 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: max678
Date: 2026-11-10 20:22
Question for everyone here:
I've often been told that "if you can make it sound great in a practice room, it'll sound phenomenal on stage" or some variation of that. However, I find that, if I want to make something sound good in such a dry acoustical environment such as the Wenger practice rooms I often have to play in, I would have to make slight adjustments compared to how I would play something on stage. My question is, do y'all think that using a very dry practice room is still beneficial?
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Author: SecondTry
Date: 2026-11-10 21:31
I think the question is less whether practicing in a room that absorbs more sound than the actual performance venue is still beneficial, and more whether practicing in such a space is better than not practicing at all. For nearly everyone, I'd have to say the answer is an unequivocal yes.
I understand your point (I think) about wanting the practice environment to resemble the performance environment as closely as possible. Otherwise, we risk developing and perfecting skills that may not translate to the concert setting and, in some cases, could even lead us to counterproductive performances.
For me, and your mileage may vary, even practicing in the carpeted rooms of my home rather than in the more reverberant, bare-floor acoustics of my basement has always felt like an exercise in working a little harder to produce a good sound. I've thought of it as a sort of metaphorical ankle-weight training: if I can produce a good sound under less forgiving acoustic conditions, the more accommodating acoustics of a performance space should only be a benefit. Rather than requiring me to adjust my playing to each venue, it helps me develop the ability to project and maintain a good sound in a variety of environments--but that's me.
In fact, even if the performance venue itself were available for practice, I (and again, that's me) would still see value in spending time in less forgiving, sound-absorbing spaces. The reality, though, is that performance venues, or practice spaces with similar acoustics, can be much harder to come by than ordinary practice rooms.
As clarinetists we're constantly making (and need to be prepared to make) adjustments to accommodate variations in our reeds, setups, intonation, venue, and even our own play from day to day, much that I appreciate that less accommodation rather than more may free us up to focus on other nuances of play.
I've often thought that the Marine motto, "Improvise, Overcome, and Adapt," applies rather well to clarinetists. But perhaps others here would firmly disagree! I don't welcome change; I accept it.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2026-11-11 01:05
max678 wrote:
> Question for everyone here:
>
> I've often been told that "if you can make it sound great in a
> practice room, it'll sound phenomenal on stage" or some
> variation of that. However, I find that, if I want to make
> something sound good in such a dry acoustical environment such
> as the Wenger practice rooms I often have to play in, I would
> have to make slight adjustments compared to how I would play
> something on stage. My question is, do y'all think that using a
> very dry practice room is still beneficial?
I guess it depends on what you're comparing to the dry practice room. Practicing in a bathroom or other high echo space is not beneficial to anything but your ego. So, compared to that, a dry, unflattering room is at least not lying to you. Gigliotti's practice studio, where he taught his students back in the 1960s and early '70s, was quite dry. But he described it as "honest." You want to be in control of the sounds that come from your instrument, not have the room determine your result.
If you have a bona-fide performance area available to practice in, by all means, use it as much as it's available. But playing in the Wenger cubicle won't hurt you.
Karl
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