highly-damped structure with a very small radiating area and thus a poor impedance match between the wall vibrations and the surrounding air.
So the clarinet body does vibrate, but the amount of acoustic energy transmitted to the air directly from these vibrations is almost unmeasurably small and is demonstrably inaudible. You may be able to feel it in your fingers (or teeth) but it is not radiating into the atmosphere.
I apologize for the big words. Basically, you can't hear it. Even without potatoes in your ears.
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Author: Clarinetgirl06
Date: 2006-07-08 20:50
OK, I just practiced and I noticed a few more things. I experimented with air and I found that when my support is less and my embouchure isn't right I can feel longer/wider vibrations in my hands. When I feel like I'm supporting and everything is right, the vibrations are still there but they feel smaller/narrower and less noticable in my hands.
vjoet-I only let myself notice this for a little bit (when I was noodling), and then I paid attention to the music I was going to practice.
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Author: vjoet
Date: 2006-07-08 21:53
Hi Carrie,
I guess I need to clarify my previous post a bit.
My point is this: When you play your concentration must be on the sound being made OR on the feel of making those sounds (eg, the vibration in your fingers). If you find yourself whispering instructions to yourself in "teacherly monologue," then you'll flub (at least I do). I can't carry on a dialog with myself ABOUT playing, and play my very best. My best comes when I hush the voice, and concentrate on the sound or the feeling involved in making those sounds. Any instruction I need to remind myself of, comes before starting to play or after, in analysis, but no instruction WHILE I am playing.
This is a practice a first encountered in "The Inner Game of Music" by Green and Gallwey, and have found it works very well in me, an amateur.
vJoe
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Author: Katrina
Date: 2006-07-09 01:23
My guess would be that you feel the air pushing against your fingers while you are supporting correctly. When I teach, I do the "turn the clarinet around" trick so that I am fingering and the student is blowing. This usually gets them supporting the air correctly, and if it hasn't worked for them at that point, I'll reverse, and have them finger while I blow. That typically shows them the level of air you "feel" in your fingers.
Katrina
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Author: buedsma
Date: 2006-07-09 12:05
if it doesn't resonate , you probablycreate a wrong sound concept in your head or are always blowing in the higher altissimo.
Resonation and vibration is for me a clear indication of how intense your sound is and how focused it reaches the audience ( without aplification of course )
I always want to play an instrument where i can create that kind of vibration. Even if the objective listener doen't notice a difference.
But how many objective listeners play the clarinet well enough to notice that kind of difference ??
So , is it worth the effort towards an audience or not ?
Would be nice to hear yourself playingin real live without recording etc
but :-(
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2006-07-09 12:39
In my experience, the feeling of vibration in my fingertips comes from the vibration of the air column inside the clarinet, and not the body of the instrument. I feel it where the skin of my fingertips covers the tone holes.
You can't feel the vibration if you're pressing your fingers down too hard. Learning to feel the vibration is a good teaching tool (and practice tool) to lighten up finger pressure.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Vytas
Date: 2006-07-09 16:14
Ken,
Are you saying you do not feel any vibration under your pinkies? Do you feel any vibration in your teeth?
You say air column creates it and not the body of the instrument.
If that is so, could you please explain to me how come that a loose ring bell vibrates and causes an audible difference when the air column is not even present there? (I mean when you play those distance tones that have no effect if the bell is on or off or even have been plugged).
It seems to me that you are seeing just one side of the coin and are completely ignorant about existence of the other. What is this? One sided vision? Are hooked on Benade?
Vytas Krass
Professional clarinet technician
Custom clarinet mouthpiece maker
Former professional clarinet player
Post Edited (2006-07-09 16:17)
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2006-07-09 16:35
Vytas,
no one ever claimed the clarinet body doesn't resonate.
But, compared to the air, its resonance is negligible in terms of audibility - you may feel it resonate under your fingers, but you can't hear it because the air inside is magnitudes louder. The amplitude in which the body "hums" is a fraction of a hundredth of a millimeter and the form is rather suboptimal to generate a discernible sound. The more we should be amazed that our fingers can pick up even that tiny motion.
Per the buzzing bell ring - here we talk about resonance frequency (google for Tacoma Bridge for a rather dramatic demonstration). The bell ring will buzz only on certain notes, on others it'll remain silent. And it won't buzz twice as loud when you blow twice as hard.
But of course I have potatoes in my ears.
--
Ben
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Author: Cuisleannach
Date: 2006-07-09 18:07
Again, Vytas, as I've said before, the major vibration you will feel on the clarinet, particularly if you play using an unpatched mp, and you are playing with good earplugs (and not potatoes) in your ears, is the clacking of the keys. If this became audible in the sound you project the clarinet would sound simply awful. It would be beautiful vibration punctuated by enough clacking to make you feel as though you were on an old-timey train.
Solids (and liquids), as a group, transmit vibrations very well. If you have a transponder in the water that can pick up water vibrations you can hear boats and whales from a very long distance away. When you put air in between yourself and the water you can't sense those vibrations. It's the same thing with a clarinet body. They certainly DO vibrate, but the body of the clarinet has a hard time imparting that vibration to the air (the density of the instrument and its inertia make any but low amplitude vibrations impossible.
Try this experiment (I'm going to do this to settle this issue as soon as I move into my knew house and find a cheap plastic clarinet): embed a tone generator with absolutely no air space (either outside the tone generator or within it) in the body of the clarinet. Then try to drive an audible tone from the tone generator through the body of the clarinet into the air. Measure the threshold of amplitutde of movement for audible sound production. Then use the tone generator as a transducer to record the amplitude of vibration produced while playing.
This experiment isn't perfect because the in the case of playing the body of the clarinet's vibration is being driven by the air column, not the other way around, but it should be pretty good as a first approximation.
Remember also that string instruments have a very complicated design in order to pass the vibration of a string to the air. Winds don't have that problem because our primary medium IS air.
Sorry to keep revisiting this, but gauntlets keep getting thrown my way.
-Randy
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Author: Vytas
Date: 2006-07-09 18:34
tictactux,
Please don't talk about things you're not aware of. This board was full of this kind of claims in the past.
Dee wrote:
"Please prove with scientific measurements (NOT anecdotal stories) that clarinets blow out.
A truly complete overhaul is more than just pads, corks, springs & and mechanical adjustments. It can include things like cleaning the virtually invisible buildup out of the toneholes, etc.
Please prove with scientific measurements that the clarinet vibrates. Only the air column is supposed to."
http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/read.html?f=1&i=98586&t=98492
"Potatoes in your ears" is not an insult but a fact of life. When we age or do not use the ability we loose it. Have you heard that kids these days download a high pitch ringtones to their sellphones and freely use them in the classroom etc. because the adults just cannot hear them? You would be surprise how many people cannot hear cat's 'miaow'. They can see the cat's mouth and the belly moving but hear no sound. 'Tone color deaf' is more common than the color blindness we just don't know it yet. The most surprising is that people that cannot hear the tone difference in the material are complete ignoramus and close minded about the ability of others to hear. Do you think all these people are stupid or did not read Benade works? They just can hear what you can't. That is simple as that.
tictactux wrote:
"But of course I have potatoes in my ears".
I have no doubt about this.
Vytas Krass
Professional clarinet technician
Custom clarinet mouthpiece maker
Former professional clarinet player
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Author: FDF
Date: 2006-07-09 18:35
Just to offer another opinion, not my own for I have no practical experience in this area, a study in "The Journal of The Acoustical Society of America," on the effect of wallmaterials on the tone qualities of wooden clarinets concludes, "that the vibrations of the walls of a woodwind instrument do not affect its steady tone either by radiating sound themselves or by affecting the harmonic structure of the internal standing wave." ©1964 Acoustical Society of America
My apologies if this abstract has previsiosly been cited.
Citation
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2006-07-09 18:44
FDF wrote:
> My apologies if this abstract has previsiosly been cited.
It's not going to matter.
My electric bass guitar body vibrates just fine - I can feel it. However, no one can hear it unless I turn the amp on.
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2006-07-09 18:56
> Please don't talk about things you're not aware of. This board was full of
> this kind of claims in the past.
Perhaps, if you take the messages verbatim. The last phrase you're quoting ("Please prove with scientific measurements that the clarinet vibrates. Only the air column is supposed to.") clearly puts that "claim" into perspective.
It is established that shock waves (such as a vibrating air column) will affect every body nearby, even sottovoce humming can shake a concrete wall - question is only whether this has any discernible influence on the sound "emitted" by the combined person/wall system.
I wonder if you can hear what a clarinet is made from by just listening to a CD. I seriously doubt it, however perfect your hearing might be.
(I'm the first to admit that I have a hard time to tell a 256kbit mp3 from a 320kbit mp3 - probably the countless childhood otites have taken their toll)
--
Ben
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2006-07-09 19:17
Vytas wrote:
> The most surprising is that people that cannot
> hear the tone difference in the material are complete ignoramus
> and close minded about the ability of others to hear.
Vytas,
I have to believe I am far from being an ignoramus ...
What you keep talking about is your perception that the material causes the difference, yet it is very difficult to separate the variables; I admit that I can make NO claim as to what you're hearing, but ...
You cannot make the claim it's the material until you've eliminated everything else. Even I, Mr. Potatohead, with ears that no longer hear above 14KHz, can hear the difference between two supposedly IDENTICAL instruments. Now, what should I attribute THAT to? Magic? No, I attribute that to the fact that making two identical instruments is well nigh impossible.
Now, suppose I hear two clarinets of different materials which sound different from each other. And, in fact, every time I hear clarinets of those two different materials I can hear the difference. I can even categorize them as "I hear A, it's material X, I hear B, it's material Y". Common sense would say "Hey, the material matters. Case closed. QED. Anyone who says otherwise is a complete ignoramus, in fact deserving of being called a potato-eared ignoramus, and worse, not believing his or her ears."
But common sense isn't common, and scepticism might be a good thing to work with. Let's see ... shiny bore, bore with open grain. Hmmm ... boreholes not as well-defined in one material as another. Hmmm ... more or less undercutting required to bring the clarinet in tune (I wonder why that is ... they're identical, right?). Etc.
Now, what has that got to do with anything? Well, I see (and I know that some of the historical explanations of sound and tuning differences) that the material's working properties can easily cause different things to occur. Does that make the difference? Well, I can't say definitively, but neither can I say that it's the material 'per se' that makes any difference. In fact, I can (and people have) put an accelerometer on a clarinet body and measure the amplitude of the material vibrations. They're in the order of 1/1000000 the amplitude of the air column, and considering the inefficient coupling between the tube and the surrounding air, we can safely say that the contributions of the material to the sound is miniscule.
Now, can you hear that miniscule sound difference? Or is it outweighed by all the other factors that might be orders of magnitude larger? I can't tell you, but my belief, based on the evidence and studies to date, is that the factors you hear are not the material, but are more probable to be based on the machining and gross surface properties evidenced by the material when it is worked.
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Author: Cuisleannach
Date: 2006-07-09 21:09
Well said, Mark.
You see, vytas, I labor under some very strict rules. I work as a mathematical modeler and statistician, and the first thing I have to tell people who come to me is that "conventional wisdom ain't so wise". Some of the most cherished perceptions that people hold (and these people are experts at the Mayo Clinic) don't mean a hill of beans to me until I test them to my satisfaction, and conventional wisdom is wrong as often as it is right.
The second thing I have to tell people is "don't believe everything you think". If I am willing to hold on to a notion to the contrary against all arguments, then that belief belongs in church and not in the realm of scientific inquiry. From what I know about the laws of mathematical physics, I find it hard to believe that the vibration in the wall of a thick pipe affects the vibration of the air column within the pipe. I am, however, willing to hear arguments and review data to the contrary, as Mark and I have done in other posts. I would love to see a well-designed experiment to test the hypothesis that it does. I do not, however, stand dogmatically by my assertion. For an argument to be proven to be true or false, it must first be refutable, otherwise it is an article of faith, not knowledge.
-Randy
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Author: Tyler
Date: 2006-07-09 22:00
Carrie-
I think vjoet has a good point about self-instruction while practicing.
When I am actually playing, whether in practice or performance, I have been trying to focus completely and totally on either the music itself, how I feel while playing the music, or what I am learning through playing the music (performance, experience, learning--------I'm reading The Inner Game of Music, and I love that book so far....and I'm only like on page 30 or so).
Too often I tend to criticize my quality of physical clarinet-playing technique while I'm playing. So much of that concentration could have been put to better use on the music itself.
Of course it's important to think about what we're doing physically, but in performance at least I think, for most of us, our goal is to PLAY MUSIC, not WORK TECHNIQUE.
fwiw!!
-Tyler
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Author: Vytas
Date: 2006-07-10 01:34
I put a very little value on the evidence and acoustical studies to date. It's like seeing one side of the coin and be completely ignorant about existence of the other.
"Acoustical Society of America concluded that the vibrations of the walls of a woodwind instrument do not affect its steady tone either by radiating sound themselves or by affecting the harmonic structure of the internal standing wave".
Sorry Acoustical Society of America I'm not buying it. You have potatoes in your ears.
How can anyone tell the person who can actually hear the difference that the material makes no difference and all of this is just his imagination tricks?
Instead of trying to explain how things work and get in to endless discussion I will try (partially) to explain what I hear. Everything closer to the mouth have a greater difference as far as the clarinet tone color is concern. I've noticed a long time ago that the reeds and mouthpieces make a huge difference in the way a person sounds. Many professionals can look at the reed's cane and tell immediately without trying it if the reed is good or bad. Many of us know how to spot a bad cane. The reed is not just an accessory, it's also the material. It's a part of clarinet. The reed is responsible for this vibrating air column that everyone is concentrating on way too much. The reed is the source, a string if you will, that sets everything in to vibrating motion. I don't think you'll find a pro payer who would agree that the cane material makes no difference on the tone. It's obvious! Bad cane sounds bad.
There're countless variables that make one mouthpieces sound different from the other but the material and design are on the top of the list. When I say different material it doesn't necessarily mean that the mouthpiece or clarinet for that matter has to be made from a different material. The same type but a softer wood or the wood cut from the center is a different material. The same applies to hard-rubber. It comes in a different softness and formulations and it's considered a different material. I don't really know how to explain what I hear but the simple and maybe understandable version would be this.
Let's call a crystal mouthpiece as having a glassy tone and the wooden one as woody/mellow. What I hear is this: the harder the rubber (steel ebonite) the glassier it sounds. And is exactly opposite happens with the softer rubber. The softer the rubber the woodier it sounds. Of course it's just a lousy simplification. I do hear different frequencies and overtones and that is basically what makes a tone color rich or poor is comparison. I can't stand a metal mouthpieces they do sound lifeless to me, no exiting overtones there! Plastic sounds better than the metal IMO
Cuisleannach wrote:
.......From what I know about the laws of mathematical physics, I find it hard to believe that the vibration in the wall of a thick pipe affects the vibration of the air column within the pipe........
1. You have no idea what you're talking about, are you? First of all clarinet is not a pipe it acts as a pipe only when you play the lowest notes. If it was a pipe it wouldn't produce much sound if the exit of the pipe was plugged. It's not about the vibration in the wall of a thick pipe affecting or not the vibration of the air column within the pipe. It's about whether on not the resonating material adds the tone color to the sound or not. I don't believe that the vibration in the walls of a clarinet affects the vibration of the air column within the bore ether. That's not the point!
Bruce Lee once said his student who was concentrating on his finger he was pointing it at him while he was giving the instruction: 'Don't concentrate on the finger or you miss all that heavenly glory'.
The vibration to the walls/material gets there trough the VIBRATING SOURCE which in this case is the vibrating reed. It seems that everyone is concentrating on the air column and ignoring the obvious; 'The connection of the VIBRATING SOURCE and the material'. That's where the tone color/overtones live and that's the point.
2. What your profession or level of education has to do with the clarinet acoustics? I'm a high ranking Karate master who can kick your butt. Does this impress you in any way? Does it give more weight to my point?
Give me a break!
Vytas Krass
Professional clarinet technician
Custom clarinet mouthpiece maker
Former professional clarinet player
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Author: FDF
Date: 2006-07-10 01:46
What your profession or level of education has to do with the clarinet acoustics? I'm a high ranking Karate master who can kick your butt. Does this impress you in any way? Does it give more weight to my point?
No, Just try.
What you say is absolute nonsense, excuse me for saying so, but it is completely irrelevant to the discussion.
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Author: Vytas
Date: 2006-07-10 01:52
FGF, I was responding to this: (bellow)
___________________________________________________________
"You see, vytas, I labor under some very strict rules. I work as a mathematical modeler and statistician, and the first thing I have to tell people who come to me is that "conventional wisdom ain't so wise". Some of the most cherished perceptions that people hold (and these people are experts at the Mayo Clinic) don't mean a hill of beans to me until I test them to my satisfaction, and conventional wisdom is wrong as often as it is right.
The second thing I have to tell people is "don't believe everything you think". If I am willing to hold on to a notion to the contrary against all arguments, then that belief belongs in church and not in the realm of scientific inquiry. From what I know about the laws of mathematical physics, I find it hard to believe that the vibration in the wall of a thick pipe affects the vibration of the air column within the pipe. I am, however, willing to hear arguments and review data to the contrary, as Mark and I have done in other posts. I would love to see a well-designed experiment to test the hypothesis that it does. I do not, however, stand dogmatically by my assertion. For an argument to be proven to be true or false, it must first be refutable, otherwise it is an article of faith, not knowledge.
-Randy"
___________________________________________________________
Vytas Krass
Professional clarinet technician
Custom clarinet mouthpiece maker
Former professional clarinet player
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2006-07-10 02:03
Vytas wrote:
> FGF, I was responding to this: (bellow)
Vytas, I assume you really meant "bellow" ...
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Author: Vytas
Date: 2006-07-10 02:29
Mark, I meant below like in see/check below. I'm still learning English which is not my native language. Sorry wrong spelling. I didn't mean anything else by that.
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Author: Cuisleannach
Date: 2006-07-10 03:13
Vytas, if my level of education had nothing to do with science (such as in karate, although I'm sure a lot that applies in the art of karate also applies in the art of making music), particularly in physics, then I could see your point. However, my level of education actually does relate to clarinet acoustics.
I agree that you can probably hear a difference, but I bet you could hear the same difference in three R-13's manufactured (ostensibly of the same material) in the same week. The problem is that you rarely get to hear a truly well-made instruments made of plastic, although you could listen to instruments of different quality made of wood. The trouble is pinpointing what is the cause of a difference.
The clarinet is indeed a pipe, with a valve at the top (the reed/mouthpiece combination) that turns a steady stream of air at the source (mouth) into a vibrating column of air. The pipe is roughly as long (a little longer, actually) as the first open hole. A clarinet always acts as a pipe, just an interesting pipe that you can change the length of.
The main point I'm trying to make is that if you are not willing to consider other points of view (as I do) or you aren't willing to accept the notion that your cherished notions may be wrong (as I do) and say things like:
<<1. You have no idea what you're talking about, are you?>>
without considering that my point of view might be worth listening to then you are arguing from a rigid belief rather than from a spirit of inquiry. If you were proposing to test your ideas and to accept the results from such a test, I would understand much better.
-Randy
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Author: Phat Cat
Date: 2006-07-10 09:58
I can see that the Sun moves around the Earth, can't you? It is very obvious that the Earth does not rotate...if it did we'd all fly off . Anyone who thinks otherwise is an ignoramus.
Don't try to confuse me with any "scientific" facts. I've already made up my mind.
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Author: Vytas
Date: 2006-07-10 14:59
Phat Cat wrote:
........if it did we'd all fly off .
__________________________
You just did as far as I'm concern
Vytas Krass
Professional clarinet technician
Custom clarinet mouthpiece maker
Former professional clarinet player
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