 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: kc261
Date: 2008-06-23 19:02
My 11 yr old daughter is starting clarinet. I think it would be beneficial to her to hear some good recordings of clarinets playing a variety of music, classical, jazz, etc. I am not expecting this to be something that she "studies", but just stuff to be able to have playing mostly "in the background". I figure this will give her a much better idea of the wide range of stuff that can be played on clarinet, and also start teaching her what good clarinet playing sounds like.
Any particular recommendations? Also, I am hoping that some of you may be able to point me in the direction of places I can legally download such music for free.
Thanks!
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Author: Jameslyons
Date: 2008-06-23 22:30
Benny Goodman - Jazz
Artie Shaw - Swing
Sharon Kam- classical
Brahms Clarinet Quintets
Mozart's Clarinet Quintets
Some great genres besides classical and jazz that use clarinets:
Klezmer
Turkish
Arabic
Eastern European Modern compositions. (In general, the modern period contains great compositions for non-string players. Because it was in the modern period that the Eastern European countries sought to write outside the string-heavy Viennese paradigm of Vivaldi, Beethoven, and Mozart.)
In general though, I think it's best to introduce your daughter to all types of music and instruments. Letting her listen to Rachmaninoff or Franz Liszt should help her develop her sense of timing, articulation, and musical harmony- even if they do focus on the piano.
Musicality, that is the scales, chord progression, harmony and counter point are present in every genre of music and is arguably the more important aspect of musical training. But Brahm's clarinet quintet is also fantastic.
Post Edited (2008-06-23 22:34)
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Author: Ryder
Date: 2008-06-23 23:38
Listening to other (professionals) clarinetists is something that should be encouraged.
I sit down with my mp3 and my solos like the all the Weber clarinet peices and Mozart, etc... and actually study the peices and compare the sheet music to the actual performance.
Great sounding clarinetists to listen to are people like David Shifrin for his beautiful use of expression, and Sabine Meyer and Martin Frost for their technical precision. There are many, many other great players. I could sit here and make a list a mile long of clarinetists worth listening to.
More important than listening is actually seeing and listening to a live perormance. CD's do not compare to the amazing sound of a live performance. Look up your local symphony and find some performances that include works for clarinet and works that are just clarinet heavy. Take your daughter there and let her listen and watch. Some ochestras have an "intrument petting zoo" before some performances. If you get there early enough try to get the clarinetist's attention and politly ask him/her to talk to your daughter about the clarinet and mabey play something for her. Just be careful not to distract them from warming up if they look like they are just concerned with the performance. Sit where you can see the clarinetists and mabey even give you daughter some binoculars to watch them closer. Just one whole note can be such an inspiration. I just recently saw the San Antonio symphony play Mahler's 4th and Miraculous Mandarin. When I got home at 11:30pm I pulled out my clarinet and started practicing because hearing the short clarinet solos in those peices inspired me.
If possible ask for a lesson or two for your daughter, so she can get some one on one time with a pro (no offense to non-pros, I'm not even closen to pro anyways). They generaly teach as a second job anyways.
sorry to stray away rom the origonal question, but having a private teacher and exposing her to the professional world is invaluble to her development.
____________________
Ryder Naymik
San Antonio, Texas
"We pracice the way we want to perform, that way when we perform it's just like we practiced"
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Author: weberfan
Date: 2008-06-24 00:57
Hello, kc261---
I'm sure you'll get many more suggestions from those who post here, but I'll offer these few, though I cannot at the moment think of where you might download these free of charge.
Boston Records, a small label, carries a half-dozen or so CD's featuring one of the greats, Harold Wright, the late principal clarinetist of the Boston Symphony. They are all wonderful..the Weber, Mozart, Schumann, Mendelssohn, etc.
Older recordings by the Cleveland Orchestra --Beethoven symphonies, for example, under George Szell and featuring the late Robert Marcellus-- are also excellent. The Mozart clarinet concerto, with Marcellus, which has been reissued with two flute concertos featuring Eugenia Zuckerman, is a must-have. Available on Amazon, I believe, or you can try ArkivMusic.
In the keepers section of the bulletin board, you will find a posting from early May with a list of the repertoire required for those auditioning for the New York Philharmonic. It will give you an idea of which classical pieces to consider listening to.
And for other kinds of fun, check out a YouTube video --posted here last week--featuring a Dixieland player from New Orleans named Doreen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4bKqL52C_U
Or, as mentioned earlier, Benny Goodman and Artie Shaw, to which you might add Eddie Daniels and Pete Fountain, to name but two more.
Post Edited (2008-06-24 02:01)
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Author: NorbertTheParrot
Date: 2008-06-24 06:28
Please don't turn your daughter into another clarinet obsessive. There are enough of them on this BBoard already.
Get her listening to music. If there are clarinets in there, fine. But don't feed her a diet of clarinet solos. There's more to music than that.
You don't need to download. Just turn on the radio. Or BBC Radio 3 over the internet. She'll soon tell you when she hears something she really likes and would like you to buy the CD.
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Author: weberfan
Date: 2008-06-24 16:09
Norbert,
You're quite right, of course.
I realized I was getting carried away.
(you noticed I threw in a few symphonies...lots of different instruments, and all playing at the same time, too!!)
Post Edited (2008-06-24 17:29)
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Author: kc261
Date: 2008-06-24 21:14
Thanks for all the replies!
Just to clarify, I know she needs a "balanced diet". Our family already has music playing on occasion, although I'm sure it would be more beneficial if it happened more often. I just wanted to add some good clarinet music in to the mix. And, since I mostly only know classical music (and probably many people on this board would qualify the extent of my knowledge in that field as not enough to count), I wanted to be sure I was widening her musical exposure.
So please keep the suggestions coming! Thanks again!
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Author: weberfan
Date: 2008-06-24 22:34
After I posted my excessive classical recommendations, I realized I had left out the kind of thing your daughter might actually encounter in band---although my choices date me.
You might look for concert band selections---even ask the local high school band director what he chooses. Better yet, if there's a community band in your area it may have a Web site that lists its repertoire. If, as your ISP address suggests, you are in the Washington, Maryland, Virginia area, there are bound to be Web sites for some pretty good bands
As for recordings, there are interesting program pieces by Sousa--not just marches. Keith Brion recorded some of these.
Also, try recordings by the Eastman Wind Ensemble. They most likely will feature conducting by Frederick Fennell.
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Author: kc261
Date: 2008-06-25 19:01
Thanks for pointing out the obvious that we all had missed... concert band stuff like what she is likely to play!
It made me think back to when I played flute in HS (well, 4th grade through HS actually), and the few song titles I could remember. But by following links from those I was able to find some others I had forgotten the title of, but recognized when I saw it. What a trip down memory lane! Listening to some of those songs I hadn't heard, or even thought of in years was amazing. Wow!
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Author: Jack Kissinger
Date: 2008-06-27 03:06
kc261,
I really have to parrot Norbert here. (Sorry, I couldn't resist! ![[rotate]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smiley25.gif) ) From observing my daughter and her friends, I conclude that some kids begin to develop a strong sense of independence around the time they become pre-teens and teenagers. If they think they are being pushed they may rebel. But you know your daughter best.
In any case, here are some sources of music on the web. All have a variety of music with some pieces that feature the clarinet, if you are specifically looking for that. Some of them stream music rather than letting you download it so you can't record it unless you have software that will capture it from your sound card, but you (and your daughter) can still perhaps listen.
http://www.naxos.com
This is a streaming site and it isn't free (at least for access to their catalog -- I haven't tried their radio). A basic subscription is $20 per year. For this, you get access to pretty much the entire classical catalogs (including some out-of-print recordings) from Naxos (one of the largest catalogs in the world), Bis and DaCapo. You can find an enormous quantity of classical and jazz music. The Bis catalog has all of Martin Frost's CD's and his performances of the standard and not-so-standard classical literature for the clarinet would be fine for your purposes. Lately, I've also had access to Naxos' Jazz and Historic Jazz labels. (I hope this is a new policy and not a glitch in their system that they will eventually correct.) Just browse through their site (including "Labels" and "catalog") for an idea of how much there is.
http://www.redhotjazz.com
While browsing around the Naxos historical jazz site, I came across a couple of bands I didn't know much about and I wanted to hear more so I ran a Google search. It led me to this amazing free site. I only listened to streams here and didn't try downloading but I think you may be able to. This site has a wealth of recordings from the early jazz era. For clarinetists, try Jimmy Noone, Barney Bigard, Johnny Dodds, and Sidney Bechet. There's even some very early Benny Goodman. Be warned though that the sound quality varies a lot and can be pretty bad -- which may or may not be a turn-off for an 11 year-old. (BTW, both here and at Naxos, which tends to have a little better sound quality for the old recordings, virtually everything I tried by Kid Ory had prominent clarinet.)
http://www.usc.edu/music/orchestra/audio_archive/index.htm
This music downloads. If you scroll down through the concerts, you should find recordings of some of the major works for clarinet and orchestra -- concertos by Mozart, Copland (2 performances), Weber (2nd), Nielsen -- as well as concertos by Bolcom and Francaix. These are live performances by a student orchestra so don't expect the Berlin Philharmonic but, of the ones I listened to, the soloists were all very good. Lots of other orchestral music as well, including Rimsky Korsakov's Capriccio Espagnol with some prominent clarinet work. Even some movie music.
http://www.ongaku-records.com/
Has five CD's with Jonathan Cohler, a top-tier classical clarinetist. All the works are linked to Real Player downloads. I haven't checked recently so things might have changed but all the links from his four solo albums, anyway, used to be full performances, not excerpts.
As far as concert band selections are concerned:
http://www.kjos.com/results.php?instrument=65&search_type=instrument&related=1&filter=level&value=17&division=1
is one place to look. One of their specialties is music for high school (and community bands). Since band directors generally would like to know what a work is going to sound like before they purchase it, Kjos has had many of their works recorded by good wind ensembles (the Saint Louis Wind Symphony has done some recording sessions as a way to raise money for their organization) and put free full performances on mp3 files. Because they publish the "Standard of Excellence" series, used by many school programs, you may even find recordings of some works your daughter will be playing early on. Just put your cursor over the "Band" button next to "Browse Our Catalog" near the top of the page, then choose either "Repertoire by Grade" or "Repertoire by Series." If there are headphones next to a piece, clicking on them will download am mp3 recording.
http://www.jwpepper.com/sheet-music/ecb.jsp
J. W. Pepper also has music files in RealPlayer format available for free download or streaming. Choose "Band." You can listen to any of the works that display a "RealPlayer" link.
http://www.usafband.af.mil/
Actually, I found this the other night by Googling on "Air Force Band" without the quotes. I'm inlcuding the link because about the middle of the page are three programs listed as "The Jazz Heritage Series Radio Broadcast Programs." If you click the middle one, you will get a program whose guest artist was Paquito D'Rivera. You may already know this but, just in case, he is a truly great clarinetist and saxophonist. A couple of the numbers on the concert feature him on clarinet. If you want to hear some remarkable clarinet playing, listen to "I Remember Diz."
If you look around the site, you can find other recordings to download. At the bottom of the Google search page, check out the related searches for Navy Band, Army Band and Coast Guard Band. For some reason, the Marine Band isn't mentioned but you can run a separate search. There are numerous recordings you can download from each of the sites.
While I could probably come up with a couple others, the last site I will mention here is:
http://www.soundclick.com
Lots of music there, including some featuring the clarinet. And, if your daughter is a Lord of the Rings fan, check out the Banda de Lalin (Lalin Wind Symphony). On their page, among some other good band music is a complete performance of Johan de Meij's "Lord of the Rings Symphony" for band. You have to register but it's free.
Finally, a couple suggestions. I generally agree that, at least a couple of lessons with a good teacher would be helpful (and give your daughter a bit of a head start on the others in her class come fall). I think even a half-hour every other week would be useful. If that's tough financially, maybe she has a friend or two who will also be starting in the fall. Perhaps you could arrange for group lessons to stretch everybody's lesson money. I would also recommend that, in addition to listening to the radio, see if you can get your daughter to try to play along with music on a station she likes. (Probably doesn't work too well with rap.  ) When I first started to play, my Dad used to make me play along with the radio (a local top-40 station) for the last 5-10 minutes of my 30-minute practice session every day. It was really difficult and sometimes frustrating at first but I actually enjoyed it and eventually I would find a few notes that fit, and then a few more. Just about as far back as I can remember, I've always been able to play by ear and improvise. I think I owe that to Dad.
Best of luck. IMO the gift of music you are offering your daughter is a wonderful one.
Best regards,
jnk
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Author: kev182
Date: 2008-06-27 05:56
I think you need to expose her to the most expressive music possible to develop an ear for phrasing -- and this shouldn't be limited to clarinet
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Author: clarnibass
Date: 2008-06-27 06:32
I think Peter And The Wolf is a great piece to play for little (and not so little) kids. Although it isn't a solo for clarinet, it made me decide I want to play clarinet when I was about six years old
11 is a older but I would still get a (good) version which has the story in it too and not just the music.
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Author: mrn
Date: 2008-06-27 17:51
For band music, in general, the Dallas Wind Symphony is a good choice. They have recordings of most of the standard band/wind ensemble repertoire, as well as some of the better new works.
Some specific works for wind ensemble/band that are worthy of note (not necessarily all recorded by the DWS, but all available on CD or iTunes):
1st & 2nd Suites and Moorside Suite by Gustav Holst
Lincolnshire Posy by Percy Grainger (or anything else by Grainger, for that matter)
Toccata Marziale by Ralph Vaughan Williams (a somewhat atypical composition for Vaughan Williams, but nonetheless very good)
Rocky Point Holiday by Ron Nelson
Symphony #3 by Vittorio Giannini
Sinfonietta by Ingolf Dahl (has interesting and tricky clarinet parts)
Symphonies of Wind Instruments by Igor Stravinsky
Celebration Overture by Paul Creston
Blue Shades by Frank Ticheli
In particular, Blue Shades has a really neat (and somewhat challenging) jazz-like clarinet solo in the middle.
Post Edited (2008-06-27 18:06)
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Author: pewd
Date: 2008-06-27 20:15
>download such music for free.
no,but i will suggest a few cd's you can get on amazon.com
beginning students need light, fun stuff
most of my students enjoy these cd's, of clarinet ensembles:
Clarinet Evergreens # B0000014DQ
Clarinet Masquerade # B0000030YC
search amazon . com for those item numbers they'll come up.
plus what mrn said about dallas wind symphony recordings
and i like the peter and the wolf suggestion
HTH,
- Paul Dods
Dallas, Texas
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Author: BobD
Date: 2008-06-28 00:27
Lots of good suggestions here and some of the selections sound better with each listening.......much of the Ticheli for example. However, "what good clarinet playing sounds" is very subjective. YouTube is a good place to get some good examples for her.
Bob Draznik
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Author: kc261
Date: 2008-06-28 01:59
Thanks for all these fabulous suggestions!
I do realize that the definition of "good clarinet playing" is highly subjective. However, there are some things that all of us could agree DON'T qualify, such as all the other 11 yr old beginners she'll hear at her middle school! Thus, my interest in exposing her to some things that at least most people would agree are better than average. It will of course be up to her to decide what sound and style she achieves, both through what she is trying to achieve, and how much effort she is willing to put in to it.
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Author: clarinetguy55
Date: 2008-06-28 23:06
For Jazz and swing, I would recommend listening to Benny Goodman. For classical, I would recommend the Robert Marcellus recording of the Mozart Concerto.
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Author: bstutsman
Date: 2008-07-01 02:24
You can download the Marcellus recording of the Mozart from Amazon for about $2/movement.
I would suggest listening to classical more than other genres. (Yeah, I know people will give me grief over this.) It seems to be easier to go from a classical sound to jazz (and others), rather than the other way around.
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Author: sfalexi
Date: 2008-07-01 05:06
My suggestion is to go to your local library and get CDs from there. I've donated my fair share of clarinet music and you'll be able to find all sorts of music for free. Keep them, and exchange them if you don't like it. Very cost-effective in finding out what you REALLY want to go out and buy.
Alexi
US Army Japan Band
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Author: DougR
Date: 2008-07-01 12:37
I love sfalexi's "use your local library" recommendation--it's a really handy (cheap) way to present your daughter with a smorgasbord of delights and let HER pick.
And I wanted to add 2 recommendations (now that you're probably exhausted from all the possibilities already presented):
one, Eddie Daniels' "Beautiful Love" -- it's pop-ish, it's lyrical, it's ballad-like in spots, it's got tremendous tuneful playing on it, very lyrical, very accessible.
two, Orpheus Chamber Orch DG recording of the two later Strauss wind serenades ("In an Invalid's Workshop" is one of them). It's perhaps more Big & Serious than you're looking for, but the playing is superb throughout, the melodies and motifs stick in your brain, and it's consistently absorbing to listen to (IF your daughter's tastes run that way). The clarinets include C, A, Bb, basset horn and bass, so it'll give her a nice impression of the whole range of clarinets too, since they all have solo exposure from time to time.
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The Clarinet Pages
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