Year: 2004

the B45?

Posted on By ericdano 5 Comments on the B45?

An anonymous coward writes “Hey,I’ve been reading articles here and I wanted to ask you, is the Vandorem B45 a student mouthpiece? Which reeds do you prefer for playing jazz?”<p>

Not at all. A B45 is a very good mouthpiece. I used one for a couple of years, and I know a few people out there who still do. When you get more into clarinet, some people like to try to find a different sound that the B45 doesn’t lend itself to. A darker sound. A B45 to me is kind of bright, which is good for Jazz playing in my opinion.

Articles

Do different type of barrels influence the sound?

Posted on By ericdano No Comments on Do different type of barrels influence the sound?

Anonymous Coward writes “Hey,
Does a different type of barrel influence or change the sound?? The other day I saw in a site hundreds of different type of barrels and I just wanted to ask you if it really makes a difference. Thanks”

To make a long story short, yes, it does effect your sound. It depends on the player, for some a different barrel changes a lot of things, for some, it doesn’t change hardly anything. Go to a music store that has some barrels and try them.

Articles

Jazz Greats Collages

Posted on By ericdano No Comments on Jazz Greats Collages

I’ve been making some collages to decorate the hallway in the store that I teach at. With OS X, it’s a piece of cake to generate PDFs of them. Well, that and Adobe’s InDesign.

Adobe Acrobat Reader 6 is required to view these. Enjoy!


  •   Benny Goodman Collage (121.7 KiB, 838 hits)
    You do not have permission to download this file. Please either login or create an account first.


  •   Eddie Daniels Collage (732.6 KiB, 563 hits)
    You do not have permission to download this file. Please either login or create an account first.



More to come!

Articles

Demnitz Scale & Chord Studies in BinaB format

Posted on By ericdano No Comments on Demnitz Scale & Chord Studies in BinaB format

Ian Ross Drummond writes “In the BIABFSG files section is a folder, which has within it a complete book of jazz guitar studies. I happen to possess this book and the BB files have made the manuscript ‘come alive’ for both me and my students. I wanted to contribute therefore a standard woodwind text in BB form to continue this worthy tradition. The Demnitz Clarinet studies are a ‘standard text’ for the clarinet and ties in nicely with the ‘scale project’ as a course of study to develop basic instrumental technique upon an instrument; in this case, the Clarinet.


I want to make this important point: – TO PLAY THESE STUDIES, POSSESSION OF THE MUSIC IS ESSENTIAL. (I used the Shirmer edition although there are others.) The notation will not display correctly in BB but will sound correctly and I have made no attempt to alter this because the music should, in my opinion, be bought!””
Now I have to state an apology. I am no expert in the field of harmony and many of the more knowledgeable members of BIABFSG will doubtless find fault with these files and will be perfectly entitled to do so!
Now to the files themselves! The musical purist will not approve of Demnitz etudes done in this way! I teach students from age 7 to 18 in a culture where ‘western music’ is rock, pop, rap etc, etc. (I have ‘plugged in’ to this perception to try and make the studies attractive to my students.) The files are for young students to hopefully enjoy practicing these etudes with their own computers at home or in a group situation at school, college etc. I have made no attempt whatsoever to make these studies ‘Classical’ or ‘Serious’ (I hate that type of labelling in music) so be aware that the files use standard BB12 styles from jazz to hip-hop. In the original Demnitz text no chords are indicated hence the potential for harmonic controversy. Mature BB users are aware of the difficulties of key signatures, dynamics and tempo changes in BB and the limitations in this regard impact on the files themselves. Nevertheless, I hope that the members, and clarinettists in particular, will find these files of interest and use.


Ian Ross Drummond


Kuwait City May 2003


PS. TO PLAY THESE STUDIES, POSSESSION OF THE MUSIC IS ESSENTIAL!”

NOTE: These are available via groups.yahoo.com. Look for the Band in a Box group.

Articles

Is it wood or resonite??

Posted on By ericdano No Comments on Is it wood or resonite??

akakoa writes “I have a Selmer Signet 100 series B flat clarinet. It’s serial number is 95593 and it was made in the USA.

Is this clarinet wood or resonite??”

Good question. I don’t know much about Selmer Clarinets. But, it’s usually easy to tell if a clarinet is wood or resonite. Maybe take it to a shop and have someone confirm what exactly it is.

Of course, we really want to know, does it BLEND.

Articles