The Wolfgang

The clarinet typically isn’t the first object one thinks of when analyzing something that has made a difference in society. What most people don’t know or understand is how the clarinet has made substantial changes to the way we define music. Other than viewing the clarinet as one solid entity, seeing the clarinet in its separate parts opens a person’s eyes. The clarinet would be nothing without its mouthpiece, which is the part of the clarinet that enters the musician’s mouth, but it would also be nothing without a reed, which is the thin piece of wood that vibrates to create sound. Aside from the mechanics of the clarinet, the player in itself is the most important part. There are numerous ways that a musician may sound and that is solely dependent upon the strength of their embouchure, which is the way that a musician applies their mouth to the mouthpiece, but what is the importance of the embouchure in the production of clarinet tone quality? In order to understand the importance of the embouchure, one must first recognize the function of the mouthpiece along with the reed, then must be able to identify differences between a spectacular tone quality and a mediocre one.