Keepers

Keepers The C4 standard

New Topic | Go to Top | Go to Topic | Search | Help/Rules | Smileys/Notes | Log In

Re: Clarinet Symposium

Author: Ralph Katz
Date: 2005-04-18 22:36

Interesting post. Thanks very much for all of your work!

There is a lot of good information here. It is always wonderful to watch and hear top-notch clinicians.

The postings about Arnold Jacob's and Daniel Bonade's markedly different approaches to breathing are well taken. I would guess that Mr. Bonade had a very large air capacity and as a result could breath pretty much any way he wanted and still produce incredible results. There are probably lots of clarinetists who wish they had access to whatever it was that allowed him to develop that prodigious breath capacity during his formative years. The rest of us may have difficulties with his approach, and having been part of this school of teaching, I can sure attest to it.

After years of frustration, I took exactly one lesson from Mr. Jacob. It is impossible for me to state just how helpful this was.

Arnold Jacob's approach was to freely expand the entire chest cavity, and yes start with as deep a breath as you can take. He said to pay particular attention to expanding upward at the chest and shoulders. and outward in the back. The mechanism he described to me was to visualize three strings hooked to your rib cage: one at the bottom of the sternum, and two just above your breasts. With each breath, you visualize all three strings are pulling upward ward.

The philosophy of not moving the shoulders can run counter to this. You should not consciously raise your shoulders, but at the same time you should should not consciously restrict them either. Allowing the shoulders to move upward with your expanding chest cavity will help provide more air.

Mr. Jacob did not fix all of my breathing problems in one lesson, but they sure help me, even a decade later, to get through passages that I could not get through beforehand. He also stated that he had a parade of former Marcellus students coming to his studio to have their breathing issues fixed.

Regards

Avail. Forums | Flat View

Newer Topic | Older Topic

Topics

Author

Date

Clarinet Symposium new

Ken Shaw

2005-04-18 20:15

Re: Clarinet Symposium new

Ralph Katz

2005-04-18 22:36