Contrabass clarinet

Contrabass clarinet
Clarinets: contrabass in B♭ (left), contra-alto in E♭ (right)
Woodwind instrument
Classification Single-reed
Developed1808
Playing range
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The contrabass clarinet in B♭ sounds two octaves and a major second lower than written.
Related instruments
Musicians

The contrabass clarinet (or pedal clarinet after the pedals of pipe organs) is an uncommonly used member of the clarinet family. Modern contrabass clarinets are transposing instruments pitched in B♭, sounding two octaves lower than the common B♭ soprano clarinet and one octave below the bass clarinet. Some contrabass clarinet models have extra keys to extend the range down to low written E♭3, D3 or C3. This gives a tessitura written range, notated in treble clef, of C3 – F6, which sounds B♭0 – E♭4. Some early instruments were pitched in C; Arnold Schoenberg's Fünf Orchesterstücke specifies a contrabass clarinet in A, but there is no evidence such an instrument has ever existed.

The smaller E♭ contra-alto clarinet is sometimes referred to as the "E♭ contrabass clarinet" and is pitched one octave lower than the E♭ alto clarinet.

Two models of subcontrabass clarinet (the octocontra-alto and octocontrabass) were built as prototypes by Leblanc in the 1930s and survive in the Leblanc museum.

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