 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: senior
Date: 2008-09-02 08:48
Before I get started, I should say that I play Soprano, Alto and Tenor sax, and have for many years.
It has been many more years since I last tried playing clarinet. I have made the attempt twice before. Both times was a disaster. This is my third time and things are progressing much better. I am actually having fun with it. I believe that the times before can be attributed to lack of understanding and crappie clarinets. This time I bought a Boosey and Hawks, 40 year old, wooden student clarinet, that has been restored. Local tech says it is leak tight. According to my tuner, the clarinet is in tune with it’s self, from the lowest note to just a couple of notes into the third register. That is as far as I can play at this time. That is the good news. The bad news is that it plays just a hair flat of a half tone. If I play a C, I get a sharp Bb. If I play an open G, I get a slightly sharp F. It is consistent over the range of notes that I am able to play. I tried 4 different mouthpieces. No change. Measured the barrel bore and compared it to the mouthpieces. Mouthpieces are 14.8 mm and the barrel is 14.6 mm Approx. So I am thinking I probably need a shorter barrel.
So my question is. Am I correct or am I missing something here?
The barrel I have is 63.5 mm. What size should I buy?
This may all be academic. If my progress continues in a satisfactory manner over the next few months, I may just buy myself a Buffet or Lablanc or something nice for Christmas.
Thanks for any insight you may have.
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2008-09-02 08:57
Er....forgive me if that sounds obvious...but when you play an open G (no fingers on), the tuner *will* show this as an F; ditto with the C: a fingered C will produce a concert Bb.
The clarinet is as much a transposing instrument as are the saxes.
--
Ben
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Author: Tobin
Date: 2008-09-02 11:52
...so to add on, your 63.5 mm barrel is probably too short, although I don't know the specific standard barrel length of the horn you're playing. Buffet's are 66 generally, but standards change from designer to designer.
When you play C you would like to have an in-tune Bb appear on your tuner. Welcome back to clarinet, and good luck!
James
Gnothi Seauton
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Author: pewd
Date: 2008-09-02 14:18
play a G on your tenor saxophone. what does that show on the tuner? it should register as an F.
tenon sax, clarinet are pitched in Bb
alto sax, bari sax: Eb
after the clarinet is warmed up, pull the barrel out about 1 mm. play an open G - it should register as an in tune concert F.
your barrel is the correct length for your instrument.
- Paul Dods
Dallas, Texas
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Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2008-09-02 19:01
Assuming you are transposing your tuner correctly there is a problem with the clarinet. The problem with getting a longer barrel, you would need at least a 66 or 67, is that it will make your throat tones much to flat in proportion to the rest of the instrument since you said that it plays in tune with itself. Let’s hope you’re just not transposing your tuner correctly as suggested above. Make sure your B on the break tunes to a concert pitch A to A440 - 441. If it can’t there’s a problem with the bore or you don’t have a Bb clarinet but perhaps a C clarinet. ESP
www.peabody.jhu.edu/457 Listen to a little Mozart
ESP eddiesclarinet.com
Post Edited (2008-09-03 01:50)
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Author: senior
Date: 2008-09-02 19:21
DUH. Being a sax player, I knew that. I just wasn't thinking. Pulled the barrel about 1 mm and there it is, just right. Thanks to all for getting my head on straight. Now for some practise.
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Author: nes
Date: 2008-09-03 07:45
i pull my barrel out about 1.5mm, and upper-lower joint out about 1.5mm, both, to get intune with the tuner.
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2008-09-03 15:21
Music stores sell sets of tuning rings for playing with the barrel pulled out. I'm pretty sure one of the standard tuning rings is 1mm. If you put the ring down over the tenon to close up the gap when you put the sections together, you get the right amount of pull-out every time and the joint can't rock, which can damage the tenon.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2008-09-03 18:46
Lelia Loban wrote:
>> I'm pretty sure one of the standard tuning rings is 1mm.>>
In fact, you usually get a set of three: 1mm, 2mm and 4mm. Mathematically inclined readers will realise instantly that that that gives you every possible whole number of mm up to 7mm, (and if you want more than that, the addition of just one 8mm ring does the trick for every whole number of mm up to 15mm!-)
Tony
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2008-09-03 20:58
HoHoHo, and many [instant] chortles, TKS, Tony, for your teachings of our numbering and addition systems, a bit of tongue-in-cheek perhaps??, Don
Thanx, Mark, Don
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Author: Avie
Date: 2008-09-03 21:11
Using your tuner I would pull out until the clarinet is in tune, measure the total space , and add it to the barrel length used. If Im not mistaken that should be the approximate length barrel I would buy. As Ed guessed, probably around 66mm for a buffet.
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2008-09-03 21:40
> In fact, you usually get a set of three: 1mm, 2mm and 4mm
Hmm. Mine are 0.5, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 mm. Which means I can eg pull the barrel by 1.5mm and between joints 0.5mm, or ... (how's that for combinations? ![[wink]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie3.gif) )
--
Ben
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2008-09-03 22:07
Ben wrote:
>> Hmm. Mine are 0.5, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 mm. Which means I can eg pull the barrel by 1.5mm and between joints 0.5mm, or ... (how's that for combinations?>>
Yes, that's a good idea that won't work for me on modern instruments, because my rings are too big to go in the middle joint. But if they were slightly smaller, it would probably be a good idea to have two lots of {0.5, 1.0, 2}, which gives you every combination up to 3.5mm in both places, plus the option of less in the middle and more at the top.
We do that sort of thing a lot on old instruments, where the wood is much more prone to change dimensions with temperature and humidity.
Tony
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Author: clarnibass
Date: 2008-09-04 05:58
I've never had a problem without using tuning rings so I've never used them, but I have a question for those who have. How easy is it to make adjustments "along the way" with the tuning rings? Can the rings rettle while you play if, for example, you need to open a bit more? What if you need to slightly close, maybe because you played bass clarinet for a long time and your clarinet got cold again.
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Author: tictactux ★2017
Date: 2008-09-04 13:58
Every loose part can start rattling and humming. So, if you use tuning rings, "open some more" is not always an option. If there's enough water in the socket, the rings may stay put due to the wather's adhesion force, but I wouldn't bet my derrière on that.
--
Ben
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2008-09-04 17:52
Ben wrote:
>> Every loose part can start rattling and humming. So, if you use tuning rings, "open some more" is not always an option. If there's enough water in the socket, the rings may stay put due to the wather's adhesion force, but I wouldn't bet my derrière on that.>>
FWIW, in my fairly extensive experience this has never been a problem. (It shouldn't put you off, therefore.)
Nitai wrote:
>> What if you need to slightly close, maybe because you played bass clarinet for a long time and your clarinet got cold again?>>
You'd need to bear this difficulty in mind.
Remember, the point of using tuning rings is only to minimise any tuning difficulties internal to the clarinet scale when you have to play at a lower pitch than the one that suits the clarinet as it normally is -- and are therefore pulled out.
But if those tuning difficulties -- eg strongly played E and F on the bottom line and space respectively -- turn out not to be a problem in a particular piece when pulled out, or can be easily corrected by other means, say by using:
E: T x o x / o o o plus RH Eb trill key
and
F: T o o x / o o o plus RH Eb trill key
....then you don't need to use the rings.
Of course, you always have to be on the lookout for changing circumstances. Just recently I pulled out in the middle of the A clarinet to play the final few bars of the slow movement of the Brahms clarinet quintet -- this helps control both low A and the final F# -- and then forgot to push in again, because I was concerned with removing moisture in the bore of the instrument.
This meant that the opening of the third movement was flatter than I expected -- I quickly worked out why, but of course had to wait for several lines before the opportunity to push in presented itself:-(
Tony
Post Edited (2008-09-04 17:53)
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Author: mrn
Date: 2008-09-04 17:58
Don Berger wrote:
<<HoHoHo, and many [instant] chortles, TKS, Tony, for your teachings of our numbering and addition systems, a bit of tongue-in-cheek perhaps??, Don>>
Hi Don. I don't think Tony's remark was intended as a joke. If you're not used to dealing with binary numbers like us engineer-types, it might not be immediately obvious that you can make all integer mm lengths from 1-7 mm with just one 1 mm, one 2mm, and one 4 mm ring.
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2008-09-04 18:05
mrn wrote:
> Hi Don. I don't think Tony's remark was intended as a joke.
> If you're not used to dealing with binary numbers like us
> engineer-types,
or woodworkers, or mechanics, or ...
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Author: mrn
Date: 2008-09-04 18:26
Mark Charette wrote:
> mrn wrote:
>
> > Hi Don. I don't think Tony's remark was intended as a joke.
>
> > If you're not used to dealing with binary numbers like us
> > engineer-types,
>
> or woodworkers, or mechanics, or ...
I should just keep my mouth shut, shouldn't I. Wait...Don't answer that!
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Author: Avie
Date: 2008-09-04 18:39
Im confused. I was under the impression that tuning rings leaves a gap inside the clarinet and may not be the best way to tune a clarinet. Are tuning rings as efficient as having the correct length barrel or does it not matter?
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2008-09-04 19:13
Hi Avie- To me, the purpose of the tuning rings is to fill-up the gap in a cl's bore due to "pulling the barrel", and elsewhere, for tuning purposes as Tony has described beautifully for us. IF, I have ruffled feathers in finding some humor in Tony's comments, particularly the addition of an 8mm to pull for a total of 15 mm, I hereby apologise and will commit hari-kari on request. Is this OK, GBK ?? delete what you may wish. Don
Thanx, Mark, Don
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Author: Jack Kissinger
Date: 2008-09-04 19:22
If tuning rings worked the way Lelia suggests (i.e., fit down over the tenon), then they would indeed create a gap (just as pulling out without a tenon ring would do). However, they don't work that way. Instead they fit up into the socket. Their primary purpose (other than perhaps spacing) is to eliminate the internal gap that would otherwise be caused by pulling out.
One way to solve all these intonation problems is to substitute a nickel for the tuning ring(s). ![[toast]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smiley15.gif)
Best regards,
jnk
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Author: mrn
Date: 2008-09-04 21:03
<<IF, I have ruffled feathers in finding some humor in Tony's comments, particularly the addition of an 8mm to pull for a total of 15 mm, I hereby apologise and will commit hari-kari on request. Is this OK, GBK ?? delete what you may wish.>>
From what I can tell, I don't think you offended anybody, Don (certainly not me). I shouldn't have even said anything.
If anything, I feel silly now for not seeing the humor in pulling out 15 mm of barrel. I don't think you can even do that and have the instrument stay in one piece!
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Author: Jack Kissinger
Date: 2008-09-04 21:45
If you look closely, you'll see that Tony, himself, included a smiley at the end of his message.
Best regards,
jnk
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Author: clarnibass
Date: 2008-09-05 08:11
Hi Tony
>> You'd need to bear this difficulty in mind.
Can I cat this in mind instead?
>> But if those tuning difficulties... turn out not to be a problem in a particular
>> piece when pulled out.... then you don't need to use the rings.
I think almost all the music I play could be equivilent to a piece where it would turn out this way, but for a more basic idea rather than specific.
Your example was very good to show the circumstances changing in a specific piece. In the music I (usually) play everything can theoretically change as fast as a person can make a change. I could plan for a while to play something specific at a certain moment, but a fraction of a second before that moment realize it's actually better not to play at all, or play something different that I planned. Or maybe I didn't play for a while, and then in just a moment decide it is better to suddenly play, and if I enter and it's a little out of tune - too late. In this respect it's similar to "classical" music - I can't just stop. It's a matter of deciding what is more important in that moment, etc.
Nitai
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Author: Avie
Date: 2008-09-06 12:08
Hi Don- I was refering to the increased internal gap, for example created between the tennon of the upper joint and the bottom of the barrel socket by whatever thickness of the external tuning ring used. I was under the impression that this could possibly make a differance in the tone. Thanks avie.
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2008-09-06 13:14
Avie wrote:
>> I was refering to the increased internal gap, for example created between the tennon of the upper joint and the bottom of the barrel socket by whatever thickness of the external tuning ring used.>>
Tuning rings don't work like this, as Jack Kissinger has pointed out.
Tony
Post Edited (2008-09-06 13:15)
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2008-09-06 13:23
Hi Avie, "since you asked", I'm afraid I dont understand your question re: "internal gap". To me, as Jack said [5th post above] that is the function of the rings to fill the gap ! J K, am I the first to comment on the "nickel solution, it prob. would work well. Don
Thanx, Mark, Don
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Author: Avie
Date: 2008-09-06 23:56
I was under the wrong impression of how a tuning ring is applied. I should have read Jacks post . Thanks Tony , Jack, Don, etc.
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Author: jeffy
Date: 2008-09-09 21:54
This is a major issue for me. I play keyboard. I understand that a C on a clarinet is not a C on a standard tuned keyboard but will the pitches be perfectly matched to the same notes on a keyboard buy the transposed name? I hope that makes sense. I will probably not bother learning the note names on the clarinet since it would only confuse me. As long is the notes are the same but only differnt in name, then I am fine. I will just call them by the notes on my keyboard. I plan on learning totally by ear anyway and just start learning the same riffs I play on my keyboard on the clarinet. Starting with blues and moving on to major scales and arpegios. I have no interest in classical music. I play jazz.
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2008-09-10 09:16
jeffy wrote:
>> I understand that a C on a clarinet is not a C on a standard tuned keyboard but will the pitches be perfectly matched to the same notes on a keyboard buy the transposed name?>>
Good clarinet players play the same sort of notes as everyone else. Bad clarinet players may well play out of tune.
What sort of clarinet player you are will be up to you.
>> I have no interest in classical music. I play jazz.>>
Perfect intonation is not of prime importance in some jazz styles -- though of course some jazz players do have impeccable intonation.
I was tempted to conclude by saying:
"I have no interest in jazz. I play classical music."
...but I didn't.
Tony
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Author: mrn
Date: 2008-09-10 15:36
Tony Pay wrote:
<<Perfect intonation is not of prime importance in some jazz styles -- though of course some jazz players do have impeccable intonation.>>
To elaborate on what Tony wrote, it's also true that some styles of jazz have a different concept of what good intonation means, because of the way intonation is used as an expressive effect in jazz. A perfect "blue note" is often only slightly flat as compared to a major scale tone (but not a complete semitone flat), for example. That would be bad intonation in classical music, but when a good jazz player hits it just right, it sounds great in context.
I would venture to say that the very best jazz players are oftentimes the ones who are the most sensitive to intonation and know when and how best to deviate from equal temperament whenever the music calls for it.
Post Edited (2008-09-10 15:50)
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2008-09-10 16:23
Michael wrote:
>> To elaborate on what Tony wrote, it's also true that some styles of jazz have a different concept of what good intonation means, because of the way intonation is used as an expressive effect in jazz. A perfect "blue note" is slightly flat as compared to a major scale tone (but not a complete semitone flat), for example. That would be bad intonation in classical music, but when a good jazz player hits it just right, it sounds great in context.>>
But the context has to be taken into account in classical music too. It's easy to underestimate the degree to which ALL players of a piece of classical music may be modulating pitches, on both sides of equal temperament, in order to create the luminosity of sound that characterises the greatest performances.
Mere 'bending' of solo notes for expressive effect is a much lower order of achievement.
>> I would venture to say that the very best jazz players are oftentimes the ones who are the most sensitive to intonation and know when and how best to deviate from equal temperament whenever the music calls for it.>>
The way you put that seems to imply that the very best jazz players are more sensitive than the very best classical players to delicate issues of intonation. I don't think that's even remotely true.
However, what is certainly true is that the jazz enterprise, far more often than the classical enterprise, tends to spotlight players who require me to switch off my 'bad intonation' module COMPLETELY in order to appreciate what they have to offer. Quite independently of expression, they're SO sharp (say) that the only explanation is that they can't possibly be hearing the pitch of what else is going on.
(Of course, you can label that as 'an expressive effect' too -- that is, if you believe that it is;-)
Tony
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Author: mrn
Date: 2008-09-10 18:08
Tony Pay wrote:
<<The way you put that seems to imply that the very best jazz players are more sensitive than the very best classical players to delicate issues of intonation. I don't think that's even remotely true.>>
No. That's not what I meant. Sorry if it came across that way. What I meant was that the best jazz players are oftentimes the *jazz players* with the most sensitive ears for intonation. I wasn't comparing jazz players to classical players in that sentence. (Of course, this might just reflect my own biases as somebody who plays mostly classical--I tend to favor players who are more sensitive to intonation.)
There are some jazz players with really rotten intonation out there, but the *best* jazz musicians, in my opinion, have a good sense of intonation and when and if they deviate from equal temperment, they know what they are doing. In other words, you can be an mediocre jazz player with questionable intonation, but to be really great, I think you have to be sensitive to tuning, too, much like a good classical player, but certainly not any more so.
To make an analogy with classical music, anyone can play dissonant notes and throw common practice harmony to the wind, but that won't turn you into a Stravinsky. Non-standard intonation is part of jazz, and it can sound terrible or wonderful, depending on who's playing/singing it.
I realize this sort of modulation happens in classical music, too, but as you suggest, it is usually much more subtle to the ear and is (usually) not a defining characteristic of the style, like it is in jazz.
And of course intonation is now a non-issue in a lot of pop music, thanks to "Auto-Tune," but that's a whole other story, one you don't want to get me started on.... :-)
Post Edited (2008-09-10 18:45)
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Author: clarnibass
Date: 2008-09-10 22:09
>> Mere 'bending' of solo notes for expressive effect is a much lower order of achievement.
Technically? Probably. But considering everything that is included in achievement (at least the way I think about it), then it still might be, but only if compared with itself it is better than the other example compared with itself. For (a theoretical) example, it's possible to imagine a solo note that is bent, in a specific place in a specific jazz song played by a specific instrument. Now imagine two identical examples of this same bend. It's very possible that one of those will be great and the other very bad, because of everything else that happened. So the "bending of solo notes" itself doesn't determine the level of achievement, and same for the other example, IMO.
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