complicated<\/strong> instruments. There are 24 keys on a Bb clarinet, which is just mind boggling! The number of possible combinations actually can make the clarinet extremely difficult to play. You have 9 fingers that you can use to push buttons–that can make it really tricky in learning to transition smoothly between notes without squeaking.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOh yeah… that’s another thing. Clarinets squeak, big time. It’s something that new players work through for years! Even a professional may let out a squeak now and again. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The reason for this is that the embouchure for the clarinet is very touchy and it’s important to solidly close the keys on the clarinet without any gaps. This sounds straightforward, but with 9 fingers to worry about you have your work cut out for you. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Furthermore, clarinets and flute players are often given fast runs in music where they have to play a lot of notes very quickly. That’s tough because of all the buttons and fingerings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Flute<\/h4>\n\n\n\n The flute is uniquely challenging because of the breath support required to play it. This is true for all wind instruments to some degree, but flute players especially are playing with very little resistance (essentially just the resistance from the shape of their mouths). This means they have to learn to budget their air extremely well, because without air there is no sound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since flutes also are best heard in their higher register… guess what? Their music is often really high which takes more air. So flute players definitely have to learn to coordinate their breath support extremely well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Summary<\/h4>\n\n\n\n Although both instruments have their unique challenges–these instruments are fairly evenly matched in difficulty, especially in the long run. They take years of practice to gain superb technique and to be able to play complex music. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Differences Between the Clarinet And the Recorder (a Type of Fipple Flute)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n So, the concert flute is often what people think when they hear the word flute, but there are different types of flutes. One type of flute called the recorder <\/strong>in particular actually has a similar shape to the clarinet. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/picture><\/figure>\n\n\n\nThe recorder is actually a special type of flute called a fipple flute<\/strong>. It’s considered a flute because the sound is still made by blowing against a hard edge. The edge in this case is a blade opening into a sound hole (this is how a whistle that your coach might of had works). <\/p>\n\n\n\nThe player blows into the mouthpiece of the instrument and the air goes over and under the blade at the sound hole which produces a similar air oscillation that the concert flute does.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To be clear, <\/strong>a recorder does not use a reed<\/strong> like the clarinet does to produce the sound. So even though the shape of the instrument is similar the sound is made very differently. <\/p>\n\n\n\nAnother difference is that the recorder doesn’t have keys–rather it has holes that you cover with your fingers directly. In fact, recorder players have to learn to master half-covering holes so they can play all the notes in tune. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
With all the dozens of instruments, it’s easy to get mixed up between them. Band nerds (see if those still exist at my other post) might be shocked if you<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1312,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[38,31,2],"tags":[],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":38,"label":"Clarinet"},{"value":31,"label":"Flute"},{"value":2,"label":"Instruments"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/clarinet-vs.-flute-1024x683.jpg",640,427,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"Peter Mitchell","author_link":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/author\/thesoundadventurer\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":38,"name":"Clarinet","slug":"clarinet","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":38,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":2,"count":1,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":38,"category_count":1,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Clarinet","category_nicename":"clarinet","category_parent":2},{"term_id":31,"name":"Flute","slug":"flute","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":31,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":2,"count":4,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":31,"category_count":4,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Flute","category_nicename":"flute","category_parent":2},{"term_id":2,"name":"Instruments","slug":"instruments","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":2,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":105,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":2,"category_count":105,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Instruments","category_nicename":"instruments","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":false,"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1301"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1301"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1301\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1316,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1301\/revisions\/1316"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}