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Tone Production

305K views 662 replies 159 participants last post by  CaillouSax 
#1 ·
I'm tired of mouthpiece makers lying to players telling them that they can get a potential customer to sound like someone, that's a bunch of BS. I'm laying out what I learned from Joe Allard, Herk Faranda, and Vick Morosco here and I’ll elaborate if some of you guys practice them and report back to me. My feeling is that the books and exercises available for sale are unnecessarily complicated. So, here's some stuff just to get started.

Play middle F without the octave key and using your throat, "slide" it down to low F. There’s no rhythm so hold the note for as long as you have to until it sounds low F but do it with the air stream and while opening your throat and supporting your diaphragm. It should be CLEAN and don't use your embouchure. If there's a gurgle or some distortion in between then keep trying until it's CLEAN. Use your diaphragm and open your throat more as you go to the low F and keep the diaphragm SUPPORTED. Do this exercise chromatically down to low Bb. It gets harder as you go down but the benefits will come by just practicing it. You should probably do it on F and E before you venture further down the register but trying to do it on D or Eb won't hurt because it's harder and may give you insight as to how to do it but if you're not successful then stop and take a break because you don't want to reinforce bad habits.

Also, practice scales on your mouthpiece when you can't have your horn with you. Remember, use your throat. The embouchure should be as loose and relaxed as possible.

Joe Allard used to tell me that the only pressure should be from the bottom of the mouthpiece using your teeth. Just enough to FEEL the reed through the bottom lip with your teeth using the muscles in your JAW, not your facial muscles and this "posture' should remain FIXED. The jaw muscles are much stronger than the facial muscles thus easier to control. This doesn't necessarily mean that you won't use your facial muscles at all but it’s just meant to lead you in the right direction.

Also, from now on, don't think of the extreme upper register as being hard to get, think of it as being easy, it’s in fact so easy that one thinks that you have to “try” in order to get them to play. The change in your embouchure stature should be SUBTLE, understand? I can get a variety of notes out using just one fingering but I don't change my embouchure, I alter my throat cavity and I hear the note a moment before I play it. Also, this is VERY important, take as much mouthpiece as possible. This may feel uncomfortable at first and the sound will be unrefined but in a few days it will feel natural and you will find the place where the mouthpiece will give you the optimum results.

I've watched many great players and the great majority of them take huge amounts of mouthpiece. Do this stuff for a few weeks then get back to me and I'll give you an exercise that along with these will enable you to play any mouthpiece and essentially sound the same. YOU will be the maker of the sound and not the mouthpiece or horn. By the way, do this as much as possible but if you don't have a lot of time just do them for a few minutes when you start your practice session and a few minutes at the end. If you're having a long practice session the try and do it in the middle too.

Phil
 
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#178 ·
Martinman said:
What does chamber size have to do with it? Teach me:) I have no school today and want to learn something.
Come on use your head it's not that hard to figure out...
Dukoff = pq sin(theta)/2
Link = (b2+d2-a2-c2)tan(theta)/4
Difference between the 2 = sqrt[4p2q2-(b2+d2-a2-c2)2]/4
and that my friend is why a smaller chamber size is harder to play....
Next...
 
#179 ·
Phil Barone said:
What the hell are you doing studying classical sax anyway? There's no such thing and what are you going to do with it? There's no market for that. If you know all the fingering on the sax it's time to start studying with a jazz musician, it doesn't matter what instrument they play but someone with a strong piano would be best. Phil
AMEN AMEN AMEN AMEN AMEN AMEN AMEN !!!:) :) :) :) :!: :!: :!: :twisted: :)
 
#180 ·
Ok, a few of you around here hate classical saxophone. Accepted.

Now, be big brave boys and girls and explain why that is (in a normal font so that you have to exercise your intellect and powers of reasoning and logic as opposed to the idea that he who shouts loudest is best).
 
#181 ·
Whether or not you love classical saxophone/woodwinds... the market for it is small but PAYS. I have made tremendous amounts of money using my classical training and gigs that require a more classical esthetic. About 500% on average more money per gig.
 
#183 ·
Jbroad572 said:
Come on use your head it's not that hard to figure out...
Dukoff = pq sin(theta)/2
Link = (b2+d2-a2-c2)tan(theta)/4
Difference between the 2 = sqrt[4p2q2-(b2+d2-a2-c2)2]/4
and that my friend is why a smaller chamber size is harder to play....
Next...
Owwww my head. I thought it was because the integral of the Link was 42x+c. I could be wrong though.

Whether or not you love classical saxophone/woodwinds... the market for it is small but PAYS. I have made tremendous amounts of money using my classical training and gigs that require a more classical esthetic. About 500% on average more money per gig.
Thank you Razzy. What kind of gigs are you talking about exactly?
 
#184 ·
DaveR said:
Ok, a few of you around here hate classical saxophone. Accepted.

Now, be big brave boys and girls and explain why that is (in a normal font so that you have to exercise your intellect and powers of reasoning and logic as opposed to the idea that he who shouts loudest is best).
Gotta run to rehearsal - don't have time to qualify my statements. Regarding classical music on sax:

- play it for your chop development
- play it because you love it (what a concept)
-- how many here make a lot of money playing their saxes regardless of what style? So play what you like.
- don't play classical, play jazz? :scratch: I'd really like to know how many sax players make any more secure living playing jazz as opposed to those who play classical sax recitals, concerts etc and teach to keep their classical playing alive.
- personally, I play in classical ensembles, and jazz groups and I make waaaaay more money playing in pop cover bands. Matter of fact, I can't remember when I've made a decent Euro playing purely jazz, so in some respects saying play jazz is almost as out of touch with reality as is alleged saying play classical would be.
- my band (pop by the way) awaits. gotta run :walk:
 
#186 ·
"Classical saxophone" is an oxymoron. The classical era in music ended about 20 years before the saxophone was invented.

It seems like we're beginning to split hairs here over a term that is used for historical purposes. Just because the Grove dictionary of music may say that such and such year was the end of classical music doesn't mean that that kind of music just stopped--like a faucet getting turned off.
Didn't Adolph Sax have composers and players come by his factory and write or transcribe things for his new instruments? ( I remember reading somewhere that he used to give saxophone quartet concerts at his shop as a way to introduce the horns--but I imagine there are folks on this forum that would know much more than I about that.)
I imagine that these people were still coming from and were deeply influenced by the rules and esthetics of the common practice period or classical music.
IMHO I want to simply say that history is written afterward and these dates/years are more fluid than they are made to seem...and it is a large umbrella term for many things now...
 
#187 ·
Al Stevens said:
"Classical saxophone" is an oxymoron. The classical era in music ended about 20 years before the saxophone was invented.
Al, you backpedaled in the other thread with your smiley comments. Which is it?

Nah, don't answer. Either way your comment is foolish. We who play classical literature know that it exists. I haven't seen you - maybe you don't exist.
 
#188 ·
Radjammin said:
AMEN AMEN AMEN AMEN AMEN AMEN AMEN !!!:) :) :) :) :!: :!: :!: :twisted: :)
Phil keep saying he didn't want blow hards in his thread, so I didn't want to run a paragraph reason behind it. I just completely agreed with it.

Legit is a stepping stone to music that will pay. To the guy that gets 500% more on legit gigs, are they done on this planet or in space? Maybe you're getting hazzard pay.

And I don't hate classical, I hate the game. Like Al said, Sax missed the Classical train by about 20-40 years.

Putting all techers in the Legit box is a little aggressive. Yes Legit works great at teaching new sax players, but like other University related teaching styles, They usually teach you in a style that cannot be applied. Now don't read to much into this, I am just saying directly I do not think you will get paid at a comparable rate for playing any type of gig on Legit sax. I don't see a market for it. There's not much of a market for Straight up Jazz either, but I think you can apply thouse skills more effectly to jobs you could get paid at.

But who am I? I really wish you would have just been happy with my AMEN, because I agreed with what he said, every word. Sry Phil, I didn't mean to derail your thread, I really like your excersice ideas.
 
#189 ·
The problem with what we refer to classical saxophone music is inherent in the words themselves. Personally I loved playing transcriptions but I think what bothers me most is teachers who influence students into thinking that there may be a career in playing classical saxophone. It's fun but the best you'll do is to teach, the classical saxophone is something that is man made as opposed to classical music played in it's intended manner or jazz music which was born as opposed to manufactured. While there may be a market, it's probably about as feasible as jazz played on oboe or like instruments that are more associated with classical music. There's nothing wrong with it but it shouldn't be marketed under false pretenses. Phil
 
#194 ·
Playing for composer's recitals, church gigs on flute, soprano, clarinet... sax quartet recitals/galleries; theater pits; subbing in local/regional symphonies.
 
#196 ·
Done down to Bb with various mouthpieces, including a Barone NY 7* which was the easiest by far.

Thank you and congratulation Phil (for the mpc and the exercise)

ike
 
#200 ·
Seems to me that the problem is one of semantics. When we refer to "classical" saxophone, that is just shorthand for non-jazz concert music. Those of us who devote considerable energies to this--and there are many--are not playing transcriptions of Bach, Mozart or whatever. We're talking about sophisticated modern concert music of Berio, Stockhausen, Lauba, Scelsi, Glass, etc. The music may or may not be to you liking, but there's no denying that, for many of us, the extraordinary challenges of this repertoire are no less (though not necessarily more) than learning Trane's Countdown solo, for example, just different. Learning this repertoire is not a means to some other end. For plenty of great players, it is the end game. Go listen to Otis Murphy, Raaf Hekkema (raafhekkema.com), Joel Versavaud, Jean-Marie Londeix, Claude Delangle, etc., and you'll hear artistry and commitment on par with any jazz player, past or present. This is really a puzzling "discussion," I have to say. As for the overtone exercises, they are indeed useful--they're part of the daily routine for many classical players, and there are great exercises to be found in Rascher's Top Tones book, or in Rousseau's High Tones for Saxophone, among others. The notion that adult players are waiting for the next utterance on the subject to arrive in this thread, instead of vigorously pursuing this on their own with all the materials already available to them, strikes me as odd. Get a great teacher, who understands the instrument, is open to all genres of music, and is committed to your progress.
 
#624 ·
The music may or may not be to you liking, but there's no denying that, for many of us, the extraordinary challenges of this repertoire are no less (though not necessarily more) than learning Trane's Countdown solo, for example, just different. Learning this repertoire is not a means to some other end. For plenty of great players, it is the end game.
Thanks for a moment of sanity. I think this is very very true, and I've watched some great young players both classical and jazz grow and mature. I think a big point to realise is that in neither field are there many careers to be had.

I admire and respect great players and artists in these idioms, probably because of the dedication required in a field that is unlikely to bring great financial rewards, as opposed to the possibilities open to a more commercial (and versatile) player who can realistically hope for some kind of a career performing.

I started out playing jazz and classical, but soon realised that I wanted to make a career as a performer, and so found that being able to have a versatile sound and approach would allow me to do that (and it worked!), so that's what I did.

There is nothing wrong in advising people to work for an artistic ideal, as long as you don't try to preach that it is the only way or that there is a career to be had there.
 
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