What is a Tonal Profile Anyways?

Let's define this puppy. A tonal profile is the combination of the characteristic tone of an instrument and the unique qualities of the individual performer.

Alright, the Bass Clarinet has a characteristic tone. This, in and of itself, is a mystery since hardly anybody can teach this correctly. The Bass Clarinet is NOT supposed to sound like a big ole Clarinet. If it sounded like a big ole Clarinet then essentially what you would have is the sound of the left hand keys on an electronic keyboard with the Clarinet patch turned on. Yuck!

Actually, the Bass Clarinet should sound like a strong Ox in the field. A cross between the Bassoon (the double-reediness) and a Soprano Clarinet (the FIRM singing quality). Without the reedy quality (I like to call it "syrup") you've got the wrong bird. I get asked for this all the time "Can we take out the reediness?" Ummm, no! You want me to sound like a completely different instrument? Really? That's weird.

Reediness is inherent in the instrument itself. If you wanted to boil the tone down to one thing it's that. It's GOT to sound reedy. You've got to be able to hear the reed vibrating. It's the difference between a Mack truck and a Ford Pinto. You can hear that Mack Truck coming from a mile away.

Ok, so now you have the strong ox (or the Mack truck, whichever you prefer.) He's just standing in the pasture waiting to pull his weight. He never fails. Ever.



Now then, you have to add to that your unique qualities. Your embouchure, your air flow, your tongue position, the position of the mouthpiece in your mouth, your posture, the shape of the inside of your mouth, the shape of your throat, the expanse of your ribcage. Yeah, yeah, all of it. These things make you unique. They make you sound like you, assuming you are exploiting these traits. If you take alot of mouthpiece in your mouth you get a particular sound, if you keep your teeth high on the mouthpiece you get a particular sound. Creating more expanse in your ribcage gives the sound more girth. Moving these things around will reveal to you all sorts of sounds, many not pretty. The ones you find that are nice can be molded into something you like. The sound you really enjoy. Your sound.

Then there's the other half of your unique qualities. And really I think it comes down to this question:

What other instrument do you want to sound like?

Is it the Cello? The Euphonium? The Contrabass? The Horn? The Tuba? The Viola? Maybe a Tenor voice? Baritone voice? True Bass voice? What?

Make a decision!

Personally, I enjoy the Viola. I kind of feel bad for 'em, having to read in Alto Clef and all. There's something about the raspy woody quality of the instrument that I LOVE, especially a really big Viola. Oversized Violas(17") sound so COOL!!! The sound reminds me of Shostakovich...the 8th Quartet. A piece written in "memory of the victims of fascism and war." I cried the first time I heard it (at a recital in college, and it was played fabulously.) I still can't make it through in tact. It's powerful. Even if you're not into classical music, listen and you will be moved. Personally, I prefer my Borodin Quartet recording, but the Emerson Quartet plays it extremely well.

That's right, the Bass Clarinet is not this boisterous, happy instrument. We fit in during circus marches, but we don't REALLY belong. That's Flute, Piccolo, Clarinet, Trumpet and Alto Sax land. I mean, you can do that and make it work, but at it's heart the Bass Clarinet is...

a harbinger of gloom, of resolution of wrongs long since past, an old friend you thought long since gone coming out of the ashes of war, the friend who Dmitri Shostakovich asked "In whose hands do you leave me to die?" The Bass Clarinet is the path "In leaves no step had trodden black." (The Road Not Taken, Robert Frost)

This isn't pretty stuff. The instrument isn't pretty. It's gritty. It's harsh. It's intense. It's raw.

The timbre of the instrument is divided. If you are truly allowing to reed to vibrate freely you'll be able to hear two sounds. The pitch and the raspy undertones of the reed. Yes, two pitches. I can whistle two notes at once so this isn't a big deal to me, but if you've never heard or experienced that it might sound really strange. Mongolian throat singers perform in this tradition and do so to great effect. Manipulating the vibrations inside their mouths they can produce multiple pitches. Manipulating the innner shape of your mouth (Yes, you don't have to just use your throat) can produce a very complex tone that will continually reveal different components the more you refine it. Now that's fun!

Things That Bug Me 2.0 (Ligatures and the mayhem surrounding them)

So, I LOVE ligatures. They're, by far, my FAVORITE piece of equipment. Why, you ask? They're not SUPER expensive, they're easy to change out, you can collect them in mass quantities without need for a storage unit, and they're cool lookin'!

I've always been a connoseiur of metal ligatures. ALWAYS. The first ligature I EVER played on Bass with a simple stock metal lig that was in the case of the school instrument I was playing in middle school. When I went back to Bass in High School I had a similar lig and a mouthpiece in a plastic bag that I took to Band Camp just in case I changed instruments at camp (which I did.) Honestly, I never thought any further than that. Ligatures are supposed to be metal, that's it. They're all metal, right? I got an inverted Bonade right after marching season my Sophomore year and played it until about halfway through college. At that point Rovners were all the rage. Now, I'm not knocking Phil's hustle. If you've got a good business and a product people like I'm all for it. Fabric ligatures just never appealed to me. By the time I graduated from college you could look down a line of any section of Clarinets and Saxophones and 98% of the ligs would be Rovners (Once again, not knocking Phil's hustle, I just never got into the fabric ligs.)

After I graduated I didn't play "hard-core-alot" for about a year. By that time I had acquired two GORGEOUS Gold Harrison-Hertz Ligatures. The crappy part is that they are no longer made under that name and are VERY expensive on Ebay.

Now, these ligatures are gold plated and respond like crazy! More than that, they have this robust sound that I can't explain. It may only make a difference to me, but it makes a DIFFERENCE! I've also acquired a Rovner MarkIII and a Bois (both of which are not horrible, but not robust like the Harrison.) I was really liking the Bois until I ran into reed issues (because it's like 20 degrees here and SEVERELY dry), and I discovered that, for me, the Harrison hits 'em outta the park every time. I played fairly regularly in ensembles for about 6 years and always stuck to the Harrisons. One has Gold that's still very bright and relatively untarnished while the other has a much darker finish and has a band that's been silver-brazed back together. They were (and still are) my work horses.

So, why is the metal ligature so responsive for me? I've always read and heard that metal ligatures are more responsive and that Gold plating makes ligatures even more responsive. Conversely, I've also heard that fabric ligs dampen sound and provide less response. Yet, people who produce fabric ligatures tout the robust sound of their ligatures and responsiveness. Maybe it's just a personal thing. I see and hear great response from kids who use fabric ligs all the time. Maybe, it's because I was brought up playing a certain way and it's hard for me to give up the feel of the olden days.

I'm gonna keep it real. I'm a monster (my high school band director likes the term "killer", as in "If you're sitting next to a "killer" then you might not be able to hear yourself.) I like playing that role. I've always been the beast. I've brought down whole brass sections. One time, the whole band. I've overthrown fascist dictators with my sound (well, not really, but it sounded good when I wrote it.) You get the idea. I can play REALLY loud. I can't remember a time when I didn't just blow my brains out in every rehearsal and performance. Everyday I'm searching for that sort of sound, just more refined and mature, but still BIG. I have this attachment to metal ligatures and the days of old when I did that everyday in rehearsal.

Nowadays I'm not in rehearsal everyday, in fact, I haven't been in a full-on band rehearsal of a group I'm playing in in a year and a half. I sit in the rehearsals of the band I tech and that's nice(because I get to work up a little bit of a sweat, but not too much), but I'm not "in charge", I'm trying to teach an upperclassman how to be "in charge". Which brings me to another point.

The sort of domineering tone I'm talking about is the kind of thing that can turn a band in the right direction. It can turn your section in the right direction. We always here that Bands are built from the bottom. Well, if you're playing Bass Clarinet, you're in the bottom of the band. You can't get much lower. On the other hand, Orchestras tend to be built from the top. The First Chair is taking the lead in everything. Pushing the section along. It's a different style of playing.

Playing Bass Clarinet is a combination of those two things. That "domineering tone" keeps the rest of your section in line. They can hear what you're doing and they follow you. If you're REALLY good, other people in other sections will follow you. Now, you control time in the group to a certain extent. In the case of a disaster you have a good chance of dragging enough people along that you can avoid a crisis(i.e. completely stopping in the middle of a performance.) Leading from the front is always a good thing. Besides having a certain amount of control over time you can control phrasing, overall expression, and expression of different melodic components in the music. While you're ducking in and out of the texture all the melodic components of the music get to shine around you. Now that's fun.

Back to ligatures. You may be asking "Do you make your students play on metal ligatures?" Nope. I don't intervene unless they have MAJOR issues that I think may be corrected by a small equipment change. 99% of the time you change you, not your stuff(Like in that new movie "Bride Wars", in the trailer Kate Hudson says "You don't alter Vera to fit you, you alter yourself to fit Vera!". When you get to a point where you know what you're doing then I think you can tinker with your stuff and look for something that fits the tonal profile you want. My point...you can affect your tonal profile with ligatures, even if people don't think so. Then again, tonal profile is a whole other post.

How to Play the Bass Clarinet Efficiently and Effectively 1.0 (or How to Play Fast Notes, aka, Acquiring Technique 1)

Well, here comes the diatribe. Things That Bug Me are just little things that probably only get on MY nerves. This series is about EXACTLY what to do in order to play better. If you've found this and you're looking for help...you're in the right place. If you're a "non-bandy" person don't stop reading! Almost everything I'm going to say is about how to process new information and quickly get better at processing that information more quickly. You never know, you might be able to apply some of this stuff to something you do that isn't even musical. Now, on with the help.

I love this zinger. It makes me want to laugh every time. "This passage just doesn't lay well on the big instruments." If you've ever heard that before you are not alone, and the person who told you this is wrong.

Granted, if you are not a technically well-developed player you probably won't have the best time learning said passage (or learning it at all.) But, if you start developing your technique now it will get smoother and silkier with time. By the way, this is not just for kids. If you are an adult amateur, do this stuff, we welcome you along for the ride.

People who have stellar technique have literally trained every muscle in their fingers, mouth, throat, and abdomen so that every note speaks perfectly, sounds good, and comes out quickly, and they had to start somewhere. Working slowly is the most tedious work you could ever do. It doesn't feel super fun. It's not like riding a roller coaster. However, if you get yourself to the point, mentally, where you know this is REALLY going to help long term: It will get fun really fast.

If you've ever been in a school band or orchestra program you are highly aware of the intense emphasis that is placed on Major Scales. Now, somebody who's reading this is thinking "Bleh, I spit the name of all Major Scales (especially the one's I don't like, you know, the hard ones.)" I know, scales are not "fun", but let me tell you, if you have these scales in your hip pocket you'll feel like a million bucks. So, step one, scales.

1. Find a print out of all 12 major scales for the instrument. On Bass Clarinet this shouldn't be hard. You can even use a Clarinet print out. By the time you learn to play them as high as I would recommend you won't need the print out anymore. Highlight the first 5 notes of each scale in only the lowest register. This is a 5-note segment. You play the pattern 1,2,3,4,5,4,3,2,1 three times. Slur the whole thing. You're done! (Actually, you're not quite done.)

2. Get a sheet of paper and a metronome. If you don't have a concrete metronome use this one. Start the metronome at 60. If you are VERY new play the pattern in 8th notes. If you are a little more developed play the pattern in 16th notes. Play through it a couple of times at 60. If you're ok, move up to the next metronome marking. When you get to a marking that you just can't handle, that's ok. Write down the FASTEST marking you could play the pattern correctly at. Move on to the next key.

3. Stop using alternate fingerings!!! You think I'm serious about this? I am. Do NOT use the right hand fork key. Do not use chromatic F#. When possible, use the sliver key. Avoid, at ALL costs, these ALTERNATE fingerings. They're alternate for a reason! The original fingering is technically more proficient in the long run. Fancy stuff is fancy (and occasionally helpful) but it's not solid like the original.

4. Rinse and repeat. Do this in ever major key. Don't fret about not playing the last 3 notes of the scale (or more if you're playing more octaves.) What you may not realize is that you're covering every fingering combo you need to play these scales.

5. Rinse and repeat again. This is the most valuable thing you can do to improve your technical response on the instrument.

6. Now you have a written record of where you started and where you've been in each key. If you're thinking "Man, this guy is a genius, why didn't I think of that?" know one thing...I didn't think of it either. I learned it from Bob Chesebro at Furman University. The man's a genius, and no, I'm not exaggerating.

7. Do NOT move on the minor scales. If you do not have Major Scales, as I said before, in your hip pocket then playing minor scales will mess with your ear.

8. Always play these segments with the fullest, most robust, billowing tone you've got. If you're thinking "But I don't sound very good." or "My tone doesn't billow." Fine! Now's a good time to learn! You're only 9 notes at a time in one segment. Voila, easy tonal practice time. Besides, every time you play your tone is improving if you're really thinking about sounding better.

9. Do NOT use the extended range on your instrument (if you have it.) I'll never forget this as long as I live. I was at another school talking with a fellow Bass Clarinetist. They popped up and said "Look, I can play the C Scale 3 octaves!" I said, "That's so cool, show me!" They proceeded to play the scale starting on super low C, using the extension, and playing up to thumb C. Now, I thought they were going to play it straight and play up to double high C...I was wrong. The point is...The extended range on your instrument is cool, but using it to practice is worthless. If you're really good, you ever need to practice it. You just put your hands on the instrument and keep going. Really. I promise. When I got my extended horn in 1998 I just took it out of the box and started playing it. No trip to the shop. No tutorial. Just "grab and go"

10. Don't get hung up on a particular scale. Everybody's got a scale or two that they just don't agree with. I never liked F#. If, at this point, I have a "bad" scale. That's it. Whenever you encounter your "Little Scale of Horrors" just do what you can do and move on. It WILL get better, it just isn't today. No big.

The simplest application of all of this is EASY sightreading. Read anything! Who cares? Don't try crazy hard stuff. Just do things that look simple and are in about every key. Don't get all technique happy and try to play something that's out of your league. Start slow. You'll get there soon enough. Virtuosic technique is a process and you're on step one. Enjoy the ride!

Old and Set in One's Ways and Yet Youthful

It's official. I'm old. (I know, I'm only 30, but stick with me here.) So I've played around with different setups on my horn for about 5 years now. I have THE setup and then I have all these other ligatures and reeds and blah, blah, blah. Every time I try something that isn't THE setup, I can play it, but it doesn't "zip", and it drives me nuts. I've been playing THE same setup since 1999 (yes, I know that's 10 years, or 1/3 of my life, I get it), but dang man, I'm really old and crochety when it comes to my playing.

I find myself saying things that were said to me in lessons when I was in school. I find myself repeating Band "Directorisms" to kids just to prove to them that the
"ism" isn't going away(This is always in response to the question "Why do Directors always say that!?") The part that's most unnerving...I know them verbatim! I'll say something and the kid will look back at me and say "Mr./Ms. So and So said that exact same thing today." Yikes! It's like I'm the Band "Directorism" Whisperer.

I'm still using the same Rose book that I got in 8th Grade. Yep, it's well-used and filled with notes from multiple teachers. I'm constantly referencing them and saying "YOU see that right there, so and so wrote that in there because it works." Like I'm an expert on Rose's arrangements or something (though I will say, I studied with a monster interpreter.) I'm turning 31 next month and I don't feel "old" but just settled in. I can only hope that I don't turn out like Job, getting called out by a kid. Elihu tells him:

Job 32(NIV)
6 So Elihu son of Barakel the Buzite said: (Speaking to Job)
"I am young in years,
and you are old;
that is why I was fearful,
not daring to tell you what I know.

7 I thought, 'Age should speak;
advanced years should teach wisdom.'

8 But it is the spirit in a man,
the breath of the Almighty, that gives him understanding.

9 It is not only the old who are wise,
not only the aged who understand what is right.

Man, that had to sting a little. It makes you wonder how sanctimonious you're being with your students or your kids.

On the other hand, I feel like I'm kind of in the middle. I can tell a 15 year old (a sophomore in H.S.) "Dude, I'm twice your age" and that resonates. They think, "Man you're old. OK, you must know SOMETHING." On the other hand I turn to a teacher with 35 years experience and they say "I'm almost twice your age" and I think, "Yeah, but I've got a brain too dude!" So, I'm Music Man in the Middle. Woo hoo!

Maybe Paul said it best to Timothy:

1 Timothy 4 (NIV)
12Don't let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity. 13Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching. 14Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you.

15Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. 16Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.

Hmm. Someone's always watching your progress, AND, someone's always hearing you. Yeah, God thinks he's soooo funny.

Things That Bug Me (about Bass Clarinetists, Teachers, and Band Directors) 1.0

I'm a Bass Clarinetist, a really serious Bass Clarinetist. I've got 3 of them for goodness sakes! Basically, that's like saying "Yeah, I'm a total freak."

There have always been things that bug me about the way people approach MY instrument (I know I didn't invent it, but it's mine). I've heard everything from "I need harder reeds....no you need really hard reeds." to "This (name the brand) doesn't play well in so and so register" blah,blah, blah. I've also heard, "You can't do this and that, this doesn't "lay well" on a bigger instrument" and my personal favorite "Why would you do that on THAT ?!" Anyways, Things That Bug Me is dedicated to my rantings about how the Bass Clarinet is, generally, poorly taught, misunderstood, and poorly received.

My biggest gripes about my equipment are always about reeds. Most kids start in school using soft reeds, a 2.5 typically. Well, at some point they run into a Band Director whose whole mission in life, it seems, is to get them to play on harder reeds. It never fails, you always hear from someone "You need harder reeds so you can sound better and play in tune." Woo hoo! You mean all I have to do to play in tune is use harder reeds? How hard? 3, 3.5? Ok! I can do that Mr. Whoseewhatzit!

Now that the kid has the harder reeds they spend the next few weeks wondering why their instrument isn't responding like it did. Then they either A) realize it must be the reeds, but they brush that off because their Director told them they HAAAAAADDDDD to have those harder reeds, yet they don't sound better and they aren't really learning because they spend all their time paying a setup that is not tenable, or B) assume their instrument is broken (which is probably partially true, but if their setup didn't suck they'd be able to play throgh the 5000 micro-leaks on ther horn.)

Now the kid is in a quandry, do I stick with reeds that aren't working, beg my Director to get my instrument to the shop, or do I go back to the softer ones that I could play on? Hmmm. They're stuck and they don't know why. I do. (Just one aside here: It's a rare day when you find a teacher who's more insterested in how you sound and how comfortable you are than they are in the "way to do things." I had teachers of the former persuasion. They didn't care what I was doing as long as I could play well. Let's all take a note, because that's the only reason I got to where I am now.)

That Director looked at the Bass Clarinet and said (insert heavy hillbilly accent)(and yes, I can say that because I'm actually from the South. It's like when people pick on your siblings....they can't do that, that's YOUR job!) "That's just like a regular Clarinet." True, except for one thing...it ain't as high! Soprano(Regular) Clarinet players tend to need to change reed strengths relatively early on to help support to strength in their embouchure. It's a necessity, you can't play Soprano Clarinet but one way, and that dropped chin does all the work for you. A Soprano Clarinet embouchure is POWERFUL! You start running into intonation issues on OPEN NOTES!!!, and it only gets worse the higher you go, so you need the POWER!

Hooooowwwever, on the Bass Clarinet, you don't start having major intonation issues until you get much higher on the instrument. Well, if that's the case, using a harder reed to account for like 4 notes makes no sense, and those 4 notes aren't THAT hard to play........ And we all wonder why alot of kids who play Bass Clarinet can't play high notes very well and we have these never ending conversations from, of all people, ADULTS!, about which instruments "play high notes better." WOW!!!!! If you're a non-band nerd and you're confused, you should be, cuz this ain't hard.

The Bass Clarinet is rivaled only by the Saxophone in its ease. Ever walk down the hall of an Elementary School with a Bass Clarinet in your hand? I have. All the kids say the same thing "Wow, that's a big Saxophone!" (Except for that one kid who paid attention when you told them it's actually a Bass Clarinet and they go around correcting everyone.) I digress. From the mouths of babes to our ears. It's a big stinking Saxophone!!!!!!! Armed with this knowledge the instrument got a wholeheckuvalot easier.

Every Saxophone player I've ever met is always referencing the "embouchure wheel" from Larry Teal's The Art of Saxophone Playing. The embouchure wheel implies that no one point of your mouth is holding a majority of tension. Hmmmmmmm....that ain't like the "regular" Clarinet. All of their tension is held in the wrinkled upper lip (which flattens your chin).

Ever notice how a Saxophone, even with the clearest tone, has the slightest hint of breathiness, raspiness, reediness (I like to call it syrup)? Ever notice Soprano Clarinets just don't unless it's intentional? Hmmmmm........ I think we're on to something. The reediness comes from a reed/mouthpiece combination that is generally freer than that of the Clarinet. Saxophone players tend to play softer reeds because the instrument is quite responsive and you don't want to kill that responsiveness with insanely hard reeds, unless you're, you know, insane. Now, I'm not saying this is universal, or that no sax player uses hard reeds, or that all Clarinet players use hard reeds, but this is a good generalization.

Approach the Bass like a Saxophone. A little softer reed than you might think. 2.5's are fine! I played them from my Sophomore Year of High School to my Junior Year of College. I was first chair in every ensemble I played in during that time (I know, I'm a show off, but you get the point, I didn't suck.) Use a reed that isn't wearing you out after 5 minutes. Don't feed so much tension into the instrument, I doesn't like that and it doesn't need that to play in tune. Because the instrument is so low it settles into pitch better than a higher instrument. Open up a little bit, don't be shy. The instrument likes LOTS of air. I mean, I love me some Dr. Pepper, and air is the Bass Clarinet's Dr. Pepper..... can't get enough. Don't be afraid of some syrup. If you sound reedy, COOL!, it's probably a neat sound. The Bass Clarinet is not supposed to sound EXCLUSIVELY like a big Soprano Clarinet.

Now I know what you're thinking. "Yeah, if you're so good, post some sound clips or something and prove how great you are, dude!" Ok, I promise to figure that out so at least you'll have some entertainment to go along with me ranting like a maniac.

Now we have Alpha and Omega. Two different instruments that are very simlar. A(Clarinet) = B(Bass Clarinet. B = C(Saxophone), BUT, A does not equal C. A and C are related by marriage though. That marriage spawned my instrument, the Bass Clarinet.