I have a vague memory from childhood, well before my bassoon-playing days, of learning that the bassoon had some special quality to its staccato notes. (From an educational tv show? a children’s book on musical instruments? I can’t recall.) My impression was that this sound was different in some way than staccato produced on other instruments.
That idea stuck in my mind, but it occurred to me recently that in my subsequent years of bassoon study I had never heard a bassoonist actually address this. I turned to some published sources to see if I could locate any information.
Several books on orchestration (geared toward composers, not bassoonists) refer to the bassoon’s supposedly unique or unusual staccato. A masters thesis by Melissa Pipe brings several of these together. (I should confess I pulled these quotes directly from Ms. Pipe’s paper, and haven’t verified them with the original sources.)
The real state of the matter is that the Bassoon has a preternatural power of playing staccato, and, if it is forced to play passages of a humorous, grotesque, or macabre sort, it easily endows them with a dry spiccato quality that is almost toneless.
—Cecil Forsyth, Orchestration. London: Macmillan and Co., 1948, 2nd edition, p. 235-236.
Its reedy staccato is often invoked for prankish diversions…
—Bernard Rogers, The Art of Orchestration: Principles of Tone Color in Modern Scoring. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1970, p. 36-39.
For while certain passages (especially staccato passages) have a way of sounding comical on the instrument…
—Kent W. Keenan, The Technique of Orchestration. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1970, p. 89.
Staccato passages are second nature to the bassoon.
—Henry Mancini, Sounds and Scores: A Practical Guide to Professional Orchestration. New York: Northridge Music, 1986, p. 86.
This passage from Adler is a little ambiguous, and may actually be saying that rather than being unique, the bassoon’s staccato is akin to the oboe’s:
Like the oboe, the bassoon performs lyric melodies beautifully and produces attacks and staccato passages as incisively… Other composers have treated the bassoon as the “clown of the orchestra” and have written staccato passages for it that truly sound humorous.
—Samuel Adler, The Study of Orchestration. New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company, 3rd edition, 2002, p. 221-222.
When playing staccato passages, on the other hand, it is an excellent instrument to portray humour…
—Sammy Nestico, The Complete Arranger. Delevan, N.Y.: Fenwood Music Co., Inc., 1993, p. 57.
But while orchestrators seem to find the bassoon’s staccato noteworthy, few bassoonists seem interested in addressing that aspect of it. (Many explain staccato technique, but do not point it out as remarkable or unusual.) I found only two counterexamples, but both are well-respected sources.
Although each tone is started with the tongue, a tone may be stopped with either the the tongue (as in saying “tut”) or with the breath (as in saying “tuh”). Not all notes which are marked staccato should be played with the “tut” style of tonguing. It should only be used in passages in which the composer seeks to use the rather humorous, dry effect of the bassoon’s sharp staccato. Two quite typical examples are the bassoon solos in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 4, First movement, measure 64, and in Dukas’ Sorcerer’s Apprentice.
All other notes which are marked staccato … should be stopped with the breath…
—William Spencer, rev. Frederick A. Mueller, The Art of Bassoon Playing. Princeton: Summy-Birchard Music, 1958, p. 54.
Among all the woodwinds our instrument possesses a special capacity for the rendering of staccato. This important effect features in many of the solo passages written for the Classical Bassoon by Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven; the 19th century French instrument possessed a quality of dry, crisp staccato which was also capitalized upon by many composers. My teacher Archie Camden declared: “a good reliable staccato is one of the brightest jewels in the bassoon player’s crown!” (Camden, 1961). However these days the German system bassoon has somewhat changed in character, being designed more for sonority and strength rather than the delivery of these effects. All too often today’s playing styles are better suited to powerful expressiveness rather than light staccato. Nonetheless we must strive to achieve these articulation effects by the judicious choice of equipment and deployment of technique…
When stopping a note, there are occasions when we wish to terminate it precisely — chopping it off cleanly as if it were a slice of salami. At other times a more artistic effect will be called for — allowing the sound to die away like the tail of a comet. For the former we may use the tongue, for the latter the breath.
—William Waterhouse, Bassoon. Yehudi Menuhin Music Guides. London: Kahn & Averill, 2003, p. 112.
So, one possibility is that the bassoon’s supposedly special staccato is the effect of ending notes with the tongue. This technique is not unique to the bassoon, but is controversial. (Personally I use the technique on all woodwinds when I believe it to be musically appropriate. And I think most woodwind players do, too, even those who claim they don’t.) Perhaps the relatively open discussion of this technique by high-profile bassoonist-authors correlates to its being viewed as uniquely a bassoon effect.
One other possibility I would like to explore is the possible relationship of bassoon staccato to another controversial technique: the bassoonist’s jaw moving during articulation.
If you have thoughts or resources regarding the mystique of bassoon staccato, please join the discussion in the comments section!
The clarinet being lucky to have a 19-note first register (from E3 to Bb4), why doesn’t the third register start another 19 notes beyond this, that is, at E6? Same might be said about the bassoon too, after exhausting the second register, the third register should technically start at F#4.
I’m not sure in what sense you mean that the registers “should” start at certain notes. They do start at those notes because using fingerings based on those particular overtones are thought to have the best combination of pitch, tone, and response. For example, it’s possible to play B-natural4 on clarinet using a side-key fingering, but that’s generally used only for special circumstances because it just doesn’t work as well as the second-register fingering.
I guess what I’m getting at is, there is some overlap between the second and third registers. Excluding the trill keys you mentioned (there to bridge the gap over the break) and only including the notes of the core octave (E3-Bb4), the second register technically goes a twelfth higher (B4-F6), and the third register 2 octaves and a major third higher (G#5-D7). So the notes in the G#5-F6 interval have technically 2 possible realizations, but somehow the third register is said to start at C#6?
Does the end of the second register sound that bad on the clarinet? Same with the bassoon that switches to the third register before the end of its regular second register (I even found a resource that qualified E4 at the top of this register a “fake”/”false”/”invented” fingering, when it’s just the regular overblown E of the fundamental octave).
On the other hand, the saxophone makes full use of its second register (and even adds a couple more notes to it, as you mentioned) and there doesn’t seem to be a need to switch to the third register halfway through it.
I was just wondering ;)
Thx
Which register you are in depends on which natural harmonic you are currently using. If that doesn’t suit your way of thinking, your dispute is with the laws of physics, not with me or with woodwind pedagogy.
When there is overlap between the registers, we have choices about fingerings, and can select the best ones for the situation.
I’m not trying to dispute anything or push whatever way of thinking, sorry if I’m sounding like that. It definite is more a physics / acoustics related question. I was just surprised at the difference between the saxophone in the one hand and the clarinet/bassoon in the other.
I am curious to learn more about the choice of the bassoon altissimo beginning on Eb4. The transitions into altissimo on the other woodwinds makes sense to me as their finger combinations begin anew (from no tone holes closed to at least one closed when entering this range) but with this, for me, does not constitute the bassoon’s altissimo range to transition from Eb4 to E4. Would it not make more sense for it to begin at the transition from D5 to Eb5 given the drastic shift in open tone holes and ventilation in the left thumb as forked fingerings are commonplace for both modern and historic bassoons? For example, the patterns for most third octave ranges and higher on all woodwinds is based on manipulations of the harmonic series. I would love to hear your thoughts on this subject.
Which register you are in depends on which natural harmonic you are currently using, not your fingerings. In some cases the fingerings appear to follow logically, and in some cases they may not.
Altissimo is when you start using 3rd or higher partial notes, that is, the notes above the fundamental octave (1st partial) and the overblown octave (2nd partial).
On the bassoon, the fundamental octave goes from F2 to F3, the overblown octave goes from F#3 to D4. Note that D#4-F4 could also be overblown but the sound is weak.
So the altissimo range starts with D#4, which is a 3rd partial G2. Note that higher partials on the bassoon are sharper and sharper, so that the expected 3rd partial of G2, D4, sounds like D#4. The fingering for this note (xxo|xxx) with an open LH3 hole is the sign of a 3rd partial fingering, since it opens a vent on a third of the tube’s length. The overblown 2nd partial G3 opens the vent halfway (/xx|xxx). The 4th partial is technically G5, but sounding as G#5, venting on both half and quarter of the tube’s length (/xx|oxx). The 5th partial is technically B5, but sounding as C#6, venting on 1/5 and 2/5 along the tube’s length (x/x|x/x) or (d xox|xox venting another 1/5-length point with the high D key). The 6th partial is technically D5, but sounding as E5 (also called “harmonic E”), venting on half and third of the tube’s length (/xx C#|xxx).
Note also that the lowest altissimo note is not D#4 but C#4. This note has a short fingering belonging to the overblown octave (2nd partial), while the long fingering is a 3rd partial of F2 (technically C4, but sounding as C#4).
This is a great explanation! Thanks!
After re-reading your comment, I have the impression that it might just be a misunderstanding in the octave naming convention. Altissimo starts at D# above middle C (xxo|xxx) after which the pattern of forking and ventilation in the thumb changes drastically, as you said.