Achieving Virtuosity: Major Scales & Arpeggios for the Intermediate Clarinetist

This edition is available in both physical book and digital PDF formats; carefully choose from the options above before adding to your cart.  
(PDF products will be delivered via email within one business day)

This edition contains the major keys.  The minor keys are also available from the same publisher, and the major and minor volumes are available together as a single collection.

Kristine Dizon's Achieving Virtuosity is an expanded compilation of Jean-Baptiste Albert's 24 Varied Scales and Exercises and the mechanism exercises from Hyacinthe Klosé's Complete Method for the Clarinet.

Dizon notes that Achieving Virtuosity is aimed at addressing technique issues that she observed in her own clarinet students - particularly, the lack of knowledge of fingering options and developing solid scale technique early on.  

Dizon's combination and reorganization of these publications offers clarinetists a well-structured path for progressive development of clarinet technique. She includes extensive fingering suggestions throughout the entire publication to address the crucial issue of a lack of fingering options.  Dizon offers her recommended practice structure of Chromatic Long Tones, Mechanism Exercises, and Scale patterns, making for a substantial edition that is also useful for adults and anyone who wants to return to playing clarinet.

The Albert is presented nearly in its totality with only two changes: the septuplet scale and the chromatic neighbor tone arpeggio in sextuplets are omitted. From the Klosé, Dizon transposed the mechanism exercises into all major tonalities.

Each key provides five pages of mechanism exercises, followed by one page of scales and arpeggios. The mechanism exercises are placed before the scales to encourage technical work prior to scale patterns. Each mechanism exercise is two to three bars long, and there are almost two hundred exercises for each key; their range stays within the chalumeau and clarion registers.  The range of the scales and arpeggios matches that of the original Albert publication source.

The key signatures start at no sharps/flats and are ordered progressively, adding one sharp up to seven sharps, and then switching to seven flats and removing one flat.

All pages have extensive suggested fingering markings using letter abbreviations (ex: "L" = Left pinky finger, "K" = Chromatic, etc.). Introductory material includes an explanation of fingering suggestions, rhythm patterns for scale practice variety, and a page of long tone warm-ups with a full chromatic range of fingering diagrams up to altissimo C7.