 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: joseph o'kelly
Date: 2001-04-18 01:46
This is purly a question out of curiosity of what fellow players think. Playing many instruments I am often asked this question. I am asked what is the hardest instrumrent to play. I reply that the clarinet is the hardest to recieve a nice plesen tone out of and that if it is not a great tone it is unplaeasant to hear. I believe that the fingers are uncanningly easy and very well thought out. The oboe's fingering are just plain horrible and even more impossible to play with a nice sound. The flute has flexibility with sound and nice fingering style. Finally I believe the sax is the funnest instrument to play as is is very easy.
Would you agree with this answer?
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2001-04-18 01:57
I pretty well agree with your analysis, J O'K, I found the oboe/eng horn quite difficult to "play-well", and found the alto sax to be somewhat more "facile" [not sure this is an appropriate term] than the soprano clarinets, followed by bass and alto cl's as a bit more difficult. Have had no bassoon or french horn experience, just made funny noises on them. Don
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Author: Pam
Date: 2001-04-18 02:28
Clarinet is probably more difficult than sax and flute, at least according to my teacher. That is why he prefers that his students learn the clarinet first and then the other ones generally come easier. He has one student currently who started off as a terrific sax player and is sometimes having a difficult time with the clarinet. After saying all that I think that the oboe would be really hard to play well - as in making a sound that wouldn't make other people want to run from the room!
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Author: Kim
Date: 2001-04-18 02:36
I think that piano is difficult because of the variety of the ways the hands can be placed on the keyboard. Percussion is pretty difficult to master because of the rhythms. The string instruments are just hard to play because of proper pressure on the strings-a beginner sounds terrible! Brass instruments are very difficult to support as I am finding with the trumpet at the moment. Now for woodwind instruments. Flutes are very easy to produce a tone on, and the fingering is fairly easy to master. Saxes have easy tone production too, and the fingering is similar to the flute. The clarinet, as you said, is difficult to produce a good tone on well. Tone quality is all too important for us and we all criticize ourselves readily on the perfect tone. The oboe and bassoon are difficult instruments because of the double reed. I've never played them, but I know the college juniors in my band are having extreme difficulty producing a good tone on their instruments!
I think that all the instruments are difficult for their own reasons. There is no one "easy" instrument out there-all instruments are unique.
Have fun.
Kim
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Author: Mike Irish
Date: 2001-04-18 05:41
goood question.....
would have to say the most difficult one was the first one...... ( Bb Clarinet )
since then have learned fingerings and playing methods for several instruments..
the Oboe was handed to me on the first day of second semester in 10th grade,
(first day in orch) with a stack of sheet music and a couple reeds supplied by the director.... ans was told I had two weeks to get on line.... I did it.....
since then, I have been able to pick up and play just about any thing , have fingerings for all instruments ( sorry, have not tryed the strings yet, want to )
I still say the first one was the hardest...
have a friend that speaks 7 languages fluently.... said the first one ( other then english, was the hardest... after that, the rest started becoming easier and easier,
he ended up being a linguist for the military and even developed his own language.
I think instruments may be the same way...
Mike
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Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2001-04-18 06:48
I consider the difficulties for flute are underated.
Much flute music is in the third octave where about 2 1/2 times as many finger changes are required on average for note changes, compared with clarinet. Add to this the responsiveness up there, making every finger-change blemish conspicuous. Then look at the extensive practice required to play softly there, with a good tone, and still be able to adjust the embouchure/air pressure, etc to correct the pitch which is highly variable with volume compared with the clarinet.
If you are messing around with mainly the the first two octaves you have barely begun playing the flute. I know many flute players who successfully double on clarinet and sax, but very few reed players master the flute with a good tone and 3rd octave facility.
I have tried to be specific to avoid the syndrome that Mike describes, which is probably real too. There is carry-over from one instrument to another, so they ought to get progressively easier in some ways. For the first instrument we have to teach our fingers to work quickly, accurately and independently. That skill is useful for all others.
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Author: David Kinder
Date: 2001-04-18 06:55
I think Basson/oboe/english horn are the hardest woodwinds to play, let alone master. Clarinet would follow behind them. A lot of keys and fingerings, not to mention tone quality.
For Brass, trombone and French horn are the hardest. With these, it's all about tone.
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Author: Eoin McAuley
Date: 2001-04-18 07:06
I think that the bassoon is the hardest woodwind. The French horn is the hardest brass instrument. For any instrument, the composers will push the players as far as they can go, so a clarinet player will be expected to play much harder music than a bassoon player. This means that to be really good on any instrument you have to work hard. Listen to Charlie Parker on saxophone, then tell me that the sax is easy!
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Author: Kai
Date: 2001-04-18 08:12
Personally, I agree with Mike!
I started with the clarinet followe by the oboe and the bassoon very recently. Now, I play the double-reeds quite regularly and I tihnk more successfully than my clarinet-playing.. but it could just be me!
Was it Philips Meyers (Principal Horn, NYPO) who jokingly said that his instrument always becomes the most difficult when asking for a raise but other than that, it's just as difficult as the others.
Also, I think strings and keyboard are generally harder than winds.
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Author: rina
Date: 2001-04-18 08:22
I heard one music professor say that the clarinet "was the easiest instrument to get a sound out of and the hardest ot master" :-)
Then again, the oboe is the instrument that has truly humbled me.
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Author: bob gardner
Date: 2001-04-18 11:18
I would vote for the keyboard. One has to play more then one line at a time. I have a hard enough time reading one line (one note) at a time. Look at piano music and you have two lines and up to God knows how many notes.
I think I will stay with the clarinet. Just wished there were more players in my area. I know of one other player and he is on this board.
Bob
Every one wants to play the Guitar.
I'm taking a class at the local college, two play brass, one drums, one saxs, one clarinet and forty taking the guitar class. What does that tell you?
Bob
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Author: Shelly
Date: 2001-04-18 12:06
I vote for the piano as well. After playing the clarinet, the piano was so hard for me. It is difficult to watch two lines of music and play two different things with two hands. Not only are you playing different notes but you are playing different rhythms. For example, you could be playing staccato quarter notes with the left hand while the right hand is playing legato eighth notes! (And that is one of the easier examples) I am sure learning the piano is easier for someone who has never played another instrument but if you are used to playing one line of music going to two is very hard.
shelly
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Author: William
Date: 2001-04-18 15:27
The one that you are just beginning to learn how to play. Ultimately, they are ALL just as difficult to master. Good Practicing!!!!!!
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Author: Ginny
Date: 2001-04-18 16:03
I still claim the hardest instrument is the one you play really well. Its easy to play any instrument badly...and very difficult to play any instrument really well.
Of course we all know the oboe is an ill wind that nobody blows good.
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Author: bob gardner
Date: 2001-04-18 16:54
Ginny that was very good --the oboe is an ill wind that nobody blows good.
if one has talent they things are easier then if you have little or no talent. it makes me sick to see kids as well as adults that do not apperate what God has given them They say no big deal. Life can be unfair at times.
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Author: Mandy
Date: 2001-04-18 20:06
IMHO the violin family are the hardest instruments to play by far,there is very little to encourage the player in the early stages.I played violin through junior and secondary school and looking back now most of the time it was just plain awful even though I was in the school and county youth orchestras.
Wind instruments offer rapid prigress to most players in the early stages but the hard work comes later on.I used to work in a music shop and could play most instruments well enough to demonstrate them but it is only recently that I've finally found an intrument I wish to share the rest of my life with THE CLARINET !
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Author: Christoffer
Date: 2001-04-18 20:14
For me, it has always been a tremendous problem, if I had to produce more than one note at a time on an instrument. Therefore, keyboards and strings are in general hard for me.
I tried for a long time to learn the bouzouki; it is mostly played on one string at a time, so that would supposedlymake things easier for me ... not so: I find it really hard to put the fingers the right place on a fretboard, I keep on hitting wrong notes. Much easier for me to do the right combination of holes covered/uncovered on a woodwind.
My first instrument was the recorder: very easy, just blow and you'll get a decent sound. And terrific music can be played on such a simple little thing, there's a lot of great renaissance/baroque stuff out there.
I once read in an edition of the Guiness Book of Records, stated as an undisputable fact, that oboe and french horn were the hardest instruments to play. Never tried one of those, but if they say so ...
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Author: Danielle
Date: 2001-04-18 21:39
the french horn is definately one of the hardest instruments that i know of. i once asked a friend who's a talented french hornist (or whatever you call 'em) how to play his horn (we were fooling around in band class, and had switched instruments. his reply? "with great difficulty." he was right, too. and oboe is also one of the harder instruments...when people hear that i play the clarinet, they're always like, "oh, doesn't everybody?" yeah, it seems like that at times...i just tell them that although "everybody" plays it, not "everybody" plays it well...^__~
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Author: Bob Rausch
Date: 2001-04-21 02:52
I don't think you can compare apples to oranges. I think the hardest Woodwind is the Bassoon/Oboe family. I think the hardest brass is french horn. I won't voice an opinion on the strings family because i dated a violin player once and she told me that wind instruments were "just blow you brains out horns". Needless to say I think the hardest instrument would be the Bag Pipes. I heard it requires huge amounts of air support and physical stamina.
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Author: FT
Date: 2002-01-21 14:45
I think that the hardest instrument is the harp. They play way more than two notes at a time and do that pedal thingy. And when I saw a song for the harp, Oh my!!!! Poor harpists!!!
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