 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: willr13
Date: 2006-12-17 16:39
hey guys, I have quite a good ear with tuning but i want to improve it and i was wandering if anyone had any ways of doing this, I'm reading a book at the mo (becoming an orchestral musician-Richard Davis) which says to set two tuners to sing a major third and then gradually flatten the upper note which should help 'train' the ear, it does help but i was wandering if anyone knew of other things like this to 'improve' your ear, thanks.
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Author: sfalexi
Date: 2006-12-17 17:06
Maybe this will jumpstart someone's memory of what it's called, but I had a quick class on tuning. I believe it was called "True" tuning or something like that.
Basically, it first showed how a piano is tuned (tuners as well) and how it SHOULD be tuned in order to sound better in a real musical situation. I don't have the papers that I had on me, but I remember vaguely that when playing a third, it should be a little flatter. I think 14 cents was how much. An exercise we played was for one person to find and stabilize at a tone. Then another played a third above it and slightly flattened a bit until you can almost hear a buzzing in the background that sounds like it's an octave below the tonic. It was very odd. Almost like a buzzing in my head, but amazing. If you can sustain that perfect interval (14 cents flat of equal temperament tuning) you'll hear it.
I can't remember, but there's a publication you can get on it. Really VERY interesting stuff to read. And probably harder to incorparate (you have to realize what key you're in and what note in the key you're playing in order to adjust your embouchure to properly tune). Lord knows I'm not up to it right now! My plate is more than full as it is.
Alexi
US Army Japan Band
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2006-12-18 15:26
willr13 -
When you play in unison with a tuner, unless you match it perfectly you will hear "beats" as your pitch goes in and out of phase with the tuner. When you play an octave above or below the tuner, beats in the 2:1 ratio are also easy to hear.
The beats in fifths (3:2 ratio) and fourths (4:3 ratio) are less obvious, but not difficult to hear.
You can learn to hear major thirds (5:4) and minor thirds (6:5), and piano tuners in particular need to be able to hear them. Working on them with the tuner will definitely help your awareness of what a beatless interval sounds like.
Unfortunately, tuning is much more complicated than that. The equal-tempered scale is a small amount out of tune on every interval except the octave. For much more than you want to know, read about tuning systems in any music reference book.
In actual performance, professional players modify tempered intervals to come closer to beatless ones, but they can't do this all the time. If they do, they drift further and further from the ensemble pitch, and other intervals clash.
Except for the voice, strings, trombone and the swanee whistle, it's impossible to make an instrument exactly in tune (unless you make a piano with, say, 60 notes to the octave), since different intervals call for different pitches. Furthermore, each wind instrument has built-in compromises to let it play close to in tune in the various registers, and each maker sets these differently. In the top orchestras, the principal players work constantly with each other to learn and match the peculiarities of the others' instruments and preferences.
There's an extra layer of complexity with the piano, in which there are many built-in resonances that change with pitch. Thus, to make a piano sound in tune, the octaves must be stretched, and the amount is peculiar to each manufacturer and model. See http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/read.html?f=1&i=56331&t=56276 and http://test.woodwind.org/Databases/Klarinet/2004/09/000086.txt.
However, you have the right approach. An electronic tuner can do much more than give you a pitch to match. An even better use is to teach you to play in-tune intervals. See the excellent article by Howard Niblock at http://www.lawrence.edu/dept/conservatory/studio/oboe/practice.shtml.
Keep up the good work.
Ken Shaw
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Author: sfalexi
Date: 2006-12-18 17:08
Also, don't underestimate the value of alternate fingerings. While certain fingerings are supposed to give the same note, sometimes there will be subtle differences in tuning or the tambre between fingerings. For instance, on the instrument I'm currently on, most every note is fine in tune, except for my thumb F and the thumb and forefinger E. They are DRASTICALLY (almost 20 cents) flat. I find I have press open a sidekey while playing these to bring them up to blending pitch. Can't do it all the time, but I do it when I can. Check out alternate fingerings for pitches, and if a pitch is sharp or flat, experiment with different keys (sometimes the pinky keys, sometimes others) to see if you can affect it positively.
Alexi
US Army Japan Band
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Author: D Dow
Date: 2006-12-18 18:13
One key element is to also have a set up which will allow you to adjust clarinet pitch easily...this means of course finding the right mouthpiece and reed relationship to your clarinet.
I think joining a vocal choir is good for learning how to hear and adapt your ears to tuning in just about any chord or area of listening for pitch... also try singing your parts before you practice....
David Dow
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Author: johng ★2017
Date: 2006-12-18 21:46
Ken Shaw's response has some great ideas. Another way to help with this is to have a sound source separate from your tuner like a held electronic keyboard key, a tuning CD, or a computer. Then with your tuner attached to your clarinet using a tuner pick-up, you can play different intervals against the sound source and watch the results independently on the tuner (which is recording only your pitches).
Tuner pick-ups are inexpensive and are great resources.
When you do this, read Ken's response again and compare what your ear tells you is a pure sounding interval with what the tuner is registering. You will see that depending on the interval, you may be sharp or flat to the tuner's equal tempered scale when the interval sounds its purest.
Singing is also good....the whole thing is training your ear.
John Gibson
John Gibson, Founder of JB Linear Music, www.music4woodwinds.com
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Author: sherman
Date: 2006-12-18 23:49
If two players are playing a unison and one is in tune and the other flat, they are both out of tune.
That is the simplest way to say that the ability to change ,sometimes imperceptively is absolutley incumbent in a good player, and the first thing that comes to mind in an ensemble.
There is no such thing as being perfectly intune, for that is but an illusion, the illusion however being most important to playing in any kind of ensemble, from a piano with clarinet, to a great orchestra with an entire woodwind section. It is an illusion.
The first question is, what exactly is the pitch of the A and does it change during a rehearsal or a performance?
The answer is unquestionably, whatever the ensemble establishes as it's A and the constantly changing temperature of the rehearsal or concert hall.
But in a practical sense, how do you choose your partners in an ensemble, or are you chosen through an audition or, perhaps even a phone call?
You choose an oboist for your quintet because he or she plays intune or with a center of pitch that is similar to yours, and you do it usually by having played or performed prior to the audition or the first rehearsal.
I do respect all of the ways of fixing and establishing intonation through all of the various tomes written, however there is not a book or a particular "way" that will lead one to good intonation.
One must know how the other plays in relation to pitch.
This of course, is the biggest reason for players to aspire to a great or very good orchestra. There, these kinds of problem have been solved by the process of competition and then ,elinimation.
Upon winning an audition one can look forward to playing Ein Heldenlenben or Sacre with little difficulty.
Hardly a solution, you say, and I agree, however it is the way of the musical world and why the wonderful players play so well...intune, and everything else.
For some, it comes very easily, for the ear is magic in the brain of one who simply does it. The quest for a good sound is solved and with it, the intonational problems that one faces on the way.
Although I have had a teaching career teaching certain methods using certain books, the young player who can play is so gifted. Don't dismiss me quickly for that is my experience for many years.
One can site example after example of certain clarinetists, very well known for their recital playing who have not been hired during a trial week or two in a solidly disciplined orchestra, or who have, then been dismissed when refusing or being unable to adjust to the other principals who have played together for years.
In my own recital playing I learned that there was a certain tuner of pianos, a simply great one, who tuned for me. He would get with me prior to the first rehearsal or perhaps during same and make both notations and comments to us both, and yes, he would tune for me. I am not sure how beautiful lor ugly the intonation was, however it was a pleasure to play with a piano that GL tuned.
Was it for me, or did I play well enough intune for him to tune the piano, for he refused many?
I cannot remember the amount of change in the A(I have read) there were during a performance of the Boston Symphony, however the figures were truly staggering. And yet, that is one of the orchestras that plays superbly intune.
I still feel it is but an illusion,roughly analagous with "depth of field" in photograhy, that amount of the photo that is clear enough to be called clear and distinct.
Just a few stray puffs to think about.
Happy Holidays, Sherman Friedland
Post Edited (2006-12-19 05:21)
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