Relatively new to Clarinet, and noticed the Scales book mentions that G to Bb in 2nd reg are known as throat notes. Does anyone know why they're called this? Not heard the term before, although expected that notes should be supported by the diaphragm/breath and not 'throat' similar to tonguing should be maintained by the tongue and again, not the throat or simply breath.
Thanks,

I was under the impression it was just because they are in the 'throat' of the instrument, not really anything to do with your throat.

They do tend to be a bit weak though, and plenty of support and an open throat seems to help, so maybe I'm wrong!

...and often putting a selection of right hand fingers down on the throat notes helps with the tuning

I would get an electronic tuner/well tuned piano and experiment

The throat notes are indeed so named because, with normal fingering, the pitch of the note is controlled mostly by the throat portion of the instrument, because the effective end of the resonating portion is at about the second or third open hole.

Acousticians have known the reason for this effect, and the relative weakness of the throat notes, for about 50 years now. It's quite a long piece of technical reasoning, so I shan't post it here unless someone really wants to know.

Pity they've not been able to do anything about it then!

The Bb throat note always sounds horrible (at least it does when I play it), plus I find the fingering difficult, although it's a bit easier now that I've got a clarinet where the thumb hole and the register key are closer together. I've often wondered why clarinet designers/manufacturers haven't been able to design something better, and if you've got an article on the subject I would be interested to read it, thanks

There is an alternative way of playing Bb that gives a nicer note (A key plus the second RH trill key from the top), but it's sometimes awkward to get to depending on what notes precede/follow it.

It is theoretically possible to move the register key to give a better Bb. Trouble is, it'd then be useless as a register key!...

I'd like to know But I'm awkward!



The register key in itself is a compromise - for some notes it would be better higher, others lower. Hence why oboes and saxes have multiple register/octave keys...

Clarinet keywork/fingerings is a fascinating subject, and probably worthy of a thread in itself. We haven't even started on alternative fingerings, and why some are better than others, but this isn't the thread to discuss this, sorry for the off-topicness...

Without going into all of the technicalities, the important acoustical difference between the throat notes and the lower ones is that the holes covered by the fingers create small Helmholtz resonators along the main tube, and these reduce the height and increase the width of the peaks in the plot of gain against frequency of the resonances to which the reed vibrations are locked. The throat notes have tall, narrow peaks. This suggests that the throat could be made similar to the main tube by drilling holes similar to the finger holes and covering them on the outside (easier than trying to drill blind holes from the inside of the tube. I seem to recall that the acousticians who wrote the paper suggested this, but I haven't reread the paper (in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America) for several decades. I don't know of anyone trying this on an actual instrument, so it remains a theoretical prediction, AFAIK.* It would only involve the barrel, so if it didn't work you could buy another one.

* But the theory predicts also the tendency of the clarinet to go flat with increased amplitude, which I am told is the case.

Thank you for the explanation.

Thanks to all - didn't think such a 'simple' question could generate such discussion!