Klezmer Clarinet

[Alex Jacobowitz <Alex_Jacobowitz...>]

B"H Munich

"the only thing that sounds worse than a clarionet 
is two clarionets" - Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"


Before people get too caught up in instrumental-style
discussions regarding the use of clarinet in klezmer music,
remember that the people (East European Jews) 
who created this music were NOT originally limiting 
themselves to specific instruments or sounds. It's
only with our academic musicological retrospect that 
we create clarinet "categories" of klezmer, a truly dangerous
proposition, since we thereby threaten to turn klezmer music 
into a Jewish "museum piece", in much the same way many
musicians reject Bach on the piano.

By the way, though most people seem to think that
the clarinet is the "typical" klezmer instrument, its
entry into klezmer music was relatively late. 
Unless, of course, the only klezmer music under discussion
is that on recordings. Careful.

Typically Snide Alex