Yamaha YCL-CSGIII Custom Series Bb Clarinet ยามาฮ่า บีแฟลตคลาริเน็ต

Slightly plump barrel and thick-walled bell produce a deep tone with rich resonance.

Ergonomically-designed new key shape offers comfortable and natural key touch. Yamaha-original silver-plating is applied on them, allowing a focused and centered sound.

A newly shaped Eb lever is adopted as a standard, along which the entire mechanism is totally re-designed as well.

Cork pads and leather pads are optimally placed to maximize on their tonal quality, touch and functionality.

New toneholes maximize superior tone quality, even intonation and a uniformed response throughout the full range of the instrument.

Yamaha original intonation correction mechanism inspired by the Oehler system (German style) clarinet is available to control low E and F note. This system assures natural finger control, excellent feel and playability.

Hamilton-plated keys models are available as optional extra.

While all CSG generations focused on maximum expression, we didn’t quite have the know-how to deal with higher air velocity. Older models had a nice soft, mild tone, but when it came to extreme expression, there was a wall we needed to overcome.

Now, our extensive research revealed three key methods to successfully increase the instrument’s dynamic range. These are secrets, though. We also incorporated the following three specs to address the clarinet’s weak points, namely, pad materials (*1), the pierced tube construction for the C#/G# tonehole (*2), and improved low E, F intonation (*3).

We have many advisory artists around the globe. In 1998, we created the first CSG prototype based on the CS (*4) that we designed nearly 30 years ago and started evaluations with artists mainly in Japan.

Later on, I was transferred to North America. During the two years’ stay since 2001, I started making improvements based on feedback from local artists. We used our warehouse about the size of a 1,000-seat auditorium to compare the dynamic range of several prototypes and gradually finalized specifications while also putting them to tests in concerts. In 2003 we introduced the first generation CSG (*5).

Next, I moved to Europe where we conducted artist evaluations in a number of countries such as France, Switzerland, Italy, UK, Belgium, and Spain. Each country has their own tastes, but all of those that I talked to unanimously agreed that a wider dynamic range, or in other words greater freedom of expression, was important.

We never stop working on enhancing freedom of expression, but we have poured all of our knowledge into our latest YCL-CSGIII. We hope this instrument will help artists make deep expressions, share the musical experience with the audience and circulate the emotion back to the performer . This exactly represents our Yamaha slogan, “Creating Kando Together” which is at the heart of anybody who is involved.

(*1) New selection of water-resistant materials for some pads.

(*4) The CS is named after Canens, a Roman Goddess of Song.

(*5) The “G” stands for German. We gave the name “CSG” to represent the German taste such as short barrel, ring-less bell, and its mild, soft tone color.