 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Jaysne
Date: 2015-04-05 02:36
Can someone give me some tips on voicing while playing clarinet? I know a little bit about it but want to know more: what exactly it is, why you do it, how to do it, and how/why you do it differently in different situations, etc.
Thanks!
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2015-04-05 07:47
Jaysne -
Voicing involves adjusting your tongue and soft palate positions to favor a particular register, typically the clarion and altissimo. See my posting at http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/read.html?f=20&i=757&t=757 for Charles Neidich's presentation.
The swab-up-the-bell exercise is the best way I know to practice voicing. Roll up a cloth swab or handkerchief and stuff it up the bell tight. Then finger middle B (everything down and the register key open) and blow like the wind. You should get a very stuffy clarion Eb. Then, blow harder and loosen up until you can get a halfway decent sound.
Then, by changing your tongue position and that of your soft palate, you can play several overtones above the Eb. Keep at it until you can play bugle calls. Then use the tongue and soft palate positions you have learned to make smooth register transitions, such as the Bb-to-C switch in the 2nd and 3rd notes of the Debussy Premiere Rhapsodie, and the 3rd movement of the Sant-Saens Sonata where you must cross back and forth over the clarion/altissimo break.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2015-04-05 07:51
If you watched the video highlighted in the thread "The Signature Sound of Daniel Bonade," it is stated quite well in there that voicing is process of using various tongue positions to change the air speed. You can also do this just with your abdominal muscles and skip the voicing but if you prefer to keep control up in the oral cavity.......use the 'voicing' method.
When moving from a lower note to a higher note (particularly skipping from one register to another) you usually need to do two things: increase the air speed and increase the control of you embouchure (a bit more firmness). The inverse is also true which is moving down, decreasing air speed and decreasing embouchure firmness. Again, some prefer to moderate air speed from the gut.
In the referenced video it seemed to say that Robert Marcellus adjusted his tongue position to a very subtle degree: lower tongue position for slower air (as if saying a German "oe" as in Oehler - or just think a combination of 'e' as in the word 'let' and an 'o' as in 'bow') and the higher tongue position for faster air (as if you are saying the sound 'EEEEE')
.................Paul Aviles
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Author: Jaysne
Date: 2015-04-06 03:24
Many thanks, Ken and Paul! This is a lot of good information.
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