The heckelphone-clarinet (or ''Heckelphon-Klarinette'') is a rare
woodwind instrument
Woodwind instruments are a family of musical instruments within the greater category of wind instruments.
Common examples include flute, clarinet, oboe, bassoon, and saxophone. There are two main types of woodwind instruments: flutes and ...
, invented in 1907 by Wilhelm Heckel in
Wiesbaden-Biebrich
Biebrich is a borough of the city of Wiesbaden, Hesse, Germany. With over 38,000 inhabitants, it is the most-populated of Wiesbaden's boroughs. It is located south of the city center on the Rhine River, opposite the Mainz borough of Mombach. Biebr ...
,
Germany
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
. Despite its name, it is essentially a wooden
saxophone
The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed on a mouthpiece vibrates to p ...
with wide conical
bore, built of red-stained maple wood,
overblowing
Overblowing is the manipulation of supplied air through a wind instrument that causes the sounded pitch to jump to a higher one without a fingering change or the operation of a slide. Overblowing may involve a change in the air pressure, in the ...
the octave, and with
clarinet
The clarinet is a Single-reed instrument, single-reed musical instrument in the woodwind family, with a nearly cylindrical bore (wind instruments), bore and a flared bell.
Clarinets comprise a Family (musical instruments), family of instrume ...
-like fingerings. It has a
single-reed
A single-reed instrument is a woodwind instrument that uses only one reed to produce sound. The very earliest single-reed instruments were documented in ancient Egypt, ancient Greece as well as the Middle East, and the Roman Empire. The earliest ...
mouthpiece
Mouthpiece may refer to:
* The part of an object which comes near or in contact with one's mouth or nose during use
** Mouthpiece (smoking pipe) or cigarette holder
** Mouthpiece (telephone handset)
** Mouthpiece (woodwind), a component of a wood ...
attached to a short metal neck, similar to an
alto clarinet
The alto clarinet is a woodwind instrument of the clarinet family. It is a transposing instrument pitched in the key of E, though instruments in F have been made. In size it lies between the soprano clarinet and the bass clarinet. It bears a gr ...
.
The heckelphone-clarinet is a
transposing instrument
A transposing instrument is a musical instrument for which music notation is not written at concert pitch (concert pitch is the pitch on a non-transposing instrument such as the piano). For example, playing a written middle C on a transposing ...
in B with sounding range of D
3 (middle line of bass staff) to C
6 (two ledger lines above the treble staff), written a whole tone higher.
The instrument is not to be confused with the
heckel-clarina The heckel-clarina, also known as ''clarina'' or ''patent clarina'', is a very rare woodwind instrument, invented and manufactured by Wilhelm Heckel in Wiesbaden-Biebrich, Germany. Heckel received a patent for the instrument on 8 December 1889. It ...
, also a very rare conical bore single reed woodwind by Heckel but higher in pitch and made of metal, nor with the
heckelphone
The heckelphone () is a musical instrument invented by Wilhelm Heckel and his sons. The idea to create the instrument was initiated by Richard Wagner, who suggested its concept at the occasion of a visit of Wilhelm Heckel in 1879. Introduced in ...
, a double reed instrument lower in pitch.
Timbre
The instrument sounds somewhat like a saxophone, but with a much softer tone. In his 1931 catalogue, Heckel asserts that "the clarinet-like tone of the instrument is excellent, extraordinarily harmonious, and powerful; nor is it sharp or metallic like that of the alto saxophone".
It was apparently intended for military use, but never became popular, and only between twelve and fifteen were manufactured.
References
External links
Diagram of heckelphone-clarinet heckel-clarina, and saxophone from 1931 Heckel catalog.
Single-reed instruments
{{SingleReed-instrument-stub