bassclar

Issue #63

Last Update April 30, 2009

Arts Bass Clarinet Quartet by Winny Gerst Roker June 22, 2007 The bass clarinet is what the baritone saxophone aspires to be. The bass clarinet has a smoothness and liquidness of tone that the brassier sax can't match, yet in the hands of a competent player, it can be bold and brassy as well. It has a wider range (an amazing four-plus octaves that rivals the range of the bassoon) that allows it to stand in for other members of the clarinet family, yet its bottom notes, mellow and rounded, have a visceral impact. In the hands of good players, this is a thrilling and versatile instrument. The Edmund Welles Bass Clarinet Quartet had four good players, and a concert repertoire that showed off these instruments to their best advantage.

In their June 22 concert at the Hillside Club in Berkeley, California, this program of “heavy chamber music” (jazz, chamber works and heavy metal tunes, most composed by members of the quartet) showed aspects of the bass clarinet not normally heard, including a percussive sound that provided a rhythmic foundation for several of the pieces, and a sound like an electric guitar in overdrive, a feature of the three rock pieces arranged for this group.

Many of the numbers were in a jazzy style with repeating figures that owed much to Stravinsky. Rich, creamy harmonies centered at the lower end of the bass's range supported melodic phrases in the middle and upper ranges, with staccato rhythms that were reminiscent of the Morse code one hears in movies about naval combat.

One piece was especially well suited to this ensemble: a 16th century motet for four voices (soprano, alto, tenor and bass). Usually performed by choruses or recorder consorts, this music was enriched by the unusual instrumentation.

Most of the rest of the offerings of this unusual group were composed by the members: Jeff Anderle, Cornelius Boots, Aaron Novik and Jonathan Russel. The lack of a printed program and the often indistinct introductions by Cornelius Boots, the leader of the group and composer of many of the numbers, made it difficult to know the names of the pieces and who composed them.

An album, "Tooth & Claw" is in preparation. Its title track has already won 2nd place in the International Songwriters Competition instrumental category. The Quartet's first album, "Agrippa's 3 Books", made the All About Jazz WNYC's Top Ten Performances of 2005.

Building bridges between "avant jazz, new music, black metal and classic rock", not to mention renaissance and classical music, is not for the faint-hearted. It is a tribute to the Quartet to say that they have succeeded, and that they have upheld their founding principals, that "the bass clarinet can achieve a virtually unlimited range of sounds, and ... when multiplied can be as powerful as a boogie woogie piano, a gospel quartet or a rock band".

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