In This Issue
August 3, 2015
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- A Note From Michelle Anderson - Looking forward to some vacation time
- Free Training - Improve Clarinet Tone With A Tuner- This short clarinet activity helps you improve your voicing (tongue position) and is easy to do at home
- My Clarinet VIP Opportunity - Join my Early Bird VIP list for some exciting new clarinet training, coming soon...
- Michelle Recommends - Michele Zukovsky performing John Williams Clarinet Concerto
- Clarinet Is Easy - Complete how-to lessons for beginners and self-taught intermediate players
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A Note from Michelle Anderson
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Hello !
Welcome to the Clarinet Mentors newsletter. I enjoy sharing my best clarinet pointers with clarinetists all over the world, and I appreciate that you are part of the Clarinet Mentors Community!
I have experienced a whirlwind of rich musical experiences since my last newsletter to you. I was at the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles conference in San Jose, CA in mid July with the Pacific Symphonic Wind Ensemble. I heard so many excellent concerts by some of the top concert bands in the world. It was very inspiring.
We were also lucky enough to meet Frank Ticheli, who wrote a wonderful clarinet concerto that I performed with our group. He is a very enthusiastic, musical, eloquent composer, and it was interesting to hear his views on the piece. Here is a photo of myself, our conductor Dr. David Branter, and Frank Ticheli, after the performance.
I also took part as a performer in the UBC Wind Conducting Symposium in late July that brings many conductors of wind band music together to hone their skills under excellent, supportive tutelage from Dr. Robert Taylor and his guest teachers, including Dr. John Lynch from Sidney Australia, who was outstanding. The quality of instruction was superb, the atmosphere very warm and supportive, and I learned a lot about conductors actually do!
After that I was in the studio for three full days working on a movie sound track for an upcoming family movie entitled Monkey Up. It was very interesting working with composer Brahm Wenger and the Vancouver Film Orchestra, and to put his very lyrical score onto the soundtrack.
In between, I have been trying to work on my next course - still in production. If you are on the VIP list, please watch your inbox carefully for a very time-limited pre-release offer to a small number of beta testers in the next few days. This offer will also allow direct feedback from me on your clarinet playing, and will therefore be limited to only 20 people. If you have been waiting to take a peek inside of the course, this is your chance to see it before it is fully completed and offered to the general public.
Thanks so much for being part of my Clarinet Community.
Free Training: Improve Your Clarinet Tone Using A Tuner - This short exercise will improve your voicing and tone
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Today I have a short video that shows how you can use your tuner at home to work on voicing (tongue position) to improve your tone by playing just 4 notes with a tuner. This is a really helpful short exercise, and I remind my students of it regularly. If you have been a long time viewer of my videos, you will have heard me preach the importance of good voicing before, but the simplicity of this tool to help you is worth learning. It is also a great reminder to all of us of the importance of staying very focused with our tone and sound quality.
You can click on the picture below to play the video, or using t his link.
Clarinet List VIP Opportunity
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I am very exciting to be finally nearing the end of a two year project to create a clarinet course for you that uses ALL of my favourite clarinet pointers and combines them with a very organized set of lesson plans to help you master them.
This course will be designed for players with an intermediate level of clarinet skills. (If you are newer to the instrument, or basically self-taught, the Clarinet Is Easy course, below, is a great starting point to prepare you for this upcoming course.)
There are still lots of video edits to do, and worksheets to finalize, and the huge task of loading it all up to a website where you can access all of the great lessons. I am not announcing the exact release date yet, but I am hoping for the next month or two. It is currently about 80% recorded, and the rest should be recorded soon if all goes well.
When this is complete, I will be ready to celebrate! I want to invite you to the celebrations. I will be hosting a series of special events, including some live online trainings that will allow members of the Clarinet Mentors community to have some live mini lessons, and ask me your clarinet questions. I'll also be sharing some great sample lessons from the course with you. If you are interested in taking part in any of these events, the best way to get the advance notice is to sign up for my VIP Clarinet List. It only takes a minute, and then I will know that you are interested in some great new training (and during my celebration week, it is all at no charge to you) to help you play clarinet more easily. I have a quick (less than one minute) video with directions on how you can sign up. VIP Clarinet members will receive special discounts and exclusive offers, so please sign up now by clicking here!
Michelle Recommends: John Williams Clarinet Concerto (not Star Wars!)
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Today, I have something for your listening pleasure. John Williams, who has written so many epic sound tracks (Star Wars, ET. Raiders of the Lost Ark, Harry Potter), also has written a rarely performed concerto for clarinet and orchestra.
This video features the marvelous clarinetist Michele Zukowsky performing the 2nd movement. An important part of our clarinet education includes listening to great players, and exposing ourselves to new music. I hope you find this recording will provide you with some interesting clarinet and orchestral sounds.
Clarinet Is Easy - Your Step-by-Step Beginner Course - Now Available! (Also enjoyed by many intermediate level players)
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How To Solve Your Common Clarinet Frustrations and Play Clarinet More Easily
I firmly believe that if anyone has the "recipe" for how to play clarinet, things are really relatively easy to do. Most of our frustrations come from inadvertently learning bad habits along the way. With that in mind, I have created for you a 10-lesson comprehensive course for beginners (and self-taught intermediate players) that gives you the tools to truly learn the clarinet easily, while avoiding all of the most common frustrations that can plague us. I believe that these lessons can save you hours of grief by giving you the best practise systems that have worked for thousands of clarinetists. The lessons have great content, and are presented in a video format so that you can watch them again and again. If you would like to play with more ease and have a clear understanding of the fundamentals of clarinet playing, you can get more information on the Clarinet Is Easy course here (including some free preview videos):
Click here for the free preview videos to Clarinet Is Easy
If you are curious about this, you can try these lessons with a 100% 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee. (That means that you can try a full 5 lessons before you decide if you have received great value from the course.) If it is not the right style for you, you get your tuition refunded, no problem. I invite you to try it now! Many students have received amazing results so far from this course (and you can read their comments on the order page).
Michelle Anderson, the founder of Clarinet Mentors, is a professional clarinetist and teacher who currently lives in Vancouver BC. Her professional career spans over 30 years and she currently plays regularly with the Vancouver Opera Orchestra, the Pacific Symphonic Wind Ensemble and the West Coast Chamber Music series. She has performed with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, the CBC Vancouver Orchestra, the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Winnipeg Ballet Touring Orchestra and many other groups. Michelle currently specializes in teaching adults to play clarinet more easily and quickly through online resources, and conducts the Vancouver Clarinet Choir. Michelle is a Backun Musical Services Artist and plays on Backun clarinets and mouthpieces.
Thanks for reading this biweekly newsletter. If you think a friend would enjoy this, please feel free to forward it. If they want to enrol in the Clarinet Mentors Community, they can go to www.learnclarinetnow.com.
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Helping you to find success on your instrument with proven, easy-to-follow systems that are designed to help you sound good, and feel better about your playing.
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