 The Clarinet BBoard
|
Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2012-02-11 23:38
So I was just watching a video of the clarinet solo section of the Pines of Rome filmed in 1952 under the direction of Arturo Toscanini. In it (in addition to the camera NEVER showing the clarinet) it was obvious that the basses were on the left and the violins were on the right.
??????
Was this ONLY a Toscaniniism or were there other schools of thought 'back-in-the-day' which called for such a thing.
I must say that I have seen the planogram of concert bands be more flexible, or the wind/horn section of orchestras moved around, or the orchestral percussion section bandied about, but NEVER have I seen this string convention challenged.
Any takers on this one welcome.
...................Paul Aviles
Post Edited (2012-02-11 23:39)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2012-02-12 01:48
Paul -
Toscanini put the 1st violins on the left and the 2nd violins on the right. He said they were "the shoulders of the orchestra." Classical composers often wrote antiphonal effects, with the two sections alternating, which are meaningless with the 2nd violins sitting on the left behind the 1sts. The opening of the last movement of the Tchaikovsky 6th switches between the two sections on every note and is nearly unintelligible without the violins divided. In http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZ3X-ijrSJM at 2:30, you can see the 1st violins at Toscanini's left.
The film is from 1952. At 3:20 you can see about half the clarinetist's head, and I'm sure it's Alexander Williams, who became principal when Augustin Duques left the orchestra in 1949 http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/read.html?f=1&i=41604&t=41502. For a list of orchestra members, see http://www.amazon.com/Arturo-Toscanini-NBC-Years-Amadeus/dp/1574670697. Open the "Look Inside link and search for Personnel. Then go to the list beginning at p. 278. The clarinetists are at p. 280. Alex Williams told me that he was playing on the RCA LP, which was recorded in 1953. See p. 297.
The Minnesota Orchestra has the same arrangement for nearly everything, and from the arrival of Alan Gilbert, the New York Philharmonic has done the same.
Ken Shaw
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: davyd
Date: 2012-02-12 04:49
I have seen a string setup (from audience left to right) of "violin 1, cello/bass, viola, violin 2" used several times, in repertoire ranging from Mozart to Mahler. I'm informed that in Mahler's day, this is how it was done. Further, I have seen this layout with clarinets and bassoons switched, to put all the bass clef instruments together.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: concertmaster3
Date: 2012-02-12 06:46
The violas and cellos often get switched too. There are so many orchestral formations that when I've gone into an orchestra to play 2nd violin or viola, I have to remember where this orchestra seats its strings or wait for another member of the section lol.
Ron Ford
Woodwind Specialist
Performer/Teacher/Arranger
http://www.RonFordMusic.com
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Grabnerwg
Date: 2012-02-12 07:11
You can move the strings around all you want. But please don't put the trumpets right behind the clarinets! At least when I'm playing.
Walter Grabner
www.clarinetxpress.com
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: BobD
Date: 2012-02-12 09:47
I'm with you Walt. I played for awhile with that arrangement and it was unbearable. Fortunately I got the conductor to move them.
Bob Draznik
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2012-02-12 13:24
Geez, thanks all for the insight.
Thank you Ken for the links and the details. Wow, you're getting war stories from one of Toscanini's minions???? I hope you are taking a digital recorder with you for some of those !!
...............Paul Aviles
P.S. Walter, that's funny, but you know if a conductor takes CONTROL of the complete sound picture no one section runs amok.
Post Edited (2012-02-12 13:30)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2012-02-12 14:58
Paul -
The "shoulders of the orchestra" quote came from a Toscanini bio I read many years ago.
I studied with Alex Williams in the late 1960s. He told me that he had played the PoR solo on the LP.
The Duques material comes from Steve Hartman, who studied with him.
I've been at Minnesota and NY Phil. concerts and seen the seating.
Ken Shaw
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: William
Date: 2012-02-12 15:40
Trumpets behind the clarinetists (or any other WW) is why God invented the sound barriers and ear plugs.
Personally, I've always mused that the "brass" (& perhaps even the perc) should be positioned on the edges of the orchestra where they would be forced to play with some degree of restraint. Placing the trumpets and trombones in the back just forces them to play with, what a trombonist once described to me as, "balls to the walls" volume. At the expense of everyone else ears..........
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2012-02-12 16:56
When Stokowski used to guest conduct us, that would be the mid 60s, he sat all the winds on his right, the basses lined up in the back center of the orchestra and the percussion and brass on opposite sides of the stage in back. He got unique sounds. Here's an old joke for you.
There was a great conductor but no one knew the secret for his greatness. At every concert he would get on the podium and look at a piece of paper he kept in his vest pocket and began to conduct and acheived a great sound. One day someone managed to get a peek at the message and it read: (drum roll please).
Violins on my left, viola's and cello's on my right, woodwinds in the center.
(Slam bam) ESP eddiesclarinet.com
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: JamesOrlandoGarcia
Date: 2012-02-12 19:45
I've never been in an orchestra where the first violins weren't to the conductors left but I've seen the seconds, violas and cellos in seated in every configuration. I currently play in an orchestra where its first, cello, viola, second with the basses behind the 1sts and cellos.
I'm a huge fan of antiphonal violins. I do have a hard time liking the cellos and the basses on the left when the bassoons and tubas are going to be more stage right. Personally I'm a fan of the first, viola, cello, second configuration.
And Walter... I feel you on the trumpets. I currently have the first trumpet behind me playing the opening of 2nd Suite of Romeo and Juliet... it hurts.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Sean.Perrin
Date: 2012-02-12 22:17
Many seating arrangements have been toyed with in the past, including having the basses seated in an arc accross the back of the entire string section. The book "Anatomy of the Orchestra" contains some really interesting history on the subject, as well as some diagrams of said arrangements in the first chapter on strings.
Founder and host of the Clarineat Podcast: http://www.clarineat.com
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: grenadilla428
Date: 2012-02-12 22:53
I'm a huge fan of the Etymotic earplugs for musicians. I bought them after I showed up to a concert to find that seating had been rearranged and I literally bumped my elbow on the timpani! Since then, they have helped whenever noise levels get too loud (like when our conductor puts us in front of the trumpets). You hear yourself differently because sound travels through your jawbone, but everything else sounds great - just quieter. The cheap ones run about $10.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: marcia
Date: 2012-02-13 04:35
>I'm a huge fan of the Etymotic earplugs for musicians.
I agree entirely. I have had to endure sitting in front of trumpets on several occasions. The thing that saved my hearing was my Etymotic earplugs. I think every trumpet player should have to spend an entire rehearsal sitting in front of the rest of the trumpet section--and don't spare the horses! ![[grin]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie5.gif)
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: concertmaster3
Date: 2012-02-13 10:59
Speaking of trumpets...
Somehow, when we played Mahler 9 during my Bachelors the trumpets ended up directly behind me...a three of them (I was playing English horn). It was like they were directly pointed at my head! No matter of shielding helped...
Also, somehow we were seated in the first couple of rehearsals for Rite of Spring, and I was in front of the Trombones, also as I was playing English horn. Still don't know how that happened. But, they got moved somewhere, and I was now beside the second timpani. Oh the life of playing an aux instrument!
Ron Ford
Woodwind Specialist
Performer/Teacher/Arranger
http://www.RonFordMusic.com
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2012-02-13 12:03
One arrangement I haven't seen much puts the musicians on risers, so that at least the brasses blast over the heads of the people in front of them instead of directly into the ears. Another advantage with risers is that the audience can see everybody.
There are major problems with risers built like open bleachers, where a dropped score, instrument or mouthpiece can fall through to the floor below. The equipment can get damaged; it makes distracting noise when it falls; and it can also go walkabout, difficult to retrieve in the middle of a rehearsal or a concert. The best risers are carpeted, solid platforms bolted together, so that they're easily moved and repositioned but they give a stable surface without gaps. The best risers I've seen had ramps at the sides, to accomodate people who can't walk up stairs. That orchestra included two musicians who used wheelchairs.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: William
Date: 2012-02-13 15:11
As a clarinetist, I refuse to sit in front of the trumpets without--at the very least--sound barriers (plastic Wengers, etc). Either the trumpet section is moved, or they can call a sub for me.
fwiw, I always try to keep a set of ear plugs in my case but hate to use them unless absolutely necessary. The sound is never quite right......
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: kdk ★2017
Date: 2012-02-13 15:30
Ed Palanker wrote:
> When Stokowski used to guest conduct us, that would be the mid
> 60s, he sat all the winds on his right, the basses lined up in
> the back center of the orchestra and the percussion and brass
> on opposite sides of the stage in back.
He set the Philadelphia Orchestra up that way, too, when he made his return to the Academy of Music in 1962, 50 years after his debut there with the orchestra. I think that seating arrangement was something he was playing with at the time, not a long-standing preference. He was always experimenting. When I saw him conduct at the Robin Hood Dell (the orchestra's summer home for many years) the orchestra was seated in a more standard way, I think with both violin sections on his left and the violas and cellos on the right.
I do have a really distinct memory of seeing Bernstein on a telecast with the NY Philharmonic with the cellos in the middle to his right. I can't remember if the violas or the 2nd violins were on his right at the apron. Maybe finding one of the Young People's Concerts (they're still available on VHS and DVD) would confirm how he arranged the NYP in those days.
Karl
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
Author: kdk ★2017
Date: 2012-02-13 17:05
I just did a quick search on YouTube and found several of the Bernstein Young People's Concerts in their collection. These are from the late 1950s. Cellos definitely inside on the conductor's right. It looks like violas on the inside left. You rarely see the outside right, but they'd have to be the 2nd violins.
Karl
|
|
Reply To Message
|
|
The Clarinet Pages
|
 |
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
.jpg){kind=small}
