CLARI, GIOVANNI CARLO MARIA, Italian musical composer, chapel-master at Pistoia, was born at Pisa about the year 1669. The time of his death is unknown. He was the most celebrated pupil of Colonna, chapel-master of S. Petronio, at Bologna. He became _maestro di cappella_ at Pistoia about 1712, at Bologna in 1720, and at Pisa in 1736. He is supposed to have died about 1745. The works by which Clari distinguished himself pre-eminently are his vocal duets and trios, with a _basso continuo_, published between 1740 and 1747. These compositions, which combine graceful melody with contrapuntal learning, were much admired by Cherubini. They appear to have been admired by Handel also, since he did not hesitate to make appropriations from them. Clari composed one opera, _Il Savio delirante_, produced at Bologna in 1695, and a large quantity of church music, several specimens of which were printed in Novello's _Fitzwilliam Music_.
CLARINA, a comparatively new instrument of the wood-wind class (although actually made of metal), a hybrid possessing characteristics of both oboe and clarinet. The clarina was invented by W. Heckel of Biebrich-am-Rhein, and has been used since 1891 at the Festspielhaus, Bayreuth, in _Tristan und Isolde_, as a substitute for the _Holztrompete_ made according to Wagner's instructions. The clarina has been found more practical and more effective in producing the desired tone-colour. The clarina is a metal instrument with the conical bore and fingering of the oboe and the clarinet single-reed mouthpiece. The compass of the instrument is as shown, and it stands in the key of B[flat]. Like the clarinet, the clarina is a transposing instrument, for which the music must be written in a key a tone higher than that of the composition. The timbre resulting from the combination of conical bore and single-reed mouthpiece has in the lowest register affinities with the _cor anglais_, in the middle with the saxophone, and in the highest with the clarinet. Other German orchestras have followed the example of Bayreuth. The clarina has also been found very effective as a solo instrument. (K. S.)
CLARINET, or CLARIONET (Fr. _clarinette_; Ger. _Clarinette, Klarinett_; Ital. _clarinetto, chiarinetto_), a wood-wind instrument having a cylindrical bore and played by means of a single-reed mouthpiece. The word "clarinet" is said to be derived from _clarinetto_, a diminutive of _clarino_, the Italian for (1) the soprano trumpet, (2) the highest register of the instrument, (3) the trumpet played musically without the blare of the martial instrument. The word "clarionet" is similarly derived from "clarion," the English equivalent of _clarino_. It is suggested that the name _clarinet_ or _clarinetto_ was bestowed on account of the resemblance in timbre between the high registers of the clarino and clarinet. By adding the speaker-hole to the old chalumeau, J.C. Denner gave it an additional compass based on the overblowing of the harmonic twelfth, and consisting of an octave and a half of harmonics, which received the name of _clarino_, while the lower register retained the name of _chalumeau_. There is something to be said also in favour of another suggested derivation from the Italian _chiarina_, the name for reed instruments and the equivalent for tibia and aulos. At the beginning of the 18th century in Italy _clarinetto_, the diminutive of _clarino_, would be masculine, whereas _chiarinetta_ or _clarinetta_ would be feminine,[1] as in Doppelmayr's account of the invention written in 1730. The word "clarinet" is sometimes used in a generic sense to denote the whole family, which consists of the clarinet, or discant corresponding to the violin, oboe, &c; the alto clarinet in E; the basset horn in F (q.v.); the bass clarinet (q.v.), and the pedal clarinet (q.v.).