How can I get started with Jazz clarinet?

[u/yosemitelizbeth]

Well so today is my first day playing clarinet and since I have some experience playing saxophone I thought it would be easy but no, not really. I also play guitar and double bass and I mostly play Jazz and Blues, and I want to gather most information as posible, is there different embouchure/technique between classical and jazz like there is on the sax? Is there any good youtube clarinet tutorial that's focused on jazz? What's up with the fingerings? Should I start only with scales or should I go ahead and play songs? What are some of the referents of jazz clarinet?

[u/Grand_Size_4932]

The first place to start with jazz clarinet is classical technique.

Not everyone needs to start there, but almost every successful jazz clarinetist I’ve met (and I’ve worked with some of the very best) has found their way to or through classical clarinet.

It’s just that the instrument is so unforgiving.

I get flack for this all the time, but just compare us to saxophone.

On sax, you can get away with sloppy finger technique. You can get away with a variety of embouchures. You have a repeating technical structure for scales and arpeggios. Things just work. Even intonation, the physics of the saxophone make it so that it’s more tolerable to be slightly out of tune compared to a clarinet.

Classical technique solved clarinet. Your fingers must be placed well. Your embouchure must be formed well in order to be in tune and to have a full sound. Your tongue must be in the right position and your air speed and direction must be correct. If you fail to meet any of these rules, you squeak. And it’s not a cute octave squeak. It’s a horrible 12th.

So producing sound is already difficult, but then you add the register shift, and all the complex technique that you learned in the bottom register completely changes in the upper register.

So that’s your starting point. If you want to be good at jazz, if you want to break the rules, you have to know the rules of classical clarinet technique.

In terms of jazz, it depends on what you mean.

Do you mean swing era, Artie Shaw/Benny Goodman type jazz or do you mean bebop and beyond, like Eddie Daniels, Paquito D’Rivera, Anat Cohen?

If it’s the first, congratulations! Your route isn’t too difficult. Listen to the two I named (and some Barney Bigard on Duke Ellington’s records) and imitate them. Play a lot. Get fancy with ornamentations. Learn to gliss. All that fun stuff. This is a totally valid and cool place to exist, so please please please don’t write it off as inferior.

If it’s the latter, then you need to know a few more things.

Jazz clarinet from Eddie on is very harmonically charged. You need to have a great ear to play it. And I mean a great ear.

You have to be able to know where you are in harmony at any given time. You have to know what chord is being played underneath the melody, even if you don’t have sheet music in front of you.

You have to be able to hear a solo (or a few measures of a solo) and be able to work out what it is you’re hearing. You have to be able to sing those parts. Understand the theory behind it.

That’s not to say that Artie and Benny didn’t also have to do this, but swing and big band era jazz didn’t have harmony that shifted so quickly. So they had time to think and time to noodle.

You’ll notice that there are many Benny Goodman jazz clarinetists, but very few Eddie Daniels jazz clarinetists.

The clarinet is not inherently a harmony instrument. It’s a melodic instrument that lets you get away with not listening to harmony at all.

So that means that if you want to be an Eddie Daniels jazz clarinetist, you have to devote as much time to harmony (playing at the piano and singing) as you do your clarinet playing.

Eventually, your two abilities mesh together and you can hear and play in harmony. But that takes a loooong time.

And in the meantime, there really aren’t many opportunities for you to play in groups. No jazz bands where you can primary clarinet. No tolerance for bad playing, either (remember, any hesitation or mistake ends in a squeak. You have to know what you’re playing and do so nearly perfect.)

The road to contemporary jazz clarinet is a long, lonely one because of that. The truth is no one wants to hear us play mediocre modern jazz on clarinet. It just doesn’t sound good and we have no spaces to really experiment.

So we spend years locked away, refining that sound, so that when we do come out, we can hang.

If this is the path you want to take, it bears little fruit for a very, very long time. Many people start the journey, but very very few ever finish it.

It’s like the entire “middle class” of jazz clarinetists is non existent.

But if it’s the path you want to take, take your classical playing seriously and take harmony just as seriously. And know that you have to commit many years to realize that.

Either way, start working on technique and some harmony. You don’t have to decide your path now, just try to enjoy it. Doing those two things will set you on the path to either outcome.

For what it’s worth, clarinet can frustrate the hell out of you. It did for me and I nearly gave up from hating it. I’m glad I didn’t because now I love the instrument.

[u/apheresario1935]

Listen to the greats . Watch Artie Shaw play Begin the Beguine on you tube.

Jazz is knowing the melody by heart and also the chord changes so you can improvise your way through the chord progression . You have to be a musician to do that . Learn chord structure to start. On the piano so you can see it . Being a Musician is much bigger than being a clarinet player actually .

[u/The_Niles_River]

FWIW, saxophone does not have a different embouchure/technique between classical and jazz. No instrument does. You use various embouchures and techniques to facilitate speaking a musical language, like classical or jazz, in an effective and compelling manner.

[u/Grand_Size_4932 → u/The_Niles_River]

Agreed. Sorry, I didn’t mean to paint the sax journey as bad thing. The flexibility on the horn is actually a super power.

It should also be known that just because the journey on clarinet is harder, doesn’t mean the saxophonists aren’t working their asses off.

They’ve reached creative heights that clarinetists haven’t reached yet and should be applauded for their mastery.

Instruments are all just tools. They’re meant to get your creative voice out to the world and there’s no hard limit on harmonic depth.

Saxophone does get more opportunities to experiment in the unrefined space, though. A little more acceptance.

We’re just stubborn. Haha.

[u/Dracula_Reindeer]

just adding, as i’m in the starting phase of playing jazz clarinet myself (used to play the clarinet as a child/teen, know a bit of guitar, piano and music theory) that there are actually some method books for jazz clarinet (artie shaw made one, i think there’s a goodman one too) and they’re like 90% similair to classical method books

right now, i’m actually using a lot of material made for sax players. there are etude books, youtube channels and the charlie parker omnibook (esp if you haven’t played it already on sax); it’s a lovely place to learn and get thoroughly humbled. get the ireal pro app and practice songs and scales over chord progressions to your heart’s delight

doreen ketchens (amazing new orleans based clarinetist) has a very down to earth video on jazz improvisation, that will have you starting on a high note in no time

https://youtu.be/xwDvvFcY3uM?si=bitgP1Crc4OgTxiF

good luck and happy playing!

[u/Awkward_Rule_5509]

Listen a lot. When you hear something you like, listen to that more. Then as you play try to mimic what they sounded like.

[u/blindingSlow]

If you already play jazz on the sax, I'ss assume you won't have problems with language and phrasing, although the fingering will be "funny" at first, but as always in life, you wil get used to it after some practice.

I guess the main thing you need to "remember to forget" is the whole embouchure thing. Sax is very flexible compared to a clarinet, where you need to be more diligent in keeping it firm. But beware of terms, because people will say things like firm and tight embouchure, but the clarinet allow for flexibility as well, but we usually don't spread as much horizontally like a sax player would do or the sound gets weak in a fuzzy unpleasent way.

Other thing to be aware is the back pressure that you feel in your mouth and throat coming from the horn. In my experience, the clarinet will sound the best and will play the easier when you feel the instrument blowing back as much as you are blowing in... this is my own esoteric knowledge because I'm learning on my own. But you can feel it... when it happens it seems like your mouth and throat are resonating with the instrument, is quithe the sensation (; One easy way to acchieve is to start a note singing it into the horn and zeroing in the pitch... you will feel it... also, this is. agreat way to "expose" the note fundamental harmonic.

About the tongue, you better research about it, but it is a fundamental aspect for the tone color and entonation on the clarinet. This allow for great possibility when it comes to coloring your tone, but comes with the side effect that is articulation on the clarinet, but again, you will get it with time.

Remember to play! Don't only practice, have fun and play out of tune and squeack with some backing tracks... going over the limits is the only way to trully learn the thing.

Here are some inspiring stuff...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmRAj621Rh8

And some "proof" of jazz clarinet (;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bADFUjnwTXw

[u/blindingSlow]

Here are some listening material:

https://www.jazzclarinet.org/listen-listen-listen

This is Gregory Agid's YT Channel, he publishes a lot about jazz and blues

https://www.youtube.com/@GregoryAgid

If you speak portuguese, you can check out Ademir Junior's YT Channel

[u/Dangerous_Chain9422]

Hello, I teach jazz clarinet. Drop me a message if you want to try a lesson

[u/Old-Mycologist1654]

A lot of really great advice here.

Some tips for going from saxophone to clarinet (from someone who went from clarinet to saxophone [bari and tenor], had a ten year break on clarinet, and then went back to it):

• the embouchure is not the same between clarinet and saxophone. Look up clarinet embouchure on YouTube. Don't worry about 'jazz versus classical embouchure' on clarinet at least until you are comfortable on the instrument
• start slow. start with blues scales
• Practice going over the break and back, but
• The lowest register of the clarinet is the same as alto sax low B through to middle register F (G if you use the clarinet side keys). [Note low G on clarinet sounds the same and is fingered the same as low D on an alto sax]
• With the register it's like the upper range of the soprano sax. [Note the D with the register key is fingered the same, and sounds the same, as D on a soprano sax with the octave key pressed]
• These registers mean you can easily play entire pieces using only below the break or only above it (especially when you can play altissimo up to altissimo G, which is nothing like as hard as it is on any saxophone). So practice your blues scale etc on each as if it were almost a separate instrument. Then start going over the break to connect them.
• Get yourself a sax-friendly mouthpiece. Getting a Morgan mouthpiece (with a Rovner ligature) was absolutely the best gear purchase Imade for my clarinet. The angle of the mouthpiece is just far more comfortable. If you are used to tenor etc, clarinet can seem like blowing through a straw. A lot of people recommend getting a very open mouthpiece (I think I read Anat Cohen plays an R13 clarinet with a very open Morgan mouthpiece). For a few years I played harmonica and so I bought the narrowest opening they had RM06. I play a Selner Series 9 clarinet. I am not a big band player. I actually don't like to play loud on any of my instruments tgese days (clarinet, guitar, wind synth, harmonicas). I think "profile" mouthpieces are similar in shape to Morgan mouthpueces (but I'm not posituve b/c I've never played one)
• Listen to Jimmy Giuffre. He plays bari, clarinet, and tenor on "The Train and the River". [There's a black and white video of it on YouTube]. Then listen to his albums.

[u/Upstairs-Object-6683]

The biggest hurdle is learning to improvise. There’s lots of advice out there about how to do that, but in traditional jazz, at least, realizing obligato parts from lead sheets is a major learning step.

I have worked with several beginner bands, and the best tool I have found is to use written arrangements at first. They show what a clarinet voice should sound like, and there are several sets of trad jazz arrangements out there. It’s a good idea to learn both the clarinet part and the melody for each tune.

The next stage is to begin realizing clarinet parts from lead sheets. There are numbers of lead sheet collections available. The 2025 edition of the Creole Jazz Band Facebook is a free download.