How to teach someone to play clarinet

From classical symphonies to early Jazz, clarinet has always been an expressive and versatile instrument. If you are getting ready to pass on the great wisdom of how to play this wind instrument, then there are a few steps that you can use in order to boost the beginning clarinet player into a professional level.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Clarinet
• Method book / instruction guides

1. Start with the way that a clarinet works. Showing someone how to clean the corks of the instrument, put together and take apart the clarinet and how the reed works with the instrument will allow the student to have a basic understanding of how to approach the instrument.

2. Take some time for reed care. Being able to keep the reed wet, in shape and in the right place is what makes the sound on the clarinet work. You want to make sure there is an understanding of how to care for the reed after one is starting to play the instrument and after they are finished.

3. Talk about embouchure. This is one of the most important steps to showing someone how to play the clarinet. Telling them where to hold the mouth piece to get the right sound and showing them where the best placement is will help. At this point, you will have to analyze with some trial and error and with the person you are teaching. If they squeak, let them know they are holding onto the mouth piece too hard. If they can't get a sound, show them how to move the mouth piece around their mouth to the very tip of the reed to get a better sound.

4. Putting it together. After the student gets a handle on the embouchure, you can put the clarinet together and show them how the notes work. Experiment with the different notes and match them up with the right keys. This will help your students to grasp how the clarinet works as a whole.

5. Take it to the next level. This is where you want to add in songs, the method book and start working on bringing the basics to the next level. Everything from showing the alternate keys, the way to maneuver with the keys and ways to improve the embouchure will help to get your students up to speed from Level 1 to playing the clarinet concertos.

Tips & Warnings

• Thinks about pace when you are teaching with the clarinet. The basic care of the clarinet may not take long, but having exercises to improve sound and to understand the keys of the clarinet should have some time spent in order to improve.
• Never forget to add in the theory. While you are teaching the notes, theory and exercises will always help to understand what the student is doing. Adding in the concept of tones, pitches, rhythms and reading will help the learning process and lead to new understanding of music as a whole.