ONE of the singular pleasures of being an exchange student in Germany was the opportunity to play clarinet in one of the myriad orchestras that are spread across the country in even the smallest Bavarian villages.

Music is the lifeblood of Germany, and it’s more democratic than politics. In the land of Beethoven and Brahms, I never lacked for an opportunity to play with other students – almost none of whom were music majors. It is as second nature for a German to play an instrument as it is for an Indian to speak more than his local dialect. There were times when I had a music evening every day of the week. Clarinet in hand, I would go from door to door, availing myself of duets, trios, and quartets. When no clarinet part was called for, I simply transposed the viola part, happy to be there.

While chamber music is an exercise in egalitarianism and partnership, where everyone gets a chance to shine as well as support the efforts of one’s fellow players, an orchestra offers one a chance to be part of something much bigger. But foreign clarinetists have a peculiar problem playing in German orchestras: Most clarinets in the world feature an arrangement of keys called the “Boehm” system, developed in the 1840s in France. Germany, however, went its own way with the “Oehler” system.

The two clarinets – French and German – really do look quite different. They also sound a bit different, the German clarinet to most ears being “darker,” and the French clarinet “brighter.” The Germans are orthodox about this difference. Ads for clarinetists in German newspapers often carry the caveat: Kein Boehm – No Boehm!

UNDETERRED, I answered a call for a first-chair clarinet in one of Gottingen’s several orchestras. As it turned out, I was the only clarinetist who showed up. Without so much as greeting me, the conductor, Herr Weiske, a corpulent, bearded, imposing man, gestured with his baton toward a vacant chair in the rear. He had no reason to assume I wasn’t German, and even less reason to suspect that I had just smuggled a Boehm clarinet into his orchestra.

The second-chair clarinetist, a young man studying at the university, nodded toward me and smiled his greeting. When he saw my clarinet, though, his eyebrows took flight. “This should be interesting!” he said.

The conductor raised his baton, hardened his eyes, and we began to play the first movement of Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony, which contains a clarinet solo in the third measure. After the full orchestra thundered its introduction, I tweedled my brief solo passage against the backdrop of an absolutely silent orchestra, which then returned in full force to echo my solo.

Herr Weiske beat his music stand with the baton. “Nein! Nein!” he barked. “Something is wrong!”