 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Angela
Date: 2001-08-25 23:39
I was recently talking to my clarinet teacher and I am now looking for Benny Goodman's classical recordings. I'm a big fan of his jazz music and I'm really interested in hearing his recordings of classical selections. Any help would be appreciated.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2001-08-26 02:55
Very easy to find...One of many ways to find these recordings is at amazon.com ...On home page, use search option on left side of page, use drop down menu for classical music. Click "GO!"
Next page is Classical Music Search..Type in Benny Goodman on the Performers line and click "Search Now". This will take you to a full page of BG classical recordings...Happy shopping!!
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Author: Ken
Date: 2001-08-26 11:09
A good start is the "BG Collector's Edition" CBS Masterworks Recordings. It contains the Bernstein Prelude, Fugue & Riffs - Copland Concerto - Stravinsky Ebony Concerto - Gould Derivations - Bartok Contrasts. And if I see anyone else on this board slam Benny's classical playing, I think I'm going to scream! Enjoy.
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Author: Bob Arney
Date: 2001-08-26 14:47
Ken, different strokes for different folks. A Reg Kell he's not, but style ain't everything
Bob A.
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-08-26 15:03
Why, Ken? Just because some of us prefer almost anyone <b>but</b> Benny when it comes to playing classical (and some of us prefer people like Buddy DeFranco when it comes to jazz playing) doesn't detract from what Benny <b>did</b> do, and he had one heck of a good Big Band.
As Bob put it - different strokes ....
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Author: Dave Beal
Date: 2001-08-27 03:16
When I was in high school and taking lessons from Donald McGinnis at Ohio State, we were working on the Mozart Concerto. He asked if I had any recordings of it. Of course, he was thinking of someone like Robert Marcellus. I said, yes, I had a Benny Goodman recording. He kind of groaned and said something like "Well, I suppose that's better than nothing."
I don't have that record anymore, but as I recall Goodman used vibrato, which I'm sure didn't endear him to Prof. McGinnis.
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Author: Danielle
Date: 2001-08-27 03:58
sorry-my computer is screwed up. original post, i was remarking that i have a recording of b.g. playing the mozart clarinet quintet, and i think he uses vibrato. my woodwind teacher at camp (clarinet and sax-i've branched out. interesting story involving a bari sax, actually), who was this 19 year old saxaphone student, used vibrato extensively when he played the saxaphone, and had a really hard time not using it when he played the clarinet, as he was just beginning. i thought it sounded interesting, but the guy spent the entire first two sessions @ camp trying to play the clarinet without vibrato...for pit orchestras (it's a performing arts camp-they put on several musicals each three-week session), he'd just say, "forget it," and play the clarinet music on soprano sax. that is, the music that he didn't have me or the other good clarinetist cover...
danielle
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Author: B.F.
Date: 2001-08-27 14:43
God, am I a freak? I love Goodman's classical playing. To me, it's like the "antidote" to the confusion and illogicality of Stolzman.
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Author: William
Date: 2001-08-27 17:45
God Bless Benny Goodman for all of the attention he brought to the clarinet and for all of the great clarinet works he gave us through his generous commissions. His classical recordings (while not perfect) are testiments to the man's versatility, viruosity and vision and, along with his jazz inovations, make him--without question--the most complete clarinetist of the twentieth century. Good Clarineting, Benny!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (and THANKS)
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Author: Bob Arney
Date: 2001-08-27 19:18
B. F. said: "confusion and illogicality of Stolzman." Oooohh!
Boy this BB brings out the true animal in people. %-]
Bob A
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Author: Ken
Date: 2001-08-28 10:56
This long time “classical Benny bashing” has always been a pet peeve of mine. A short anecdote to illustrate my position: In concert band last year, I shared a stand with a charming young lady in her early 20s. During the rehearsal we read through a five-tune Beatles medley. Somewhere in mid-football she leaned over and whispered how “lame these oldies are”. After reading the chart down we started back at the top to rehearse it, she apparently caught a glimpse of the composer credits, turned back to me in astonishment and asked the probing question, “You mean Paul McCartney was in another band besides Wings?” To a 43 y/o nerdy sheltered band geek who grew up forced to stomach his Dad’s Mrs. Miller and Jackie Gleason “For Lover’s Only” records that one blew even MY mind. (Don’t know who Mrs. Miller was? She was the 50-60s pop counterpart to the cat-crooning Florence Foster Jenkins of the 30s. Don’t know who she is either? N-e-v-e-r m-i-n-d). It dawned on me she hadn’t even been born until nine years after the Beatles broke up...still a classic. Without a shred of knowledge, personal experience or supporting facts she managed to stick a whole shoe store in her mouth with that one. Even more amusing she confided the next day she was a fan of Paul McCartney and ran out to the record store and bought a Sergeant Pepper CD. Those Beatles, they were such hipsters.
Sometimes you got to take a long hard look at someone and realize they’re doing the very best they can, respect the effort, give credit where it’s due and look at and hear the “whole person” and performance not just the nuts and bolts. Be honest, how many recordings have you heard of standard literature by known if not revered industry giants that shocked you it was so bad and about as musical as a turning car bone dry of power steering fluid? Benny’s classical recordings were at least genuine and from the heart, not note perfect or interpreted. Why does an isolated group of celebrated blue-blooded degree-waving classical clarinetists (especially professionals who know Benny’s legacy as a born and bred swing jazz player) insist on making him their favorite whipping boy and laughing stock? Who continually compare him to the fields’ 20th century elite? Benny was a musician’s musician; his excellence and versatility spanned a career of over 50 years and he was truly one-of-a-kind. An innovator, composer, educator, mentor, self-made institution; a national treasure and instrumental trailblazer we should all respect and not place under a magnifying glass and dissect like a biology science project.
A great classical player he wasn't, but he never claimed to be and didn't specialize nor limit himself to the classical vein, he always strived to be the complete musician. How many of the great classical virtuosos of the last century or who grace our presence today could pull off the Mozart, (disputably the most challenging piece of music ever written for clarinet) and in the blink of an eye break into Let’s Dance or an extended improv solo in Sing, Sing, Sing…and play them equally as well? Bonade, McGinnis, Marcellus, Gigolotti, Laurie, Wright, Shifrin, Morales, etc. From today’s hot axe men, Stoltzman (he takes his share of lumps as well), Daniels maybe Combs, a scant few others? It’s disconcerting how a handful of multi-style clarinetists are permitted to bridge the gap and readily accepted while others shunned. Combs and Sifles dabble in jazz and enjoy notoriety, Daniels and Stoltzman elevated to god-like status. How about Ron Rueben quietly tucked away in Philadelphia, an absolutely amazing freak of nature as a world-class bass/clar and local club jazz tenor player. In my 25 years in the business, from time to time I’ve had to endure these shortsighted people of great vision and they all fall into the same category: highly educated but mediocre, unaccomplished, marginally talented, frustrated and insecure clarinet players with a bad case of tunnel vision. Not the least bit interested in jazz or willing to acknowledge it as a legitimate art form. These disinterested but esteemed colleagues of mine would be the first to clutch their heart and run screaming into the night if they saw a chord symbol on their music, couldn’t swing two 8th notes in succession if they were hanging from a jungle vine and even worse, actually believe it takes MORE talent and hard work to play the classical than the jazz, balderdash...don't you know it's just supposed to come out of the horn?
The popular retort is jazzers do the same thing. I don’t buy it, it happens no doubt but a good deal of them don’t know any better, predominantly hardcore boppers, generally high school graduates at best and street players that never leave the street, never had the benefit of formal education. If we took a poll here I’d venture 95%+ of us started music by establishing good roots in grade school and/or high school band programs. I’ve spent 20 years performing and giving free clinics in over 600 elementary, high schools, state and private colleges in 40+ states ranging from inner city flat broke to middle, upper-middle class affluent burb districts to rural barns 30 miles from the nearest 7-11. All of about six I can even recall regardless of operating budget DIDN’T have a jazz band program. The curriculum and focus might have been on orchestra, concert band and marching band but students were at least “exposed” to traditional, big band or contemporary mainstream jazz early on; the upshot, most of us were afforded the choice. Translation, no real excuse just unfounded elitism. As musicians it’s our birthright to like who and what kind of style of music we wish to pursue but let’s cut Benny some slack, if anyone deserves a break HE does.
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Author: Roger
Date: 2001-08-28 19:35
For my money nobody had better technique than Artie Shaw. Listen to his Stardust recording where he plays a pp double high C as sweet as can be.
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2001-08-28 21:33
I don't know, Ken. That's an awfully broad brush. Some of us just don't like his classical stylings (or his "jazz" playing, either). Even those of us who have played jazz professionally ...
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Author: Sylvain
Date: 2001-08-28 22:57
Ken:
What BG has done for the clarinet has nothing to do with the quality of his recordings. Nobody can deny his impact on the world of clarinet and many of us picked the instrument because of him.
However, one has the right not to like his interpretation of a piece and notice his technical flaws. I can safely say that any professional player plays better than I. But I still have the right to criticize their playing because I think they do not render a piece in a way I like. The same goes with some Jazz musicians who will go on stage play 2 scales up and down add a few ornementations here and there and call it a creative process. Give me a break...
Music is supposed to make you react some way or another. Crying, dancing, laughing, surprising, intriguing, even painful. I love pop, rock, jazz, classical or any form of sound which makes me FEEL something.
Thanks BG for the concertos he commissioned and for all that swing, but as much as I am jumping up and down when listening to Sing Sing Sing, BG playing Mozart does NOTHING for me.
-S
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Author: Bob Arney
Date: 2001-08-29 14:14
Hey Sylvain, No "Country"? Think what a great song you could write about your reed being split, your R13 cracked, and your wife ran off with the drummer.
Bob A
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Author: Sylvain
Date: 2001-08-29 15:56
Bob:
That would be a great song, but forget about the crack I have a greenline ;->
-S
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Author: William
Date: 2001-08-30 18:36
Mark!!!! As a classical and jazz player myself, I'm with Ken on this one and stand, also, by my previous post concerning the legacy of Benny Goodman and his contributions to the world of clarinet. Nicely said, Ken!!!!!!!
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