Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2008-08-03 16:58
As long as you can sit where the audience can't see your floor peg substute and get the giggles if they recognize it, try this:
Buy a toilet plunger, the kind with a rubber cup on a wooden stick. (Some hardware stores carry these in black: less obvious than red rubber.)
Cut a piece of 2x4 or other strong wood to a length that will let you rest the alto clarinet on one end in a comfortable playing position while the other end of the wood touches the leg of the chair you normally sit on.
Leave the wooden stick on the plunger, but cut the stick short, to just the right height so that, when you set the stick-end of the plunger on top of the piece of 2x4, the cup, with the concave side facing upwards, holds the bell of the alto clarinet at the right height for playing. Using 4 metal L-brackets of 2 different sizes (so that screws will not collide in the middle of the plunger stick), screw the plunger stick firmly onto the piece of 2x4 with the plunger cup facing up. Paint all the wood and metal black.
Now measure a strong band of elastic (this can also be had in black, at fabric stores) so that it will fit around your chair leg with room to attach the ends of the elastic to the sides of the 2x4. Attach one end of the elastic permanently to the 2x4. On the other side of the 2x4, screw in a screw with a large head, but leave the head of the screw sticking out enough so that you can fasten the loose end of the elastic to it with either a loop or a buttonhole that you sew or otherwise create in the loose end. When you play, loop the elastic around the chair leg. (You can also fasten both ends of the elastic permanently to the board, a quicker way to create the stand, but the ability to fasten and unfasten will prove more handy, in case you ever need to sit on those folding metal school chairs that have the front and back sets of legs made as one unit each of bent metal, instead of as separate legs.) Bracing the stick against the chair leg this way improves stability and reduces the chance of the clarinet and/or stand sliding across the floor. For more stability (drag), you can glue rough fabric to the bottom of the piece of 2x4. For even more stability, use a strap that won't stretch instead of the elastic--but that option has the disadvantage that you can't make small changes in your position as easily while playing.
You now have a portable alto clarinet support that will not mar the bell.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
Post Edited (2008-08-03 17:10)
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The Clarinet BBoard
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