Reform Boehm System

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The Böhm system is a handle system for the flute and the clarinet, the Reform Böhm system is the corresponding handle system for the clarinet, connected to a clarinet body that has a different internal bore than the original Böhm clarinet, with the aim of to produce a different sound character together with another mouthpiece.

  • Reform Böhm clarinets from Wurlitzer

  • Reform Böhm clarinets in Bb and A with 7 rings (the 7th of which is the 3rd ring on the upper part), with extended key for G sharp ", roller connection between C" / Es ", lateral overblow key, and low E / F- improvement

  • 3. Ring and extended G # key

  • Roller connection and lateral double-decimal flap with improvement for B`

  • normal duodecim key

  • Deep E / F improvement

Grip systems for the modern clarinet

There are (essentially) two fingering systems, the German system, also called the Oehler system, which has been further developed from the historical clarinet , and the French, also known as the Böhm system, for more details

The advantage of the German system lies in the sound properties, that of the French in the mechanics.

Development of the Reform Böhm system

  • Clarinets from Leitner & Kraus

  • Original Böhm clarinet with 17 keys and 6 rings

  • Reform Böhm clarinet with 20 keys and 7 rings

In the second half of the 1940s, the Erlbach Vogtland / Saxony- based master clarinet builder Fritz Wurlitzer, with the intention of combining the advantages of both systems, undertook to change a Böhm clarinet while retaining the fingering system so that its sound was largely that of the historical and thus also corresponded to that of the Oehler clarinet. For this he built a Boehm clarinet with a smaller conicity, whereby the resulting impairment of the intonation was compensated by shortening the lower piece by a few millimeters and slightly offsetting the lower tone holes. He also provided them with a German-style mouthpiece. Finally, in 1949, he was able to hand over the first clarinet of this type, which he called the "Reform Böhm Clarinet", to a clarinetist of the Concertgebow Orchestra in Amsterdam.

Such a clarinet can visually match a normal standard Böhm clarinet with 17 keys and 6 rings. With some makes or models, however, there are these differences: 1. There is another ring on the glasses of the upper piece (on the tone hole for the crossed C), which means that the two crossed B can also be used as a fork handle. This ring can also be found on normal Böhm clarinets, albeit rarely ("Voll-Böhm"). 2. Extension of the flap for the two crossed G sharp to be operated with the right index finger. 3, The two upper flaps for the little finger on the right (for the two bowed C and Eb) have rollers on the inside (as with German clarinets). 4. The duodecimal key is shaped like German clarinets, ie the corresponding tone hole is not on the underside of the clarinet, but on the left side, which requires an upward-shaped key instead of a straight key; this can be connected to an additional flap that opens and closes automatically to improve the sound of the streaked Bb and the intonation of the notes on the upper upper piece. 5. Deep E / F improvement. All of the above improvements (adopted or inspired by the German clarinet) can be seen in the illustrations.

Current situation and outlook

Initially, Reform Böhm clarinets were only built by Fritz Wurlitzer and later by his son Herbert Wurlitzer , and other manufacturers in Germany (e.g. Leitner & Kraus , Wolfgang Dietz, Harald Hüying) and Japan (Yamaha) followed. The major French manufacturers showed no interest in this type of clarinet. The main customers were clarinetists in the Netherlands, Japan, Spain, Italy and the USA. and until 1990 also the Eastern Bloc for instruments made in the GDR. The numbers sold by the individual manufacturers are likely to have lagged significantly behind those of the clarinets they made with the German system and continue to do so, which was and is probably due to the relatively high prices of these instruments, but also to a lack of publicity. Yamaha stopped producing this type a few years ago. The current trend for this system is downward (mid-2019). Instead - as already mentioned in a work from 2007 - "it has recently become increasingly evident that more and more professional clarinettists, in cooperation with instrument makers, have individual instruments designed for the needs of musicians based on either the German or French system" . Finally, it should be mentioned that - according to Fritz Wurlitzer's basic idea of ​​a Boehm clarinet that approximates the "German" sound - the Canadian manufacturer Stephen Fox has in recent years developed an A and B clarinet from an acoustic point of view. Purity of the German sound ”with the“ brilliance and projection ”of the French clarinet, together with a“ superior intonation ”. He calls them "Benade NX Clarinets". A Buffet Crampom R13 and a Reform Böhm clarinet by Herbert Wurlitzer, from which some of the above-mentioned optional additional mechanisms were adopted and supplemented by others, were the models for comparison.

The decline in the distribution of the Reform Böhm clarinet, which is still made for lovers of this instrument by various German manufacturers, except Wurlitzer especially Leitner & Kraus , Wolfgang Dietz and Harald Hüying, is probably also due to the fact that In the last 20 years or so the perception of sound by French clarinetists (meaning those who play Böhm clarinets) has shifted towards the German sound perception and the manufacturers of Böhm clarinets have followed this trend by adjusting the average bore course, bore diameter and of the tone holes in the German clarinet seem to support, with the result that today the sound of a modern Böhm clarinet does not have to be far removed from that of the Reform Böhm clarinet or that of a German clarinet in general. If the clarinetist then also uses a German mouthpiece with the appropriate reed, with the intention of getting as close as possible to the German sound perception, even trained ears may not hear that a Böhm clarinet is being played, like this z. B. with the soloist Sharon Kam . While ambitious supporters of the sound of German clarinets (in cultural orchestras) might welcome this development, from a more independent point of view one could rather regret the ongoing global standardization or close rapprochement and the associated loss of different worlds of sound and see it as impoverishment, similar to the case with the observed worldwide loss of the individual sound of top international orchestras.

Web links

References and comments

  1. ↑ today a district of Markneukirchen
  2. ↑ Colin Lawson, The Cambridge Companion to the Clarinet, pp. 29f, Cambridge University Press, December 14, 1995
  3. ↑ Eric Hoeprich, The Clarinet, Yale University Press, 2008, p. 271
  4. ^ Charles Stier: The Wurlitzer Reform-Boehm Clarinet in America . In: International Clarinet Society (Ed.): The Clarinet . 18, No. 4, July – August 1991, p. 18.
  5. ↑ a b Stephanie Angloher, the German and French clarinet system. A comparative study of sound aesthetics and didactic communication, inaugural dissertation to obtain a doctorate in philosophy at the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich , 293 pages, Herbert Utz Verlag GmbH, Munich 2007, here p. 246 and p. 140
  6. ↑ For more details see here: variant between the systems: the hybrid clarinet in fingering systems clarinet
  7. ↑ Stephen Fox (Benade) website
  8. ↑ Stephanie Angloher, the German and French clarinet system. A comparative study of sound aesthetics and didactic communication, inaugural dissertation to obtain a doctorate in philosophy at the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich , 293 pages, Herbert Utz Verlag GmbH, Munich 2007, pp. 43 and 47
  9. ↑ In detail on this topic: Stephanie Angloher, The German and French Clarinet System. A comparative study on sound aesthetics and didactic communication, inaugural dissertation to obtain a doctorate in philosophy at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich , 293 pages, Herbert Utz Verlag GmbH, Munich 2007, pp. 221-234