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Re: Why is the low F flat?

Author: skygardener
Date: 2006-12-11 09:57

rgames- "I've played on a number of clarinets that play better in tune than mine but with a sound that I didn't like as much."
That reminds me a little something several people have told me.
1. A professional oboist once said to me, "good oboes have bad pitch and good tone. You have to fix the pitch with crazy fingerings, but if you play an oboe that has really good pitch, the tone is always bad."
2. I also heard a bit about sax design history- most of us know about the high/low pitch designs in the first half of the 20thC. When A=440 was decided, the high pitch instruments were useless for sax, but the low pitch were useful. Pushing in the mouthpiece was about enough, but the intonation of the sax with itself was destroyed. Then, in the 50's and 60's some makers tried making saxophones that were truly in-tune. Most of the pros that sampled the instruments had been playing on the bad intonation sax for so long that they had gotten used to it- ie. they didn't like the saxes that where made with good pitch. The result, those makes continued to make saxes with pitch problems because everyone had "learned to love it". They only fixed the notes that were exceptionally out of tune, but they purposely left many pitch problems alone.
3. There is also something that Karl Leister said at a masterclass I went to. "Some notes are out of tune on clarinet, but if you have 4 clarinets in an orchestra and they are all out of tune in the same way, then they are not out of tune- they are in tune."--ie. don't stress your life over bad pitch. I suppose that if one player has a new clarinet with good pitch it would be a problem for them if they are the only "in tune" person in the section.
Any comment?

Post Edited (2008-10-11 09:21)

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