(Adapted from 100 LAST Orchestration Tips, planned for release in late 2026)
The clarinet’s lack of 2nd-partial overtones on the octave above can make woodwind harmony feel lighter and brighter; and yet has implications for underlining the 3rd partial at an octave+5th higher.
Mozart’s first significant exposure to more qualified clarinetists of his day was during his second, momentous visit to Mannheim in 1777. While he’d scored more rudimentary parts 6 years prior in his Divertimento no. 1, K.113 during a sojourn in Italy, it was not until the late 1770s that he truly became aware of the instrument’s possibilities of technique and timbral colour.
I’ll be focusing on Mozart in this tip because it’s important for the modern orchestrator to realise that the finer points of instrumental colour were always of concern through the history of orchestration, however texturally simplistic some of the earlier Classical and Baroque era scoring might seem. In fact, I would argue that textural simplicity puts an even greater focus on the timbral qualities of particular instruments, especially brass and woodwinds; and even more so, the impetus for Mozart, Haydn, and other late Classical composers to make the clarinet a regular member of the orchestra.
So let’s start with the classical era’s conception of symphonic scoring. A minimal complement would appear to be two oboes, two horns, and strings; quite often with timpani. As the genre grew along with public and aristocratic interest (and therefore funding and musician training), so did the ensemble. We see flute and bassoon, sometimes singly and sometimes in pairs, added to roster; as with trumpets, and an increase to 4 horns, sometimes in differently tuned paired crooks to assist with the increasing complexities of harmony on grander scales of formal development. Truly massive works toward the later end of the era might also include a trio of alto, tenor, and bass trombones, and maybe cymbals and bass drum. This is not to say that every symphony was scored bigger as time progressed; but there were certainly more and more large-scale ensembles required, laying the groundwork for Berlioz to open the floodgates.
All of the Musical Examples appear in a special score+audio video on the Patreon feed.
Of course, from the 1760s to the late 1770s, the clarinet had been scored in quite a few operas by Gluck already, and in its modernised 5-key form had become a dependable timbral resource in several large European cities such as Paris, Mannheim, and most importantly Vienna, where many of his operas were performed. Gluck is often pointed to as preceding Mozart as a clarinet-friendly composer; but looking at several of his scores featuring clarinet, one comes away with a different idea of his conceptions of the instrument’s importance and necessity. In fact, Gluck’s default strategy for his pair of clarinets is to score them in unison with his oboes, for hundreds of bars (a strategy adopted by other composers of the same period such as Salieri). This creates a very full-blooded, intense sound which helps the functions of both instruments compete with the brass a bit better, and fill out the sound picture with simple intervals of 3rds, 4ths, and 6ths (often tracking the flutes below at the octave, or joining them for a triple unison). Very occasionally the clarinets are stacked above the horns in long harmonic tones or as the top note of an octave; and almost never do they appear of their own accord. This probably helped the staging of operas like Alceste in towns with less-capable clarinetists, or none at all.
One has only to look at the score of Mozart’s first serious opera Idomeneo, written in 1781, a few short years after his aforementioned Mannheim visit, to see how far the clarinet’s role and capabilities were immediately advanced. Gluck had just finished the revision of his final opera, Iphigenie auf Tauris, which features a few tentative passages of exposed clarinets (such as the Chors nos. 16 & 18 from Act II, and the no. 26 Hymne from Act III), with a slightly more independent placement of harmonic tones. In Idomeneo, Mozart easily surpasses him in scoring the clarinet as a fully integrated, dependable member of an 8-voice wind section comprising four equally important pairs of instruments. The clarinet finds its own characteristic voice immediately of a tender, empathetic counterpoint and colour behind expressions of affection, or lugubrious tones during moments of grief, or even chirruping gaiety in passages of joyous abandon. And there’s even a bit of tone-painting underlining the drama of certain arias: such as in Idamante’s Act I aria Non ho colpa, in which the line “E di pena afflitto io moro” (“and I die of distress and pain”) is accompanied by surging, flowing clarinets in 3rds in unison octaves over bassoons on the first instance; and then under flutes the second time.
By the time of Mozart’s complete artistic maturity in the mid-1780s, his imagination and innovation regarding the clarinet is fully unleashed. One need only look at the opening of 1787’s Don Giovannioverture to witness several distinct clarinet scoring strategies, all within the first 30 bars. First, integrated harmony on the first two tutti chords; followed by unison pitches in octaves with flutes and between oboes and bassoons, in a very wind-band fashion; integrated harmony again; then descending octaves doubling unison oboes above and 1st bassoon below, mellowing the double-reed timbre on both ends; ending with more integrated harmony for 2nd clarinet, with 1st clarinet doubling 1st and then 2nd oboe. It’s all superbly intelligent, imaginative, and colourful scoring, that feels perfectly natural to the sound picture and yet dramatic as hell.
This is not to say that Mozart scored clarinets everywhere throughout every page of his operas. Though they certainly appear regularly in overtures, large tutti numbers, and finales, their use is somewhat curtailed during the normal proceedings of scenes. In Don Giovanni, for instance, Mozart favours a woodwind complement of flutes, oboes, and bassoons during most of the male soloist numbers; while trotting out the clarinets in place of oboes (and additionally flutes in some places) to accompany his more exquisite female soloist arias. Examples of the latter are Donna Elvira’s Act I, Scene V aria Ah chi mi dice mai; Zerlina’s Act II, Scene VI aria Vedrai, carino; and Donna Anna’s touching Act II, Scene XII aria Non mi dir, bell’idol mio. Likewise in the Act I Quartetto Non ti fidar, o misera and Act II Terzetto Ah taci, ingiusto core! the clarinets are used in place of oboes to make radiant the beseeching, heartbroken reproaches of Donna Elvira over the gaslighting of Don Giovanni. Intriguingly, Mozart also scores a simple complement of paired clarinets, bassoons, and horns with strings accompanying Don Ottavio’s Act II, Scene X aria Il mio tesoro intanto. 1st clarinet gently intensifies the muted 1st violin line in an octave over exposed 1st bassoon – sometimes in reaction, sometimes in support of the tenor solo line.
Probably the greatest use of featured clarinet in the whole opera is Donna Elvira’s Act II, Scene X(e) aria Mi tradì quell’alma ingrata, scored for a trio of solo flute, solo clarinet, and solo bassoon, with horns and strings. In some ways, this is Elvira’s moment of victory over Don Giovanni, in both putting him in his place and rising above his petty scheming – and when it’s cut from the opera as sometimes happens, the overall emotional arc makes a lot less sense. Nonetheless, the gentle rise and fall of the clarinet reveals her inner moment of emotional resolution and self-possession, and is a great first-rate example of early solo scoring for the instrument.
So we can see that Mozart, for all his adventuresome brilliance as an operatic composer, still approached the timbre of his clarinets with an eye towards featuring their unique sound in lengthier passages, and leaving them out elsewhere more than including them as regular textural components. His general large-scale operatic tutti scoring including clarinet definitely laid the groundwork for composers to follow him in adopting clarinets, such as with Haydn in his final symphonies, and Beethoven throughout all his orchestral scoring. And yet with regard to his own purely instrumental orchestral music, Mozart mostly avoided scoring oboes and clarinets together; using the clarinet as a replacement in the customary role of oboes in his Symphony no. 39, and in his Piano Concerto no. 22. Other works scored for the customary flutes, oboes, and bassoons had clarinets added to them in retrospect, like his Symphony no. 40, and his Concerto for Two Pianos (which might be the posthumous work of an editor rather than by Mozart himself). His Piano Concerto no. 24 appears to be a rare case of a full complement of winds, including both oboes andclarinets – and those clarinets are full integrated both texturally and thematically. In fact, Mozart seems to revel in contrasting clarinets against oboes, the instruments chasing each other’s tails in swapping fragments of motif. It’s a tantalising indication of where he might have headed symphonically had he achieved another decade of life.
I’ve spent a huge amount of this chapter charting Mozart’s evolving orchestral approach to the clarinet – and there are many many other writings dedicated to his scoring of the instrument in solo, chamber, and wind band ensembles – but all to bring us around to the point of what sound Mozart was trying to cultivate with its inclusion. And the answer is quite simple and yet subtle; falling back on our understanding of those timbral properties which make the clarinet unique. Mozart’s hypersensitive ear for overtones (which made him frightened of horns as a toddler, and dislike an overabundance of flute as a mature composer) cannot have missed the clarinet’s accentuation of certain partials, and diminution of others; resulting in that refined, cooler tone so refreshing after a solid century of the oboe’s predominance.
The lessons he learned, so clear and well-stated in his own development as an orchestrator, can be easily applied to our own work today; in using the clarinet to lighten textures from within, and clarify harmonic motion within potentially distracting elements of rhythm and dramatics. A great example occurs in Movement 2 of his 22nd Piano Concerto, bars 170-172, in which Mozart scores a quadruple stack of woodwind octaves, with bassoons below and clarinets above, 1st clarinet doubling the flute on the top pitches. I’ve diagrammed the first pitch below, along with an alternate example substituting oboes in the place of clarinets – with extra staves above charting out the overtones that result from either combination – followed by the 3-bar excerpt. In the Musical Examples video, you can clearly hear the difference between the two. In Mozart’s original conception, the two clarinets bring a cool radiance to the top of the octave, the 1st clarinet tempering the resonance of the first flute. There’s a bit more space up there, and yet we have a sense of a complete quadruple octave. Compare that to the overtones we can hear in the mockup with oboes, how much energy is focused at the top of the combination. The result is that the middle of the sound picture has less clarity.
The above is but one of many instances in which Mozart used a clarinet or clarinets in octave combinations for a similar effect. What’s even more interesting is how he explored relationships of timbre between the clarinet and other instruments. For an introductory example, let’s jump to the start of his 39th Symphony, and look at the opening two contrasting E♭ major chords: the first high in flute, clarinets, horns, and double basses; the second an octave lower, while bassoons, trumpets, and the rest of the strings stay in a stationary position. As with the octaves in Ex. 8, the clarinets on the mediant and dominant lighten the top of the harmony so the flute can shine through simply and clearly on the tonic above – where oboes would add a lot of extra weight of resonance in the same position. This is as true for the first chord as for the second. But there’s more going on; this sounding G3rd sits an octave above the horns on the same pitches. In that position, the clarinets bring out a certain clear, penetrating character to the horns below; while oboes make the horns sound brassier and less clean. This latter approach is also quite effective, but not so intense and direct in the way Mozart intends at the start of his symphony. Of course, once one adds the trumpets into the mix, their strong overtones can obliterate any of these subtleties in an instant. But have a listen to the chord mockups compared between clarinets and oboes – and then in context with a live excerpt in which the trumpets hold back a little. Mozart’s intentions become crystal clear.
(I may edit out some of the beginning for the book version, and add a couple more textural examples at the end, but that should be enough for now. Thanks everyone for dropping by for another orchestration tip focused on clarinets!)
