ouch...

... well, today I had, what I can only call, my first proper clarinet practice: The first eight Demnitz studies for 20 mins and then the first three bars of the Mozart Clarinet Quintet for a further 20 mins.

by the end I was able to play those three bars at 84 bpm, with the right tonguing, phrasing etc... the correct speed is 120 bpm... oh well - practice makes perfect!

I now hurt, so am going to sit down for the rest of the evening...

tone!

have just finished 20 mins or so of clarinet practice and for at least 5 mins of that I had, what I would consider to be, decent tone! Not great tone - decent, but worth a celebration as it's the first time that I've been semi-pleased with how I've sounded!

also - sight-reading has come on a bit and I'm now almost comfortable in the third register!

finger memory and co-ordination...

... I've started playing the clarinet again (only a few mins a day until I'm better) and am really looking forward to getting up to a decent standard again (probably about a year away).

two things have amazed me so far:

1) finger memory. Even though I can't remember what all the notes are called, or sight-read properly, I can still remember how to play the first movement of the Mozart Clarinet Quintet (albeit very badly...)

2) co-ordination between tongue and fingers. This one sounds strange, but when you play the clarinet, you sometimes 'tongue' each note. This means that rather than just blowing, you bring your tongue to the reed at the start and end of each note. It sounds really simple, but I've just tried playing a basic scale at speed, and it didn't work! My fingers and my tongue were working at different tempos, so I either had 2 identical notes in a row, or missed out one...

oh well, just one more thing that I'll need to re-learn. I've also got to get used to the pain again - my right thumb, my lower lip, both wrist at the moment! - and get my embouchure good enough to get over the second break, into the third register!