Author: Clarimellonet
Date: 2020-10-21 02:19
For the Vivaldi I'm playing a copy I made back in 2012. I've made chalumeaux in every type of wood including boxwood, but for this particular performance, I was using one in grenadilla of all things because the size of the hall (Wortham in Houston, TX) needed some extra projection to carry.
I tend to think the chalumeau always filled the role of a "doubler's" instrument, even later in its life. The players who were assigned to chalumeaux parts frequently performed on bassoon, oboe, recorder, and flute in addition, and given the relatively small volume of virtuoso repertoire compared to the other winds, I think it's fairly evident that except in the case of itinerant virtuosi, the court wind players were all versed on a number of instruments and able to switch from one to the other seamlessly. In the case of Juditha Triumphans, the obvious assumption would be that the two oboe players switched to "clarens" for the Bb pastorale number, and one took the solo line in the aria. Similarly, the sole appearance of chalumeaux in one number of Gluck's 1762 Orphee, and subsequent omission from the Paris revision seems to indicate that the wind players (maybe the oboes or bassoons in this case) put down their instruments and took up the chalumeaux for that single moment.
One thing that has always struck me as an obvious parallel between the chalumeau and recorder is the number of trios and quartets for the instrument in the same vein as the recorder consort. Since we know that no court (even Darmstadt) would employ three or four chalumeau players on a permanent basis for rare works like those, it's a pretty good assumption that the parts were meant to be played by woodwind doublers rather than specialists. While there were certainly those who excelled at the instrument (Klotsch, the likely dedicatee of the Fasch Concerto was heralded as an exceptional chalumeau player in addition to his skill as a bassoonist), the instrument was always listed second when a musician was praised.
Thankfully this practice would differ from the treatment of the clarinet and clarinet virtuosi in the latter part of the 18th century, though it IS interesting to note that pretty much every modern Broadway book includes some form of clarinet, again just an assumption that any woodwind player can play it, and should be able to at a moment's notice.
Thomas Carroll
Historical Clarinets and Chalumeaux
http://carrollclarinet.com
lotzofgrenser@gmail.com
Post Edited (2020-10-21 02:27)
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