How Adults should approach learning the clarinet:

"I wish I had started playing the clarinet when I was younger," and "I am not able to play the clarinet like I want to."

These are laments I hear frequently. For those who harbor such feelings, I have good news. (Re)Learning the clarinet as an adult can be a rewarding and meaningful experience, and more importantly, it can be done in a way that uses your age and experience as an asset.

The first obstacle is overcoming a common (and largely untrue) belief: Learning the clarinet is harder as an adult. This belief stems from a connection to the idea that language learning is most effectively done during our formative years as children. Watching my child learn language, I am struck by this— if I were in a situation where I was not allowed to speak my native language and all that I experienced and struggled with was a new language, I would speak at about the same level she does in about six years. I would hope that I would speak it better than a six year old because there is a lot more at stake in adult conversations than those of a six year old. 

I bring this up because adults learning or relearning the clarinet don’t have the time or context (such as a school band) to learn in the same way as children. Working with adults, I have found certain obstacles to be consistent among all. The primary obstacle is this:

Understanding does not create ability.

When learning a new job, assuming the hiring process is appropriate, we come with an existing set of skills that allow us to succeed simply by understanding the task. Adult learners of the clarinet understand the result they want but lack the foundational skills to bring that understanding into being.

This often leads to conclusions like "the clarinet is hard to learn as an adult," "the clarinet is not for me," or simply frustration that the process is not yielding the desired results and/or not yielding the desired results fast enough to be comfortable. 

The solution to this is relatively simple in concept but complicated to deliver from an educational standpoint unless there are some fundamental differences in how clarinet playing is introduced. Clarinet needs to be presented in an entirely different order that leverages the advantages of an adult rather than catering to the needs of a child.

At the end of a school year, a child who does not take private lessons and only practices a little bit, a range of around one octave and a half (twelve notes) is considered pretty successful. Sure, in addition to that, the child learns other components of how to read music. Rhythm, dynamics, and articulation are all part of the learning that is done through playing in a band. I dare say that every adult I work with would find that they would not consider it a success if they could only play twelve notes after a year of playing clarinet.

Adults have a need. They don’t know it (how could they?) but they need to be introduced to the clarinet in a much different way than a child would.

Why is this?

Adults want to play music that requires more foundational skill than a child gets in the early stages of clarinet learning.

The solution: I call it “clarion-based” playing.

The clarinet has three registers.

Kids, who don’t study privately, spend most of the first year playing in the chalumeau. Pedagogically speaking, this is appropriate. Their embouchure muscles are not strong, their fingers often struggle to cover the tone holes entirely, and they don’t practice much. Adults have the strength, size, and motivation to progress much faster.

From an educator's standpoint, there is an obligation to modify (quite dramatically) the way the fundamental aspects of the clarinet are introduced.

Whether we are aware of it or not, voicing is something we all do when we play the clarinet. Voicing is how we form embouchure, tongue position, oral cavity, and throat/larynx. It is the resonance we have in our bodies while we play the clarinet. Our voicing needs to sustain all registers of the clarinet. If one gets used to voicing only for the chalumeau register, it can have a disastrous impact on the ability to progress at the pace adults want. Adults need to be able to move comfortably between registers far earlier in their journey to maintain the motivation necessary to continue playing the clarinet.

Teaching with words to help a student (of any age) about voicing is a terrible way of going about it.

This is for people who are new, relearning, or refining their ability on the clarinet.

The starting point is simple.

Take the mouthpiece, with reed and ligature attached, and play the note that comes out of it for about 10 seconds. Play it at a MP (Mezzo Piano - slightly soft)  or MF (Mezzo Forte - slightly loud) dynamic. Start the note only with air (do not start the note with the tongue). Hold the note for ten seconds. The resulting note should be a sounding C above the staff (high D on the clarinet). This note should remain consistent in pitch for the entire duration it is played.

This is step one in finding a voicing that will be reliable for all registers of the clarinet. One will find the path to better intonation, articulation, and response in every register of the clarinet when this is in place.

Voicing the clarinet

Clarinet voicing has to do with all parts of our body that impact the way the reed/air vibrates. The amount of reed/mouthpiece in the mouth, amount of pressure on the reed, our embouchure, our larynx and airspeed need to be within a certain parameter for this note (high C) to sound - and sound consistently - on the mouthpiece. 

Will you need this to play notes in the Chalumeau? NO - but use it in the Chalumeau anyway. It will provide results in all registers and minimize frustration as one continues to hone new skills on the clarinet.