Steve Hartman

The interview with Steve Hartman was held the 8th of June 2019 in New York and has been edited by Heinrich Mätzener.

Sound quality and the essence of Music

HM: Which requirements, would you say, a clarinetist should meet with his sound quality?

SH: The essence of this, you know, it’s all about the musicality, the ears, rhythm, that’s what is really important. Ultimately, you know, a good sound all by itself, it’s completely boring!
HM: I agree.

SH: No direction, no shape in the phrasing, this is just - so what? When it’s in tune, that’s great! Nice, that’s great to play and blend with other instruments, but you have a solo, do something!

I mean the vibrato is illegal on the clarinet, right? This is internationally forbidden; Interpol comes and arrests you if you play with vibrato. However, do you know anything about baseball?

HM: A littel...

The idea of shape, of saying, of phrasing

SH: In baseball, if a pitcher throws a nice, really fast, straight fast ball, it’s going to be hit, no matter how fast it is, it has to have some movement, it has to do something. The sound has to have some movement, so it’ll have direction in terms of dynamic, or a little of this, a little of that, you know what I mean?
The only time that you play a flat line, it’s when it says “senza espressione” and then you purposely go (daa, imitates in sound), you know, play like a machine, and then you go back to normal. As far as the tone, it’s what pleases your ear and what pleases other people’s ears. Then again, you could have someone who would play a non-pleasing tone and would be very successful. As performers, as virtuosos, as whatever, they have something fantastic about their playing.
They have the gift of grabbing the audience’s attention and holding it. That’s phenomenal! Nobody can teach that! There is no way to quantify, to verbalize what they do that has that effect. You can hear the most flawless player with a beautiful sound and perfect intonation and rhythm...but somehow you are missing something.

HM: A clarinetist should have technical possibilities that enables him to move with the sound, to do something with the sound.

SH: For sure! Hopefully, you start with a basic concept of evenness, or equalizing notes, so you can play a line. The way I look at it is that the purpose of evenness, is that you “call the shots” (expression of billiard playing). If you have a series of notes and let’s say there’s no meter: it’s just 12 notes in some kind of order, then, the composer hasn’t told you what he wants you to do in terms of emphasis, unless it’s says “senza espressione”. For 12 equal notes, you decide where it goes and where it comes back from. Obviously, if there’s meter that’s a pretty good clue to start with. And the idea of saying: if you have like Stravinsky Three Pieces or something like that, he wants you to play a 2/4 bar like a 2/4 bar. a 3/8 like a 3/8. There’s a reason for it, and so the meter dictates the shape, the phrasing. Every time he writes that, he means something, because otherwise, why would he bother?

In the tradition of Robert Marcellus?

HM: I took some lessons with Robert Marcellus.

SH: No kidding, I never met him!

HM. It was very impressive. Unfortunately, Robert Marcellus has gone blind. He could tell me without seeing: “I think you should change the position of your tongue, to get more focused sound, to get a clear staccato.” He could make the connection between the sound he heard and the specific way a student produced that sound. He trained me before I made the audition in the Zurich Opera and really helped me to be successful there. Later, Ramon Wodkowski told me, that young students today were mainly looking for a big, dark sound. There is a fear to be too bright.
Would you say that today, there does exist is a typical American clarinet sound?

SH: You know, I don’t hear that many players, to be honest with you. We had an audition at the ballet recently, for second clarinet and bass clarinet. I don’t know what to say. There was a period of time where there were really rough sounds out there. A lot of them ironically were sort of Marcellus students, or at least thinking they were of Marcellus’ school. But they misunderstood his playing. His sound had a tremendous ring, but he could also blend. What they picked up is the ability to blend. They picked up the dark, without the ring and without the center. So, a lot of players play admiring the great dark sound. The thing about the Cleveland orchestra that was groundbreaking is how well in tune they played and how well they blended. But Marcellus also had a great sound, and he was a great clarinetist and musician. I never thought of him as an expressive player or as singer on the instrument, but certainly, he had a very good sound. It’s easy to understand why he was a model for so many players.

Play with the intensity of the different registers

SH: Often, the high register doesn’t sound like high register. It sounds so smooth and dark, but you’re a clarinet, not a piccolo. The high register is supposed to sound like a tenor going for high notes, not a soprano in the same octave. There is supposed to be an intensity to the register. Obviously, a high C on a tenor is not a high C on a soprano but it’s thrilling to hear, because of what’s happening inside to get there. If it sounds too easy in the high registers, you lose the whole effect.