 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-19 22:45
Attachment: 01 - Full score - Untitled Project 1 - 001.jpg (81k)
Hi,
I wondered if I could how other people manage the fiddly bit at the end of Gade's Fantasy piece (No 1 from Fantasiestucke op 43)?
I think it might be one of those passages where I am meant to keep my right hand down for open notes, but it also just seems a bit complicated to rattle through at speed. Maybe I just need to memorise it and play it about 40,000 times? I have attached a jpg of the phrase I am talking about.
I'd be really grateful for any thoughts on it.
Thanks!
Jennifer
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-19 22:59
I've just been reading this book about how to memorise music, and have been trying to think about memorising this passage. It's kind of nice to ignore everything else and just focus on this little bit. I still can't imagine being able to play it that fast though.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1508786550/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
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Author: Tom H
Date: 2020-11-19 23:00
I wouldn't keep the right hand down for anything (there are only a couple of throat notes anyway). I would use the RH low F#, but either works of course.
Yes, practice many times and break it up. Maybe use "beat to beat" practicing.
I would not memorize this. What is the speed?
The Most Advanced Clarinet Book--
tomheimer.ampbk.com/ Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001315, Musicnotes product no. MB0000649.
Boreal Ballad for unaccompanied clarinet-Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001314.
Musicnotes product no. MNO287475
Post Edited (2020-11-19 23:01)
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2020-11-19 23:15
I remember this piece well - it was the first non-etude music I learned, not so many years back.
I can't help but memorize pieces so I don't have that problem. I remember having a little problem with the rhythm here - getting the notes to fit seamlessly. That might be your problem - sometimes rhythms throw our fingers into conniptions.
I don't remember exactly how I played it and my clarinet is out of hand right now. I know my hands will remember when I can get back to the clarinet.
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-19 23:33
Thanks for the thoughts. It's 88 crotchets per minute.
I think I am maybe having problems because it is hopping through the full range of the instrument in a series of quite big jumps, so that I have to rearrange my fingers a lot very quickly. I tend to do better with slow sensitive music and not so well with quick music. I will look up "beat to beat" practicing. Thanks!
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2020-11-19 23:48
A more experienced player sees bars three and four as just ONE thing – namely a diminished seventh arpeggio on low F sharp.
If you have practiced THAT sufficiently, the passage will fall out easily.
Tony
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-19 23:58
Crikey! I have no idea what a diminished seventh arpeggio on low F sharp is. I will go and find that out right now.
I bet it's going to be lurking in the back of my Grade 4 exam book on the one page that I haven't yet tried. :-)
Thanks!
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2020-11-20 00:18
Baermann Book 3
the "Bible"
The diminished sevenths are really common because they sound harmonically nebulous. It allows the composer to go from somewhere (hamonically) to almost anywhere else.
.................Paul Aviles
Post Edited (2020-11-20 00:21)
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 00:24
That sounds brilliant. :-)
Is this book that you mean? https://www.musicroom.com/product/hl03770605/carl-baermann-foundation-studies-op-63-clarinet.aspx?clid=510&CAWELAID=120075890000346930
I like David Hite. I have a Hite mouthpiece. :-)
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Author: kdk
Date: 2020-11-20 00:36
What method books do you have available? Maybe if someone here has a copy of one of them we could point you to an exercise to practice diminished 7ths. They're very handy to have under your fingers.
The unique thing about them from a fingering perspective is that, because (putting aside why they're called "diminished 7ths") they are a stack of minor 3rds (3 half steps) there are only really three unique diminished 7th chords. There are different ways enharmonically to spell them, but if you start on C, the next on C# and the next on D, the next one that begins on Eb is enharmonically the same four notes as the one that started on C.
You can build your own study. Start with C-Eb-Gb-A (for purists, technically Bbb, but A works). Next, going up a chromatic scale, is C#-E-G-Bb. Then D-F-Ab-B (again, technically Cb). Continuing up the chromatic scale, start on Eb and use the same notes as the one on C (Eb-Gb/F#-A-C). Starting on E, use the same notes as the one starting on C#, etc.... The Gade excerpt is spelled with F# (which in the excerpt is the actual root) instead of Gb, but it's fingered the same as the C dim 7 chord I started with.
Karl
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Author: kdk
Date: 2020-11-20 00:41
Paul Aviles wrote:
> Baermann Book 3
>
Also Klose (II if you have it in two volumes) in the Daily Studies section and in the Scales and Arpeggios volume of James Collis's series. I'd bet they're somewhere in the Hite series as well.
Karl
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 00:51
Attachment: study.jpg (376k)
I have Essential Clarinet Technique by Davies and Harris, which has a lot of exercises in it. It's this one:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Essential-Clarinet-Technique-John-Davies/dp/0571508596/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=essential+clarinet+technique&qid=1605818751&s=books&sr=1-1
The second exercise on page 61 seems a lot like what I need to do. I have attached a photograph of it.
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 00:56
I also have "The Most Advanced Clarinet Book" by Tom Heimer, and "Technique & Musicianship" by Bruce Peason and Ryan Nowlin.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Most-Advanced-Clarinet-Book/dp/1788785401/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=The+Most+Advanced+Clarinet+Book%22+by+Tom+Heimer&qid=1605819337&s=books&sr=1-1
https://www.amazon.co.uk/W64CL-Tradition-Excellence-Technique-Musicianship/dp/0849771773/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Tradition+of+Excellence%3A+Technique+%26+Musicianship+clarinet&qid=1605819403&s=books&sr=1-1
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 01:05
Attachment: studyredbook.jpg (882k)
I can't see much about it in the other two books except on page 19 of the red book where they have the attached exercise.
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 01:13
Attachment: grade4.jpg (486k)
Attachment: grade5.jpg (517k)
The ABRSM scales and arpeggios book for grades 1 - 5 has these attached exercises in grades 4 and 5. Maybe that means that the one I need is in grade 6 or above?
Adult learner, Grade 3
Equipment: Yamaha Custom CX Bb, Fobes 10K CF mp,
Legere Bb clarinet European Cut #2.5, Vandoren Optimum German Lig.
Post Edited (2020-11-20 01:14)
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 01:22
Attachment: grade 7.jpg (236k)
Here it is!
I found it in the Grade 7 ABRSM syllabus (screenshot attached).
It says:
DIMINISHED SEVENTHS
starting on F+, B- and C+ 2 oct.
legato-tongued / staccato / slurred
starting on F 3 oct.
So that means that what I need is the Grade 7 clarinet exam book, presumably.
That would make a lot of sense, because studying music theory ahead of time, up to grade 5, has helped me a lot with the lower practical grades, so learning the scales and arpeggios ahead might be a really good idea too.
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 01:29
Grade 8 also includes these:
DIMINISHED SEVENTHS
starting on B, C and E- 2 oct.
legato-tongued / staccato / slurred starting on F+ and G 3 oct.
and they come in the same book for £5. That's handy.
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2020-11-20 03:25
It seems to me that you don't need a book: you already have the material you posted originally. And exercises you make up for yourself are an important part of your player development. Here is one suggestion:
Look at the Gade passage. Starting on the low F#, play the arpeggio going up in groups of three, so we get F#AC|ACEb|CEbF#|EbF#A|F#AC|...and so on.
You can follow the notes on the page as you play them. That's useful because it generates a link between the notes you see on the page and the experience of playing them.
Then start at the top A and do the same thing going downwards. In the Gade, the arpeggio loops back on itself, but you can ignore that (or not, depending how much you want to challenge yourself). So the simple version is:
AF#Eb|F#EbC|EbCA|CAF#|AF#Eb(the lower Eb)|F#EbC|...and so on, while the 'looping' version follows the Gade notes directly.
You'll probably make mistakes at first, and have to go slowly, but you'll get better at it.
The next step would be to group the notes in fours, so you'd start:
F#ACEb|ACEbF#|CEbF#A|...etc
The principle here is that you're practising something more complicated than the original passage in one way (there are more notes and more interval shifts to think about) but also simpler, in that you're not tied down to making a musical phrase work.
The final outcome may well be that the original Gade seems to 'play itself' to a greater extent.
Tony
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 03:50
Attachment: 7ths.jpg (33k)
Yes that would really help actually. If it looked like that attached image, is that what you have in mind?
Taking the pressure to sound musical out of the problem is definitely going to help a lot.
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 03:58
Attachment: 7ths.jpg (68k)
Here it is again going in both directions. Is that right?
I completely see what you mean about the importance of learning to make my own exercises. I feel as though the thing I have learned during each ABRSM grade book was not how to play three pieces of music, but how to use the techniques that I needed to learn those pieces. Each time I go up a grade the techniques seem to be different, but they seem to stand me in good stead for whatever is coming next.
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2020-11-20 04:14
Well, you COULD do that; but it’s not what I meant.
I don’t have a music notation program to hand, but in your first example you’d take the second group of 3 down an octave so that F#AC is followed by ACEb with the A and C being a repetition of the last two notes of the first F#AC.
The passage climbs GRADUALLY through the arpeggio.
Tony
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2020-11-20 04:23
And, think of it in triplet quavers with no particular barlength.
Tony
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2020-11-20 04:40
Yes, now in triplet quavers, not across the beat.
And, I don’t think you should write it out. You WANT the bit of struggle that creating it off the Gade entails. Distracting your conscious process allows your unconscious to learn:-)
Tony
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 04:49
That's interesting. That's more or less what that book said. It said that memorising the notes was ideal, and that if I couldn't do that, then putting them slightly off to the side so it was inconvenient to look at them was the next best thing. I might try both of those, but also reading them from the page. I could do with an easy win. :-)
I will see about sorting out triplet quavers tomorrow now. I am on a different computer from the usual and it will be easier on my usual computer. Good idea.
Thanks so much for your advice. When I asked the question I assumed the whole escapade was a lost cause. I've learned such a lot from asking and it seems quite feasible now. :-)
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2020-11-20 04:55
>> I need an easy win >>
No, you don’t. You need a ‘bigger’ problem.
Leave the computer out of it.
Tony
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Author: Tom H
Date: 2020-11-20 09:12
SunnyDaze, "Beat to Beat" practicing is simple. When you have a run of notes you play the ones in the first beat of the phrase and end on the note that starts the next beat. Then do 2 beats worth of the run and end on the first note of the 3rd beat, etc. You can work it different ways, and practice one "length" over & over until it is perfect every time. Then it's good to practice the end beats a bit more since the process has you doing them the fewest times. It is a method I got from Russianoff 45+ years ago.
The Most Advanced Clarinet Book--
tomheimer.ampbk.com/ Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001315, Musicnotes product no. MB0000649.
Boreal Ballad for unaccompanied clarinet-Sheet Music Plus item A0.1001314.
Musicnotes product no. MNO287475
Post Edited (2020-11-20 09:13)
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 09:31
Thank you for the book recommendation Paul. That will sort me right out for Christmas. :-)
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 10:33
Here is my exercise properly written out in case anyone else would like it.
Adult learner, Grade 3
Equipment: Yamaha Custom CX Bb, Fobes 10K CF mp,
Legere Bb clarinet European Cut #2.5, Vandoren Optimum German Lig.
Post Edited (2020-11-20 10:36)
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Author: Jarmo Hyvakko
Date: 2020-11-20 11:04
If you don't know what a diminished 7th accord is, the question is, who the hell is your teacher.
Jarmo Hyvakko, Principal Clarinet, Tampere Philharmonic, Finland
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Author: SunnyDaze
Date: 2020-11-20 13:38
Hi Jarmo,
I just started grade four performance and passed my grade 5 theory exam, and diminished 7th accords haven't crossed my path yet. There's a dominant 7th in Grade 4, but no diminished 7ths.
My teacher is very encouraging and plays the piano like an angel, and that counts for a lot in my book. :-)
Jen
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The Clarinet Pages
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