 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: gladiator
Date: 2016-12-20 03:18
what is the technique to effectively and smoothly glissando(bend) up from clarion to altissimo?
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Author: Simon Aldrich
Date: 2016-12-20 07:26
One effective technique to gliss from the clarion register to the altissimo is to use alternate ("fake") fingerings for the altissimo notes. These fingerings are extensions of the clarion register, which makes the gliss seamless.
For example, if you have to gliss from the clarion to an altissimo Eb, you would finger the high Eb as octave key plus the throat Ab key. That fingering renders the high Eb an extension of the clarion register.
Simon
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Author: gladiator
Date: 2016-12-20 16:21
the question is how to gliss smoothly from clarion C to altissimo C#, as there are no toneholes or anything similar to glide fingers off.
similar thing with glissing from chalumeau A# to clarion B
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Author: Tobin
Date: 2016-12-20 16:50
Hello Gladiator,
"clarion C to altissimo C#". As Simon Aldrich has suggested -- you finger the altissimo C# as a chalumeau F#4, no thumb (register key if you prefer the pitch).
"Open" G = D
Ab/G# = Eb
A = E
Bb = F
These go progressively flat as you ascend in fingering. They are often great fingerings on Eb and Bass clarinet.
"Chalumea A# to clarion B"?
Bb fingering plus the addition of LH trill key 2.
James
Gnothi Seauton
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Author: sfalexi
Date: 2016-12-21 04:09
I slide my fingers into the C# position, but purposely half-hole the left hand fingers as I'm going about C and it works very well. I've been trying to tame that darn Artie Shaw Concerto gliss (clarion G to altissimo G) for a while, and I can go G to altissimo E, but there's always a distinctive jump in notes trying to go above that.
Lately, I've had better success half-holing the left hand fingers (middle and ring finger), and holding the RH index and middle fingers down, and using that to manipulate the smear up to a G (you can play G as an overblown C#, so I'm trying to use that one).
Much like you slide your fingers off to go up to C, you actually slide them back ON to go smoothly to C#, and then can continue to slide off AGAIN, or work with different fingerings to manipulate the overtones and transitions above that.
Alexi
US Army Japan Band
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Author: DSMUSIC1
Date: 2016-12-21 06:50
I am reposting this for you....it is something I wrote awhile ago. I hope it will be of some help to you. For me it has less (but still something) to do with finger movement and their position and more to do with learning how to manipulate voicing. It is a combination of using your throat, embouchure and the speed of your airstream in the proper way. At the bottom of the post is an exercise I used to develop it.
Dennis Strawley
Author: DSMUSIC1 (---.hsd1.md.comcast.net - (Comcast Cable) Ellicott City, MD United States)
Date: 2014-11-16 06:50
In my opinion, you will get the best results bending notes or when playing glissando with the reed and mouthpiece combination that you presently play......as long as it is the set-up that you get your best overall results with and are comfortable and happy with (a good teacher can help you with this).
It is a very individual thing. There is no one reed/mouthpiece combination that will work for all. That being said, I can glissando and bend notes with a close/long or a open/short facing mouthpiece, however It is easiest for me to achieve the results I am after by playing a medium open mouthpiece with an opening of around 113 and a 32-34 length.
For me, bending notes and glissando are achieved by a combination of proper voicing manipulation, finger movement and air speed.
In the link below you will find an example of Rhapsody in Blue. You can see where I smear notes without using my fingers. I am playing a Pomarico Black Crystal mouthpiece (if I remember correctly) with the above measurements. I am pretty sure it would sound similar if I played it on any of my Vandoren mouthpieces, my Chedeville, Kanter, or anything else I may have in my mouthpiece drawer, with subtle tonal differences.
The important thing to remember is to keep the airstream very fast and well supported. For learning voicing manipulation, practice chromatically from high C descending chromatically, first using your fingers, than by voicing the notes only and not moving your fingers: C-B-C (fingers), C-B-C (voicing), C-Bb-C, C-A-C, etc.
Hope this helps and good luck!
-Dennis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3GbAKww1KI
Post Edited (2016-12-21 06:59)
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Author: Gouffre
Date: 2016-12-22 18:28
You can play the clarion high C as an altissimo fingering, 0xx xxx G#.
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Author: gladiator
Date: 2016-12-28 03:45
thank you everyone for your suggestions
thank you for your video and insight Dennis, I watched it and I think your gliss is very good and you played the passage with character. I agree - there are many factors involved in playing the clarinet in general and of course many factors in playing glissandos properly. best thing is for me to experiment a lot and see how and what works well... don't get me wrong, but it IS a clarion gliss though... ones going into altissimo are the trickiest hence why I was asking about those specifically
Post Edited (2016-12-28 04:00)
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2016-12-29 01:09
I'd say that there is no generic answer to the question, "What is the technique to effectively and smoothly glissando up from clarion to altissimo?"
It depends on which clarion note and which altissimo note.
Simon's idea of extending the clarion upwards by using overblown throat notes (G, G# A, Bb) is one idea, and you can add trill keys too.
But if you want to go even higher, you have to practice using very unusual tongue positions that give extensions of altissimo notes DOWNWARDS. Then you can sometimes hop to an altissimo fingering from a half-holing clarion glissando fingering as you go up. The positions involve very small mouth cavities around the reed – the tongue is right to the roof of the mouth.
To find the tongue positions experientially, I just now found it best to start with the altissimo fingering and gliss downwards as a preliminary exercise.
But, I hardly ever need to do it. (There's a bit in Berio Sequenza IXa where something of the sort is indicated, but it's not clear whether he wants a fingered chromatic or a true gliss, and I never asked him because, well, he might have told me.)
What do YOU want to do? Which note to which note?
I'll then have a go at answering you.
Tony
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Author: sfalexi
Date: 2016-12-30 00:19
I thought i linked to this video in my post. (the exercise starts at about 20 seconds in)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CC80DN_xunI
Quote:
To find the tongue positions experientially, I just now found it best to start with the altissimo fingering and gliss downwards as a preliminary exercise.
This is an example of how to practice voicing. It's a common exercise on sax, however I've never seen it really taught or talked about on clarinet.
You play a note (easiest on higher clarion or altissimo notes), and use your tongue position, throat, and to a SLIGHT extent, your embouchure to bend the note down.
A good exercise would be to play a thumb C (C above the staff). Slur to a B (using fingers). Then play C to B using only your voicing. Then C to Bb with fingers, then C to Bb with voicing. See how far down you can go.
Essentially you are smearing up the clarinet with the SOUND, but what is actually happening is you are constantly voicing a lower pitch than you're actually fingering as you go up, and at the end allowing the voicing to bring it back up to the fingered pitch.
Alexi
US Army Japan Band
Post Edited (2016-12-30 00:19)
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2016-12-30 02:03
Indeed you did mention glissandi to C in your post, Alexi. My purpose was to say something about glissandi beyond that.
He'd pointed out that "ones going into altissimo are the trickiest hence why I was asking about those specifically", so I was trying to answer him by saying that THOSE, in my experience, are pitch-specific, and therefore fingering specific.
We still don't know quite what he wants to do – and I'm not interested in spending more time than I have already trying to address the general problem – so that's why I posted as I did.
Do you want to CLAIM PRECEDENCE, or something?
Tony
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Author: sfalexi
Date: 2016-12-30 03:09
Tony Pay wrote:
> Do you want to CLAIM PRECEDENCE, or something?
>
> Tony
Nope.
I wonder if the OP has tried out some of the stuff in this thread? I haven't tried the alternative altissimo fingerings like mentioned above (using the chalemeau F# overblown to C#, open G overblown to D, etc), but I'm curious if he/she's tried stuff and what worked for them.
Alexi
US Army Japan Band
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Author: SarahC
Date: 2017-01-02 02:47
without reading the above
3 ways to gliss
- super fast chromatic scale
- bending the pitch with your tongue position and jaw position
- peeling the fingers off the keys
or a combination of those
i find each glass I have tried (although I haven't tried that many....) I have experimented with those options to see which suits the passage/piece the best.
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2017-01-02 23:50
Re. the links and other information above, I regard Tony Pay as one of our most reliable sources because he's a highly-respected teacher as well as a virtuoso. I've heard his glissando. It's brilliant.
My facetious remarks about needing a magical clarinet were a clumsy way of saying that sometimes, those of us who aren't in that professional league need to recognize and accept our own limitations. Maybe if I'd taken private clarinet lessons as a youngster, I might have been able to learn to play a satisfactory glissando, but as an adult amateur working on this skill, I've never mastered it.
Years ago, a visiting friend showed me exactly how to play a seamless glissando covering the entire range of the clarinet, from the lowest chalumeau through the highest altissimo. I'm not going to identify the friend (who sometimes posts here) because I'm afraid that some readers might incorrectly blame that person for poor teaching of the technique, one described by several people in more than one thread on this bulletin board, instead of laying the fault where it belongs, on me. For several months, I practiced diligently what that visitor showed me. My glissando still sounds like crap. Eventually I decided to give up on the "Rhapsody in Blue" glissando (let alone that whole-range gliss) and put the work into less frustrating techniques where I could hear significant progress. Some of us don't have the chops. That's life.
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: gladiator
Date: 2017-01-07 19:21
I'd like to perform a gliss from clarion C to altissimo G(5th above C).
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2017-01-07 19:56
Finger B4 (just above the chalumeau/clarion break) and add RH Ab/Eb key. That overblows to C6 – I find it helps to take a bit more mouthpiece into my mouth.
Then, taking off LH2, LH3, LH4 and RH3 gives standard fingering for G6. You have to find the tongue positions for the smear, and perhaps slide rather than take off LH2 and LH3.
It's a matter of practice. Go up and down at varying speeds.
Tony
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Author: gladiator
Date: 2017-01-07 21:28
are you sure all of those 3 should be taken off? the left middle finger should stay covering the hole for standard g6
and what would I do if I wanted to go from G5 to G6?
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2017-01-07 21:47
No, I'm using the convention that the left hand is, sp (speaker key), LT (thumb), L1, L2, L3, L4 (little finger).
My 'standard' G6 has L1 still on in the left hand, so it looks like:
sp T xoo/xxoEb
You can replace L1 by L2 if you want. Clarinets differ up there.
>> and what what would I do if I wanted to go from G5 to G6? >>
Do this one first.
By the way, you have a misconception if you think I can ever really TELL you what to DO. Try TELLING a child what to DO in order to speak.
Tony
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Author: gladiator
Date: 2017-01-07 22:40
it might be hard to completely describe what i "need to do" to perform this and i don't expect that of you.
however, while telling a child what to do in order to speak will probably be fruitless as the child doesn't even properly understand the language we use as means of communication - telling me how to perform a glissandi is a different thing altogether as i already have adequate experience to understand and grasp the concepts you're trying to relay to me so that i may achieve what i'm trying to.
thanks for your advice, and i'll keep you posted, maybe upload a recording of that gliss :-)
Post Edited (2017-01-07 22:42)
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2017-01-07 23:00
My point was rather that a child babbles until they discover what's required. And what's required in the case of glissando is akin to what's required in order to make the right speech sounds – or better, perhaps, the WRONG speech sounds...
I don't know how to do it, but it's something like....
I'm encouraging you to babble, perhaps:-)
Tony
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2017-01-08 00:53
>> and what what would I do if I wanted to go from G5 to G6? >>
I wrote, "Do this one first."
OK, changed my mind after experimentation, because I find there's a better way than my original idea:
Play the G5 as an overblown B4 (relaxed embouchure to get the pitch right), then slide fingers off and snatch the final G6 either with your conventional fingering or as sp T xoo/xoo which you can also get to pitch with embouchure.
How fast do you need these glissandi, by the way?
Tony
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