Author: Gregory Smith
Date: 2002-02-25 01:43
Mark said:
Gregory Smith wrote:
>
> I guess my point was that we don't know why they have
> changed, they just have. And that's all we can go by. How it
> happens is irrelevant.
I disagree, Greg. How it happens or if it happens is very relevant - if something really does happen to clarinets over time, then either we can change them to what they used to be, or find out we can't and that's that.
Or perhaps we'll find out that our hearing's changed and what we remember doesn't compare with our revised reality.*
In any case, I believe it is relevant to know, even if there's nothing we can actually do about it.
* My hearings changed enough that what I remember a Steinway piano sounding like no longer matches what I hear. My memory's sound is much better than what I hear nowadays.
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Hi Mark,
Yes, I agree that it is relevant if we have an interest, not to mention the ability, to change it back to something better. That is, if that something is measureable. That's for the scientists to figure out.
I only meant "irrelevant" in the sense that as a practical matter, as a player, some changes occur to the instrument to make it less desireable. The scientific end of the equation is what is irrelevant in the short term to us as performers.
The issue you raise of "revised reality" is an interesting one especially pertaining to this issue. I believe that the developed artists' ear, tactile sense, and other issues of feel remain much more stable, intact, and consistent (or change very much more slowly over time) than the instrument itself - hence the perceived change in the instrument. If an artist cannot trust the relative consistency of their own senses then that doesn't leave them anywhere except shooting at a moving target.....and to extend the metaphor - while travelling in the opposite direction!
That, as Mr. Leeson is fond of saying, is no way to run a railroad.
Gregory Smith
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The Clarinet BBoard
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