 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Jill
Date: 2000-09-06 01:10
Okay, I am not sure if this is just me who notices this, but in almost every band I have ever played in, almost all the clarinet players are generally concieted. Not that this is a bad thing, because you have to be proud of what you do. I have also noticed that trumpet players are overall the same way. Am I the only person who thinks this way?
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Author: Lelia
Date: 2000-09-06 12:35
Jill wrote:
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Okay, I am not sure if this is just me who notices this, but in almost every band I have ever played in, almost all the clarinet players are generally concieted. Not that this is a bad thing, because you have to be proud of what you do. I have also noticed that trumpet players are overall the same way. Am I the only person who thinks this way?
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I noticed a fair amount of good-natured rivalry, including instrument stereotyping, when I was in school. In some ways I think the stereotypes were self-fulfilling prophecies. Our grade school band director definitely steered certain kids toward certain instruments. He picked tough, wild guys for drums, "brassy" show-offy boys for trumpet and trombone, all girls for flute (although a boy who transferred in played so well that he promptly copped first chair), all boys for bass and brass instruments, a conspicuously brainy kid for the one oboe, and a mixture of everybody else for clarinet. The clarinet section was the only one in the grade school band that I thought didn't have a specific personality. We had quite a cross-section.
In junior high, that changed some, because so many kids who weren't really interested in band had dropped out. By then, I think the clarinet players tended to be a bit less rowdy and more "adult" than the others. I didn't notice a prevailing attitude of conceit, although when I switched to alto clarinet, it was clear to me that other clarinetists considered this a huge step down the ladder. I had asked to play bass clarinet, but "girls don't play bass clarinet." One of my friends in the section said something to the effect that if she got "dumped" onto alto, she'd quit. Well, I didn't feel that way. I liked the low tones. Once the school replaced a borrowed wreck with a pretty good alto clarinet, I liked it so much that as an adult, I now own my own alto. But there was definitely peer pressure to think of the soprano clarinets, even down in the 4th section, as more prestigious than the low clarinets, with bass clarinet orders of magnitude higher in prestige than alto. (We didn't have any contras, but I suspect those would have ranked pretty high, since tubas were much admired -- anything *really huge* was cool.)
In high school, I played first (sop.) clarinet out of four in the orchestra and I was a total snot about it! So, yes, there was conceit amongst the *orchestra* clarinetists in high school, and it was largely my fault! I don't know what the band people were doing at the time, besides marching and marching and marching.... ;-)
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Author: Kontragirl
Date: 2000-09-06 20:30
My band has three really conceited clarinets (me and two others). The rest of the clarinets are well behaved. Most of our trumpets have big egos. The place in my band where I notice it in the flute section (some of it brought on by us clarinets) and the trombone section is just HORRIBLE! I'm not sure I believe in the joke about the trumpet player hand shake (Hi, I'm better than you). I think people act like other people in their section...It must be all of that sectional time.
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Author: The bald eagle
Date: 2000-09-06 22:19
My experience is primarily in church orchestras. Generally these are adult groups but high school students generally are welcome. Invariably a twitty little high school girl comes in and thinks she is God's gift to the flute section. These twitts even think they are better than flute players who are getting advanced degrees in performance on the Flute at FSU. They eventually get put down.
There is something about the flute that seems to bring this on.
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Author: Sara
Date: 2000-09-07 02:32
Actually as I've gone through my past three years of playing you separate those how don't care and those who do. But I've noticed that whiel we do have those players who are well above the line of being proud of self seficiency-its not entirely there fault. The band directors tend to have a large part in helping to boost there egos, this one girl whos been playing trumpet a year more than me-her5 and me 4- has has her ego boosted since the beginning and has been in the top ensemble her entire life, because the directors wanted to challange her. But they didn't really notice me that much, I kinda hid in the shadows and let her have the glory. Well for the past two years, I've been forced to try our for Region and All state band, which I'd never had experience with before and I made third in All state and she made 23 and the director made a huge announcement and all this gory put on her- and I think he forgot about me. So you see its not entirely the student fault, sometimes its the teachers. No offense to you teachers out there! Its just one particular case. Who knows you could hide in the shodow for high chool and end up with a full scholarship for sollege!
Sara
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Author: Meredith H
Date: 2000-09-07 03:24
I can't remember too much of the rivalry the was part of my high school band. We were never auditioned so those that had been there the longest were usually in the higher chairs no matter how well you played.
I think if you give a particular section of the band the melody all of the time they tend to think they are the best and their egos seem to match. I currently play in a brass band and I wouldn't sit in the cornet or euphonium sections if I was paid, there is just too much back-biting.
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Author: Jim
Date: 2000-09-08 02:54
Generalazations may be fun, but are unfair to the individuals that we all truly are!
I suspect that there is a very fine line between conceit and the confidence that all of us who perform need to develop lest we surcumb to "butterflies" or shaky knees. Likely, those whose confidence is lacking push a bit harder to be confident with the possibility of over compensating. This is not unique to instrumentalists, singers, public speakers, and certainally actors (I have dabled in community theater as a techie) share the temptation.
What we do IS difficult! I had a new perspective a few years ago while helping my wife (a pianist!) learn to do public speaking.
False humility is no antidote for conceit either. I've always liked a line from a song in the musical Camelot: "It's not the earth the meek inherit, it's the dirt." (Sounds conceited, right??!)
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Author: Allen Cole
Date: 2000-09-09 02:37
I think that confidence runs its greatest risk of becoming conceit among players who don't put in enough time doing smaller groups on their own. Too often, a school band or orchestra musician's extracurricular activies simply involve more elite (citywide or countywide) bands and orchestras. In these larger ensembles, students can get a feeling of working directly for the conductor and ideas of teamwork in the section can get swept under the rug.
I feel that chamber groups can be helpful in toning down some of the extremes. That sort of unsupervised teamwork can force players at all ability levels to reexamine their attitudes.
In one high school where I teach privately, ALL students in the program are required to participate in Solo & Ensemble Festival. This means the hot players have to depend on each other in order to be able to perform chamber music of a certain level. If personnel are short, and a group member isn't quite as hot, the better players may be forced to help and encourage the weaker player.
This kind of thing can break a lot of ice. Community bands have ego problems too, and many can be considerably less than friendly. I am involved with one of the friendliest such groups in my area, and a unique facet of the groups history is the fact that many of the better players got together and played chamber music together during the early years. In this group, there is much more emphasis on developing the talents of newcomers and teenagers. More of these players are prone to take others under their wings.
On the other side of the coin, it's hard to get this sort of atmposphere going where ego problems are already in place and growing more acute.
I always tell my students that their closest rival is in reality their best friend, and that every player should be armed with a good duet book.
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