“Master Class on the Contemporary Clarinet”
An appendix of the “Clarinet Solo Project”, this masterclass is part of a on-going research on extended techniques for the contemporary repertoire and new music for solo clarinet. Luca is one of the few musicians at HE Level who specialise in both classical and jazz music and he has been invited by universities and colleges in the UK and overseas (Cambridge University, Newcastle University, Reading University and Glasgow University in the UK, Sao Paulo University and the Faculty of Santa Marcelina in Brazil, the University of Salerno in Italy). His experience as a performer and an academic has given him the chance to design a masterclass for both classical and non-classical (jazz, world music, etc.) clarinet-players who want to enhance their technique and gain the skills necessary to play contemporary music.
The event starts with the performance of music for clarinet solo to demonstrate the potential of the instrument and it goes on facing different topics as follow:
- Performance of “Sequenza #1″ for Clarinet Solo (from the album “Partenope”) and “Lied” by Luciano Berio;
- Excerpts from compositions for Clarinet Solo (including unpublished material sent to Luca by living composers and extended excerpts from “Sequenza IXa” by Luciano Berio) where some of these techniques are applied;
- Demonstration and explanation of different techniques also used during the Sequenza and how to generate them (multi-phonics, glissando/portamento, “timbral trills” or quartertone trills, growl/flutter, quatertones and microtones, voice in the instrument, with objects as resonators and without pieces of the instrument, etc.);
- Tone alteration;
- Examples of tone alteration within different styles of music (40s swing, be-bop, post-bop/free jazz, classical, tarantella/folk/world music, etc.);
- The possibilities of the clarinet within a wide range of music genres from mainstream jazz or classical to more experimental and avant-garde, thanks to his acoustic characteristics, dynamics, range;
- Handouts and Reference Material.
- (Extra) Demonstration of the potential of the instrument endorsed by Luciano (with extra keys and rings) with some more audio examples.