Clarinet choirs and quartets

[Ciel_Rouge]

I am a total beginner in the field of the clarinet so I would highly appreciate any recommendations of pieces composed or arranged for many clarinets. Chamber music with clarinets will do as well. I am beginning to fully appreciate this instrument and get deeper into listening to it. A side note on good Klezmer clarinet recordings would also be highly appreciated.

[Mark G. Simon]

I am also tremendously fond of clarinet ensembles. I currently play in two such groups, one of them an expanded quartet that doubles up on parts, and the other a true clarinet choir. The smaller group is performing two of my compositions, The Philosopher's Rag and Silver Spring on Dec. 18 in Washington DC.

I've written a good deal of music for clarinet, which you can browse through here:

http://www.markgsimon.com

Dancing on Water for clarinet quartet and marimba:

[pjme]

http://www.walterboeykens.com/introduction.htm

Belgian clarinetist Walter Boeykens ( still quite actif) conducts a clarinet choir. Earlier this year he issued a CD with concertos by Jean Françaix, Marcel Poot and Verbesselt.

Belgian brassbands-windensembles still go strong . Composers write (and wrote) for al kinds of clarinet ensembles ( duo, quartet, sextet...) .

P.

[Mark G. Simon]

http://www.walterboeykens.com/introduction.htm

Belgian clarinetist Walter Boeykens ( still quite actif) conducts a clarinet choir. Earlier this year he issued a CD with concertos by Jean Françaix, Marcel Poot and Verbesselt.

Are there any recordings of it (the clarinet choir that is)? I no doubt would have heard them had I attended the International Clarinet Association's Clarinetfest in Ostend a few years ago. But of course I didn't.

Belgian brassbands-windensembles still go strong . Composers write (and wrote) for al kinds of clarinet ensembles ( duo, quartet, sextet...) .

I hope some of that Belgian music is available on this side of the Atlantic.

[pjme]

I'll give you more info tomorrow....Bedtime overhere!
Peter 0:)

[Joe Barron]

Elliott Carter's Canonic Suite for four clarinets. Also arranged for four saxohones, which I believe is the only version available on CD. It's an  attractive example of Mr. Carter's early neoclassical phase.

More recently, there is Carter's Hiyoku (2001) for two clarinets.

[Mark G. Simon]

I've played the Canonic Suite with a clarinet choir, each part being doubled. It helps to have a conductor. Even when Carter is being simple, he's difficult to keep together.

[karlhenning]

Dancing on Water for clarinet quartet and marimba:

I've said it before: a dandy piece which deserves a performance, nay, several performances.

[SonicMan46]

I am a total beginner in the field of the clarinet so I would highly appreciate any recommendations of pieces composed or arranged for many clarinets. Chamber music with clarinets will do as well. I am beginning to fully appreciate this instrument and get deeper into listening to it. A side note on good Klezmer clarinet recordings would also be highly appreciated.

Hi Ciel_Rouge - I've seen that after 2 months despite a number of responses, you have not returned to this thread?  Are you still interested in this topic started?  If so, you might want to be more specific concerning you interests, i.e. do you really want only 'combos' of clarinets, or clarinet music in general (e.g. chamber, orchestral, etc.) - plenty of us can certainly recommended clarinet music in various genres and from different periods; as to Klezmer, that is still another source or recommendations - please provide some response & direction - 

[pjme]

..and I completely forgot.Sorry...

Here's an excerpt from Boeykens website. I'm not sure if he is that active anymore. I think that he is mainly teaching nowadays.

http://www.walterboeykens.com/choir_eng.htm

The Walter Boeykens Clarinet Choir has, since its formation in 1981, become an important institution within the music world. The ensemble has its roots at the Royal Flemish Conservatoire of Music in Antwerp. The Clarinet Choir is unique in its instrumentation: no less than 50 clarinet players are involved, covering the whole range of the clarinet family.
Over the years, the Walter Boeykens Clarinet Choir has put together a wide and varied repertoire of existing and new works and transcriptions. Composers who have written works specially for the Choir include Frits Celis, Robert Groslot, Jan L. Coeck, Harry Stalpers and Daan Mannke.

All members are students or former students of Professor Boeykens at the Royal Flemish Conservatoire of Music and the Rotterdam Conservatoire. Many musicians who have gone a long way in their professional career as clarinettists remain a part of the Clarinet Choir. The international character of the ensemble should also be mentioned. Walter Boeykens has not only achieved fame as a soloist, but also as an educationalist throughout the world, and this results in clarinettists coming from all over the world to study with him. These students have also become part of the Clarinet Choir. Thus clarinettists from Belgium and Holland sit alongside colleagues from Spain, Sweden, Greece, South Africa, Great Britain, Japan and Finland. 
During its twenty two years, the Walter Boeykens Clarinet Choir has given many concerts at home and abroad: Frankfurt International Musik Messe, Rotterdam De Doelen, Munich, Paris and a tour throughout England.
The most exciting international undertaking has been a concert tour to Japan with concerts in six major cities including Tokyo and Osaka, where a live CD was recorded. De Haske published their second album "Rikudum", and "Rotary Antwerpen Ring" published an album with Toots Thielemans as soloist player.

[Ciel_Rouge]

Hi SonicMan and pjme, I am most definitely still interested, I am just exploring many directions simultanously. I started this thread after I found out there is such thing as clarinet choirs and was curious about the pieces and what it would sound like in general. And I do love the solo clarinet and all other possible combinations as well, so any suggestions of clarinet concertos or any othe pieces with the clarinet would be highly welcome. And I am indeed intending to go deeper into Klezmer music, so I am also very much looking forward to any suggestions in this field as well. Just to give you an additional hint as required, my personal taste is more inclined towards baroque up to late romantic pieces, not so much towards 20th century.

[Mark G. Simon]

I am currently playing E flat clarinet in a group called the Gennusa Clarinet Consort. One of the pieces we're playing is a piece written for the Walter Boeykens Clarinet Choir. This is a Tango by Maarten Jense. It's fun piece, though some of the players find the rhythms tricky. There's also a colorful little piece written for the University of Florida Clarinet Choir by Paul Richards called A Butterfly Coughs in Africa and it has all sorts of fluttery figures. An arrangement of Ravel's Mother Goose Suite sounds rather undernourished for clarinets, but the Beauty and the Beast movement gives the contrabass clarinet a real workout.

[SonicMan46]

...... And I do love the solo clarinet and all other possible combinations as well, so any suggestions of clarinet concertos or any othe pieces with the clarinet would be highly welcome. And I am indeed intending to go deeper into Klezmer music, so I am also very much looking forward to any suggestions in this field as well. Just to give you an additional hint as required, my personal taste is more inclined towards baroque up to late romantic pieces, not so much towards 20th century.

Well, not sure 'what' you may already own, but some composers & recommendations below:

Brahms, Johannes - Clarinet Sonatas, Trio, and Quintet

Cartellieri, Antonio - Clarinet Concertos & Quartets (Klocker on MDG is excellent; believe I have a thread on the 'old' forum)

Crusell, Bernhard - Clarinet Concertos & Quartets (see Weber below for a recommendation)

Koechlin, Charles - Clarinet Works (Altmann-Henschel on Hanssler)

Krommer, Franz - Clarinet Concertos & Quartets (Berkes on Naxos & Klocker on CPO)

Mozart, WA - Clarinet Quintet & Concerto (so many options)

Ries, Ferdinand - Clarinet Sonatas & Trio (Klocker on CPO - the guy is amazing in finding these works!)

Rosetti, Antonio - Clarinet Concertos (Klocker on CPO - yet, again!)

Spohr, Louis - Clarinet Concertos (Collins et al on Hyperion - 2 different discs; maybe now a Dyad?)

Stamitz, Carl - Clarinet Concertos (Berkes on Naxos)

Telemann, GP - Chalumeau Concertos (Standage on Chandos; baroque instrument, kind of a link between the recorder & clarinet)

Von Weber, CM - Clarinet Concertos, Quintet et al (Pay & Orch Age of Enlightenment; 2-CD bargin on Virgin Veritas; includes Crussell)

[SonicMan46]

As to klezmer music, check out some of the posts HERE in the listening thread (made a couple posts myself, as did others, so check the entire page) -