 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: WhitePlainsDave
Date: 2015-02-20 19:45
This question came up in a recent post, and I thought posters nellsonic and Karl Krelove (kdk) did a terrific job answering it. I wish to elaborate.
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Put two clarinetists in a room, ask them to debate a topic, and don’t be surprised if you don't get merely 2 opinions, but 5. We already know this about ourselves.
Well, it’s not that bad, but you get the idea. And there’s nothing wrong with someone having multiple suggestions. Clarinet is not like an exact science.
The point is we bring our own equipment, experiences, and personal nuances to the “table ,” and no two players are the same in any of these attributes. As the conversation progresses, more details often unfold, and recommendations can be fine tuned from those given when the story was initially provided: often with a scarcer relevant fact base.
Accordingly, it’s not uncommon that people may have advice on, say, a bboard such as this one, that seems to run in a different, if not in the opposite direction from that the student’s teacher recommends. And yet smart people with answers, I think, are correct to say here, as a general rule, “but go with or check with your teacher first.”
This isn’t to say that we won’t jump in and say, “that’s outright nuts,” if someone reports that their teacher is having them “immerse their reed in toxic bug spray before using it ,” but rather, that benefit of the doubt goes to the teacher.
Why? If a post responder knows that a teacher’s approach is “beyond the pale,” shouldn’t we step in?
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The teacher who sits with you is our (and your) “boots on the ground.” Even if they may not be as experienced as some bboard posters (itself debatable) it’s quite possible that what they lack in pedagogy they more than make up for in having the best and most up to date “intel” about a student. They may have a “game plan” for a student, that even if flexible, for example, deliberately holds back information initially so as to not overwhelm a student.
It’s entirely possible that when a poster comments “your teacher hasn’t taught you that yet?” that there may be a good reason behind why something wasn’t taught, that has nothing to do with the teacher not knowing it, or failure to remember to bring it up for discussion.
And of course it could be that the teacher is simply lacking, but to quote nellsonic: If you don’t trust your teacher with these matters, you don’t have the right teacher; implying that blame needs to fall on the student or student’s parent here as well, not just the teacher, for such situations.
Perhaps another reason, and maybe the least justifiable one, if not the most noble one why we give the teacher the benefit of the doubt is “golden rule” based. Many of us teach as well and wouldn’t want our plans second guessed by Jon Manasse (IMHO a great teacher) let alone someone on a bboard operating in the dark with questionable credentials. No teacher is perfect.
And speaking of the dark, at least for me, there’s 2 more reasons we refrain from questioning a teacher here: a) bias, and b) the imperfect nature of communication, particularly at the written level, as is done here.
When people report problems here, answers are only as good as the truth the O.P. (original poster) initially provided: both in their willingness to be honest, and their ability (assuming their honest) to not only understand what their issue is, but then convey it in words understood by those who reply.
Then, we members process the O.P’s comments, and man, replies sometimes not only differ because we disagree on how to solve the problem, but as is sometimes so clearly evident from the content of our replies (present company included) we interpret (with good intentions) the question differently from not only what the O.P. wanted to know, but from other responders.
Fault for this lies in varying degrees on sender and received alike. Everyone’s well intentioned, including the bboard itself. Problems nevertheless sometimes emerge because the communication model is never a perfect one.
Is it any wonder that there are so many different types of biases: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases. And they apply to O.P. and responder alike.
And then, if we’re lucky, in such cases of misunderstand, an astute poster gets us all interpreting the question the same way, again, limited by the O.P.’s ability to describe it. Speaking in metaphors, we now all agree that the dots and dashes of Morse code you’ve sent us reads in one universal way, but the message is sometimes so choppy that we can’t agree on meaning.
Furthering this metaphor, we may have “…meet at the Butcher,” when what you said, or meant to say was “I am going to Tommy’s track meet, and then afterwards I’ll be at the Butcher.”
Better still, sometimes you're crystal clear, and we screw up the reply anyway.
But heck, let’s be optimistic. Let’s assume the O.P. indentifies their problem correctly, conveys it well, and it's universally understood, (which by the way is certainly not uncommon here). Heck, I’ll even take it further and say that in this pipe dream most of the responders are in concurrence with their suggestions. Even then the O.P.’s limited by their ability to not only understand us, but know if they’ve correctly applied our advice.
“Take a smidgen of wood off the stronger side of the reed.” What amount’s a “smidgen?”
“Curl the sides of your mouth down.” The O.P. looks in the mirror and humbly wonders if they’ve done what’s been asked of them.”
“Put the tip of the tongue on the tip of the reeed.” This is one of my favorite because I’ve found this to better be a metaphor than literal. I don’t literally figure out where the absolute very tip of my tongue is, much less my reed's is. I approximate it. I think everyone does.
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And so it’s in humble recognition of these limitations and ours, whether we articulate this at the conscience level, or simply know it in our hearts without having expressed it, barring unusualy circumstances, that we yield right of way to the teacher on scene.
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2015-02-20 20:02
"Tip of the tongue to tip of the reed" comes from no less than Larry Combs. This advice is accomanied by Mr. Combs drawing a dot at the very center of the very tip (at the edge) of the reed.
The idea that your tongue (being a very larg accumulation of muscles) has a "tip" is a bit of an exaggeration, however it does get at the idea of avoiding some point further down on the tongue (the extreme example of what to avoid is anchor tonguing where you can be an inch or so back).
Yes, the idea is more the mental imagery of what you want, but for standard classical clarinet playing, it IS what you want.
I certainly agree with the basic notion that a student's teacher should have a much better idea of what is going on. And perhaps some advice from the teacher that may seem to contravene standard logic may in fact by a means to correct something of which we (as outsiders) do not know and cannot see.
Of course the beauty of what goes on here is that anyone is free to ask whatever question they want and we are all free to offer any suggestions we want. It is up to the poster and what readers come along to take something from the discussion deciding for themselves what might work and what does not.
.....................Paul Aviles
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Author: WhitePlainsDave
Date: 2015-02-20 20:29
All well said Paul, except I tend personally to put more responsibility on us in the communication model, when we play the role of advisors, rather than split this responsibility equally between O.P. and responder.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2015-02-20 21:00
More often than not, people who post technical and equipment questions here do so *because they don't have a teacher.* And so they often get, as a first reaction, a suggestion that they arrange for lessons locally. It is rare for young students and almost unheard of for adults who post questions here to say "my teacher says [...] and I want to know if you agree." Most of the time the questioners either don't study with anyone or they have asked here first because their next lesson is a week or two or more away and they don't want to wait that long.
I agree with you completely that *if a poster is studying with a clarinet teacher,* our reactions should maintain a level of respect for the teacher's approach. In such a case my first question would always be, "What does your teacher say about this?" A local teacher, as you suggest, can best diagnose a student's problem because he doesn't need to rely on the student's correctly assessing and interpreting it. He can hear for himself. We can't. That a local teacher's way of getting a student to a particular place technically or musically is different from what we would do is not by itself a reason to criticize it. The teacher is rarely if ever directly involved in the discussion here to tell us what he's thinking.
There are often many ways to skin a cat. Larry Combs, whose playing is certainly exemplary, is not the only very successful clarinetist on the planet and some of the other successful ones actually anchor tongue. Their success argues against "tip-to-tip" tonguing's being the *only correct* approach, metaphorically or otherwise, albeit one that demonstrably *can* produce great success (given that a player's physical attributes don't make another approach more accessible). That's why when someone gives an answer to any question here as if it were unarguably the only right answer possible, we get into rows among ourselves that produce more confusion than clarity.
Karl
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Author: brycon
Date: 2015-02-20 21:28
Quote:
Of course the beauty of what goes on here is that anyone is free to ask whatever question they want and we are all free to offer any suggestions we want. It is up to the poster and what readers come along to take something from the discussion deciding for themselves what might work and what does not.
That so many people take this sort of "We report, you decide" mentality is frustrating to me; as WhitePlainsDave just said, you (not just you in particular, Paul) should put more responsibility on yourself. Many posters offer advice as though their system of clarinet playing cannot fail; the player, however, can fail and is therefore the issue:
"Use the tip of the tongue on the tip of the reed." To which the OP might respond, "It still sounds crappy when I try that." The next link in this conversation is often "Well, you must not be doing tip of the tongue to the tip of the reed. Keep trying."
Yeah, they may not be doing tip of the tongue to the tip of the reed, but it could very well be another issue, in which case the player might devote weeks or months to incorrect practicing, screwing up his or her playing in the process. And even if it is a tip of the tongue to the tip of the reed problem, the player could still screw up his or her playing by incorrectly learning the tip of the tongue to the tip of the reed technique.
If I were offering advice on playing, I would do so carefully and with qualification (e.g. "In my experience, x was the problem; With one of my students, y was happening; etc.).
I wouldn't speak in absolutes or in appeals to authority, such as, "This comes from no less than Larry Combs." (I have personally heard Larry Combs say that he tongues near the tip of the reed with nearly the tip of the tongue. Maybe he's changed his approach? Who really cares--as if Larry Combs saying something makes it beyond argument. Amicus Plato, sed magis amica veritas.)
Just look, for example, at the mess in the "So many dumb questions" thread. Rather than just saying, "Most likely, your son squeaks because he's isn't good (yet)," the conversation veers into mouthpieces and barrels and runs onward for nearly a hundred posts. This dude, who knows nothing about music or the clarinet, is in need of Occam's razor to cut through the BS. I realize the advice comes from a good place, but I think it might be more beneficial to just say "Your son probably isn't that good, so check with his private teacher about the squeaking."
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Author: acermak
Date: 2015-02-21 19:42
I think different teachers have different approaches. Maybe a teacher has not focused on a basic thing (say articulation) because the student has a more fundamental problem. When I first started lessons, I had no rhythmic sense. I couldn't play 3 quarter notes in a row and have them be the same duration. While we worked on that (by clapping and tapping patterns from a drummer's book), my instructor had me move ahead in the first method book but he didn't belabor issues of tone or technique at that time. We've since addressed a lot of that while we worked through the 2nd method book and the first Hite etude book. We just started the Hite French school book and Kroepsch Book 3. I think that was good teaching technique on his part, as otherwise I may very well have felt overwhelmed.
I mean maybe it would be great to have studied the instrument and learned flawless technique before ever playing a note on the instrument, but that would not have likely engaged my attention or passion.
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2015-02-21 21:12
Brycon, you're right, but I disagree.
Posters who ask questions here shouldn't think "they can't put anything on the internet that isn't true". They should also be prepared to think for themselves (and probably most people do.)
Posters offering advice here should also project enough context and caveats that readers can evaluate their advice. Most posters here do this.
It's a two-way street, obviously.
If someone gets screwed up by trying to tongue tip-to-tip, well, they need to experiment and think more. I heard about tip-to-top here some years ago, and I wasn't doing it, so I gave it a try. It didnt' work very well for me, in part because I seem to have a relatively long tongue, and there didn't seem to be room in my mouth to tongue tip-to-tip and still make sound.
So, I didn't force tip-to-tip. But I remembered it. And as I've worked on tongueing speed AND sound over several years (they go together), tip-to-tip has gradually come to be what I do. I learned (on my own) that the tongue arch is important for sound in all registers, and when the tongue is arched along its length, there's room for the tiny tip-to-tip articulation that seems to work. The advice reinforced the gradual transition.
So, I benefited from advice, but only by working with it. Topics like that have no magic answers, and people shouldn't expect either to get them or give them.
The "so many dumb questions" thing was something else altogether. I'm not going to analyze it, as that's the moderator's territory. It was instructive.
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Author: JonTheReeds
Date: 2015-02-21 23:11
I have a great teacher whom I trust absolutely
However I still ask questions here for several reasons
1. My next lesson is in 3 weeks because of holidays/illness/performances etc.
2. I like to get different points of view - I often understand things better if I have several ways of looking at the same thing
3. Just because my teacher is right doesn't mean that I understand, or that I am ready to understand. Just knowing that something is not straight forward at least soothes my fevered brow
4. And I'm greedy and impatient - I want to be able to do everything NOW!
I am constantly amazed at the generosity and depth of knowledge on this forum
Thank you
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The older I get, the better I was
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Author: saxlite
Date: 2015-02-22 01:42
As a repairman (not a teacher), I have met both many students and music teachers. What I have observed is that many students do not have a private clarinet teacher, but instead, totally rely on the school band teacher for their instruction. Sadly, most of these school band teachers have little more than the very smallest amount of expertise on instruments other than the one they majored on in their own education. So, it is not surprising when younger players come to the BB looking for additional help. When I am asked, I give them what help I can, but always followed by: "here are the names of several excellent clarinet teachers- you should contact them and get yourself a good instructor!"
Jerry
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Author: WhitePlainsDave
Date: 2015-02-22 01:49
I hear you Jon. You're insights are useful but need no explanation. In that capacity you are the client, and we the servers, who have been discussing here our obligations to your teacher.
I don't think it's ever wrong to ask a question here, even if you have a teacher. Heck, you can even ask if he or she is doing things right.
Instead, responders need to give that person the benefit of the doubt.
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