Texas Bandmasters Association
Bandmasters Review • June 2014
17
Clarinet Clarity:
An Interview with Julie DeRoche
Mary El len Cavi tt
Julie DeRoche is Chair of the Music
Performance Department and Clarinet
Professor at DePaul University in Chicago
and has performed frequently in the clarinet
section of the Chicago Symphony. After
having read many of her clarinet pedagogy
articles over the years, I was excited to
be selected to be in an administrative
development program with her last summer
at Harvard University. What follows is
a discussion we had about clarinet skill
development. I hope you enjoy!
—Dr. Mary Ellen Cavitt
MEC:
:
In your mind, who has
the ideal clarinet sound? Is it your
own sound?
JD:
[laughter] I wish. I think
clarinet players are always looking
for a good sound. I have occasionally
heard myself have this sound that I
like, but not always. There’s an
old recording of Robert Marcellus
doing the Mozart
Concerto
. As a
tone model, I think it’s absolutely
gorgeous. It’s got a lot of richness
in it, it’s clear, and it’s in tune. The
articulation is wonderful.
MEC :
Who else is on that
recording?
JD :
It’s the
Mozart Clarinet
Concerto
with the Cleveland
Orchestra. I still send my students
to that.
MEC:
So that’s your ideal?
JD:
It’s close. I guess at this point
in my life, I think of tone with more
flexibility. We still work hard with
our students on creating a good
tone. That’s a big thing at DePaul.
I let them have a little more variety
than I used to because I’ve come to
discover that tone is having a really
even sound from the low range
through our four registers, which
are all distinctly different. Having
a tone that is as even as possible,
that’s number one. Playing in tune
note-to-note is number two.
MEC :
When you say four
registers, do you think of the throat
tones as a separate register?
JD :
Yes, the chalumeau,
the throat, the clarion, and the
altissimo. So a goal for me and for
my students is to be able to play a
slurred scale like a long tone with
as even a sound as possible. The
evenness and the pitch are actually
more of a priority than the actual
sound, as long as the sound doesn’t
interfere with music making.
MEC :
And do you get this
evenness by manipulating some-
thing?
JD:
No, actually the opposite.
This is really important. You get it
by not manipulating. Consistency
of embouchure, consistency of
tongue position, consistency of air
against the reed, and subtle voicing
coming only from the top lip, (not
the tongue position!) will make an
even and in-tune tone.
MEC:
What do you mean by
voicing coming only from the top
lip?
JD:
Just be flexible with it. If
you want to control a break so that
it’s smoother, strengthen your top
lip. If you want to control high
notes, either for tone or pitch, use
your top lip more. Any time I want
to add extra control, I use my top
lip more. Mostly it’s instinctive. But
the more you control your top lip,
against the structure of the face and
against the mouthpiece, the more
you will control the sound and
response.
MEC:
Does using the top lip
more let pressure off of the reed?
JD:
It probably does. It probably
does in very minor ways change
the pressure point. It changes the
roundness of the embouchure. It
helps projection. It adds control.
The tone then becomes a function
of the music you’re playing, not
just clarinet tone. I have to say on
the highest level, one of the tones
I admire the most is my colleague
Larry Combs’. He was especially
Part Two.
The first part of this interview was printed
in the April issue of the
Bandmasters Review.
The entire article can be found under the
Resources tab at
www.texasbandmasters.org
.