 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: FT
Date: 2001-12-29 21:45
Why do clarinets have open holes?? Why aren't they like the sax or (some)flutes????
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Author: Joseph O'Kelly
Date: 2001-12-29 21:50
Intonation is probably the number one reason.
an added bonus is that it makes the opening gliss in Rhapsody in Blue easier to do.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2001-12-29 22:35
To make it easier to squeek...obviously...GBK
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Author: David Pegel
Date: 2001-12-29 22:50
as for some flutes, the better ones normally have open holes. Doesn't that say something?
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Author: GBK
Date: 2001-12-29 23:51
Top 4 Reasons Why Clarinets Have Open Holes:
4. Want to play clarinet at 4 years old? Too bad!!
3. Smoker? Holds 6 at once.
2. Christmas at the Denner house - 1690: "Thanks, dear, a new drill press"
1. Hey...ANYONE can play saxophone... ...GBK
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Author: Fred
Date: 2001-12-30 01:25
Open holes is a term from the Department of Redundancy Department.
Closed holes aren't.
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Author: Donn
Date: 2001-12-30 14:06
How many more pads would you have if all the holes had pads? More pad trouble
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Author: bob gardner
Date: 2001-12-30 14:30
GBK==that was great.
Just think about the amount of money you save by having less pads.
All the great donuts in the world have holes, why not the rest of the nuts?
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Author: Micaela
Date: 2001-12-30 16:23
So we can tell the difference between a clarinet and an oboe
So we can play quarter tones when we don't want to
So my fingertips have a funky shape
So we can keep a hole-cleaner thingy around- clarinetists love gagets
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Author: David Pegel
Date: 2001-12-31 03:10
It makes the nickel-plating wear a little less easy to notice when it's not being used?
As for silver... who knows?
Creating the Doppler effect is nice, though...
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Author: Eoin
Date: 2002-01-02 22:25
Clarinets have open holes because:
1. the holes are small enough to be covered with the finger tips. In the very early clarinets, there was a hole for the right little finger too, but it had to be made small so that the finger could cover it and this made problems, so Mueller replaced it with a pad-covered bigger hole in a different place.
2. finger tips make a good contact with the wood/plastic so there is no need for pads which will eventually wear out and have to be replaced
3. the pad mechanism is metal so it adds to the weight of the instrument. I've been told that a German system clarinet which has much more metal on it weighs considerably more than the Boehm we all know and love. Anything that keeps the weight down is good.
Saxophones use pads rather than open holes because the holes are in the wrong places for the fingers and are much too big to be covered by the finger tips.
The real question is why flutes don't all have open holes.
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Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2002-01-05 01:59
David Pegel wrote "as for some flutes, the better ones normally have open holes."
Not necessarily so. All top makers I know of make all their top models with this aspect optional.
There are acoustic reasons why open holes should be inferior.
If open holes sounded better then flute players would find 5 notes (open holed) out of 12 in each of the first 2 octaves sound better. Not so.
If the finger skin is not quite soft then considerably more pressure is required to stop air leaking along the finger prints from tone holes.
I concede that some players may use open hole options for humouring pitch. Players with closed holes do this qute satisfactorilly with embouchure/air pressure techniques.
I concede that open holes has become so much a fashion in US that major suppliers are stocking only open holes in the non-student-range instruments, hence feeding the fashion and distorting rational perspective.
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