 The Clarinet BBoard
|
Author: Ryan Young
Date: 2007-12-13 22:27
Hi everyone,
My High School Band will be performing Eric Whitacre's Lux Aurumque at the start of next semester and I have two questions for anyone that may help.
1) I've checked the forums and the best thing it appears to do for the Bb-D tremolo across the break is to keep the right hand down and "just deal" basically, right?
and 2) The song ends with the First Clarinet part sustaining an A4 for quite a few measures, long enough that staggered breathing is a necessity. There are only two Firsts playing, myself and someone else. To produce the best quality of sound would it be best for only one of us to play it at a time or only one of us play it, have the other one come in to cover as the rest of the band plays the chords and the person playing during the rest of the bands silence sneaks a breath, or just both of us play it and stagger as usual. My director and I talked about it for a few minutes yesterday and we both agreed that this part needed the best sound quality as possible and any thing to achieve that can be done should.
I appreciate all your help,
Ryan Young
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: MaDxClArInAtOr
Date: 2007-12-14 00:05
Lux Aurumque is by far one of the most beautiful choral pieces i've ever heard/performed and whitacre arranged it beautifully for band, with only that annoying tremolo which you have encountered. unless you have a clarinet with a low Eb key, you "just have to deal with it" and play the tremolo as fast as you can the regular way.
as for the throat A, if you haven't heard the choral work the way whitacre originally wrote it, the sopranos sustain concert G all through the end and it should just sloooowwly and ever so gently fade away into nothingness. so keeping that in mind, make sure you're not blasting that A and try to maintain your intonation as best as you can. your part there is not the most complex part so it should not be in the foreground. there is gorgeous harmony moving around you. so i say you should stagger and once your A's are in tune, you should be perfectly fine.
its one of those works where it may look easy on the page, but is absolutely brutal to put together. just enjoy what's there.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Ryan Young
Date: 2007-12-14 03:11
Thanks...I did know that it faded away but in the choral version that i have heard, the concert G is initially at a much louder level than in the symphonic version that I have heard. What i guess my question is is that would it be "better" tone-wise to have only one of us playing at a time or the both of us? The other 9 clarinets we have are on the second and third parts and they are not exposed as the sustained concert G is. To me, it seems its presence must be felt and not fade drastically away until the last 2-4 measures and the duration that it is sustained requires a lot of thought on keeping that tone as pure as possible the same a soprano would be singing it.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: MaDxClArInAtOr
Date: 2007-12-14 23:54
try looking as some resonance fingerings. and keep in mind that there isn't only one soprano singing the concert G all the way through, and there's a lot of staggering. you and the other clarinetist should just work out smooth transitions with one another. and if one person actually CAN sustain that A the entire way, then great. as long as the person doing it is comfortable for the entire duration without feeling like they're going to fall over, it shouldnt be a problem. and like you said, the tone needs to be pure, so just work with the other clarinet player and see if you can match one another.
and i dont think it should really be that difficult to blend the A's of two clarinet players at soft dynamic level.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: OmarHo
Date: 2007-12-15 00:16
I love his piece Sleep as well. Eric Whitacre himself conducted one of my bands playing it, and throughout the whole piece he sang the words. If you think playing a throat A for a few measures is bad, I had the 3rd clarinet part for sleep and we had to sustain the low D (below the staff) for about 30 slow beats plus fermata...
Except when we played it in band, we also had a big mass choir singing along with us so he had his combined arrangement for choir and band at the same time. It sounded fabulous!
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Ryan Young
Date: 2007-12-15 04:56
I took a look at the music this morning. The piece is 4/4 at quarter note equals 56 and the concert G is held for 13 measures plus two beats giving 54 beats. I timed myself earlier (we had a tour for all of our elementary schools today, giving much downtime) and i got to 45 rather easily so I think we will stagger either both playing or only one at a time, depending on how our sounds mesh. Thanks for all the help.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Wittlenix
Date: 2007-12-29 10:21
Gorgeous piece but Eric Whitacre is clearly not a clarinet player. Who in their right mind would write a tremolo like that? He wants to get the most fluttering delicate sound ever but its not possible with a trill like that. It'll never be smooth, even for the best player.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
The Clarinet Pages
|
 |
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
