By The Landlord
“No birdcall is the musical equal of a clarinet blown with panache.” – Edward Hoagland
"The sound of the clarinet is like a softened folk song." – Antonin Dvorak
“I did all you can do with a clarinet. Any more would have been less.” – Artie Shaw
“We still have to overcome the notion that a clarinet squeaks. People need to remember what a beautiful instrument it is, including in popular music. The clarinet chose me more than I chose the clarinet ... When I play the clarinet, I am 100 percent myself. It is as if it is part of my body.” – Anat Cohen
“The clarinet in its most perfect form is a strange beast – if it is imperfect, it is also completely untamable.” – Jack Brymer
“I always imagined music trapped inside my clarinet, not trapped inside of me. But what if music is what escapes when a heart breaks?” – Jandy Nelson
“It's my life. I don't want to play the flute or any other instrument." – Sabine Meyer
“I look at my clarinet sometimes and I think, I wonder what's going to come out of there tonight? You never know.” – Acker Bilk
That note you hold, narrowing and rising, shakes
Like New Orleans reflected on the water,
And in all ears appropriate falsehood wakes,
Building for some a legendary Quarter
Of balconies, flower-baskets and quadrilles,
Everyone making love and going shares—
... On me your voice falls as they say love should,
Like an enormous yes. My Crescent City
Is where your speech alone is understood,
And greeted as the natural noise of good,
Scattering long-haired grief and scored pity. – Philip Larkin, For Sidney Bechet
What's that? It's time for a tootle on the old liquorice stick. Versatile in sound, from a smooth, pure voice, to a dirty growl, a gradual glissando to a noisy blast of so-called blarinet, from resonant, lovely soloist to a voluminous harmonised group, perhaps a quintetinent, this week we're going all clarinetage, where everything's clarineted, all sounds can come out to suit all the clarinuts.
From intricately elevated classical and to the smooth swing or complexity of jazz, all the way to pop and contemporary experimental, from slow melancholy blows, gliding to blasting, to fingers flying and holes and valves opening and closing, this instrument has many associations, moods and voices. Perhaps it's seen as the sensible, skinnier brother of the saxophone, but as we'll see below, it also has a very sexy and seductive side.
This is a topic that can cover all genres, from pieces built around the instrument itself, or in which it features key solos, or has a character all of its own, such as the laughing fun sound of klezmer to gypsy music, to reggae or pop songs in which it brings different hue, clarity and refreshing sound.
Perhaps, like me, you tried it at school, or played it in a kids' orchestra. As Anat Cohen puts it above, the big obstacle is to avoid the horrible squeak, or no sound at all, when you don't get the flat reed on the mouthpiece in the right place, to I took it to a certain level, then got more interested in the sound of the saxophone (which seemed easier) as well as guitar, simply because it seemed more likely to fit into playing in a band. But I've still got my old Boosey & Hawkes B-flat model in a cupboard somewhere, and perhaps during this week I'll dust it out and give it a blow.
I'm in good company. The great comic actor and writer Christopher Guest, best known for This Is Spinal Tap, also took up the instrument as a child, but not the way he wanted. "I started on the clarinet. I was going to a music school - my mother took me - and the guy said, 'What do you want to play?' I said the drums, and my mother said, 'No, you don't. You don't want to play the drums.' So I said, 'Maybe the trumpet would be cool.' And my mother said, 'I don't think so.' And then the clarinet was handed to me."
The modern clarinet as we know it, as single-reed woodwind instrument with a nearly cylindrical (originally wooden bore and a flared bell, evolved from a Baroque instrument, the chalumeau in the early 18th century. The chalumeau was like a recorder, but with a single-reed mouthpiece and a cylindrical bore, but it lacked a until German instrument maker Johann Christoph Denner and his son Jacob added two keys to double the range. By the middle of the century and beyond, Denner and other makers evolved the clarinet with a growing number of valves and holes towards the instrument we know today. The clarinet family has one of the biggest ranges of the woodwinds, from the big deep octocontrabass all the way up to the high piccolo model. The B-flat is the most common.
Some clarinets through history
Clarinet range
But who was among one of the instrument’s big stars? “Truly your instrument has so soft and lovely a tone that nobody with a heart could resist it," said Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to his close friend and woodwind musical muse Anton Paul Stadler (1753–1812), who was himself a renowned Austrian clarinet and basset horn player, and for whom the great composer wrote his Clarinet Concerto, Clarinet Quintet and other pieces.
But the instrument also has its detractors, even if tongue-in-cheek ones. “Clarinets, like lawyers, have cases, mouthpieces, and they need a constant supply of hot air in order to function," remarks Victor Borge. And here's Ambrose Bierce: "Clarinet n. An instrument of torture operated by a person with cotton in his ears. There are two instruments worse than a clarinet – two clarinets.”
It's not a topic for those guys, but thankfully there are likely many who love it. Many great players were inspired by others. The renowed jazz player and composer Lee Konitz is here, and his hero is the king of swing. "Benny Goodman was one of the big influences as a clarinet player. That's why I wanted the clarinet."
While Bechet sprung from, and dazzled in New Orleans, Chicago's Goodman, who later moved to New York was one of the prime movers in developing swing jazz as player and bandleader. in the 1920s and 1930s. Goodman really expanded the appeal of the instrument at home and abroad.
Benny Goodman entertains crowds in Moscow in 1962
Meanwhile, another son of Jewish immigrants, Arthur Jacob Arshawsky, aka Artie Shaw, had a stellar career from jazz and beyond, the so-called King of the Clarinet.
Artie Shaw perhaps admired Goodman, but didn't let on. “When I first met Benny Goodman he wouldn't talk about anything but clarinets, mouthpieces, reeds, etc. When I tried to change the subject, he said 'But that's what we have in common. We both play clarinet.' I said, 'No, Benny, that's where we're different. You play clarinet, I play music.’”
A complex man and brilliant player, he hired and signed up many great black musicians from Buddy Rich, he signed Billie Holiday, but he was also notoriously difficult and manipulative. In the 1950s he was also involved reporting information the House Un-American Activities Committee and reported his once close friend, the writer Hy Kraft to the Hollywood blacklist. Constantly creating and breaking up bands, and had an extraordinary string of lovers and no less than eight wives, including Lana Turner and Ava Gardner, and a full list of Hollywood girlfriends from Betty Grable to Judy Garland, Joan Crawford to Lena Horne to Rita Hayworth, most of whom he treated very badly. So much for the clarinet the sensible, straight instrument. The liquorice stick clearly attracted the ladies.
Artie Shaw
As Shaw put it: "It's just a piece of wood, you know, with holes in it and they put these clumsy keys on it and you're supposed to try to take that and manipulate it with throat muscles and chops... and try to make something happen that never happened before. And when you do, you never forget it. It beats sex, it beats anything."
So then, from classical to jazz and all other genres in which a prominent corner of clarinet can be heard, it's time to nominate your songs and pieces. Who will be this week's bandleader? This time it’s the ever knowledgeable Nicko to have a blast. Deadline for nominations is 11pm on Monday UK time, for playlists published next week.
Sabine Meyer
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