make your sax more free blowing ??

[saxjazzjohn]

i had a friend a bit crazy .. he told me that if i want my sax to be more free blowing that i had to do some adjustments like when u look into the sax at the top of it .. u can see the like tube that stick a bit .. is the octave 2nd tube that i should make it shorter if is a bit long the tube .. anyone can answer this guys .. thx

[milandro]

don’t do that!

[mi000ke]

You could also remove the bell, but that's probably not a good idea either. Nor should you add any holes

[chinux79]

What Milandro said! Good thing that you "had" that friend...bad advice!

[milandro]

if you want to read more read here
http://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthr...-some-saxes?s=
as always before you post anything, first try the search function!

[Jeff Foster]

Why don't you guys try it on your friend's horn first? Then if y'all really like the way it plays you can start monkeying around with yours. If you get tired of fooling around with horns you can go out in the driveway and drill a few holes in your car mufflers. I've heard that'll make them go faster.

[saxjazzjohn]

i got a welklang the tube is very short is very free blowing in the high note .. i know i wont do it on my over sax .. but i just wondering y ..some long some short ... mark6 alto also very short

[saxjazzjohn]

my friend he did it on all his sax .. and delacguered all his sax and polished his neck also .. but he really got an amazing sound .. but i think is because he work a lot on his sound .. not the instruments is doing that

[saxjazzjohn]

he use lemon to delacquered his saxes

[Stuckond]

Mad scientists, wizards and worlocks! Oh, my!

[Enviroguy]

Without too much sarcasm, here's some real advice:

1. Have your sax checked for leaks and regulation. A leaking and mal-adjusted sax is often anything but free-blowing.

2. Try some different mouthpieces. The mouthpiece is the main factor in making a sax free-blowing or not. And the mouthpiece can make a huge difference. I've given out several Morgan Protone mouthpieces to young students I know simply because they are such a joy to play and easy to blow. There's nothing worse than trying to learn sax on a crappy hard-to-blow mouthpiece.

3. Try some different reeds and ligatures. I use Fibracells on tenor and Rico Plasticovers on sop and alto. I do this because they blow very easily and basically, I'm kind'a lazy. I spend too much time arranging and not enough time blowing sax. So I make up for my lack of super-strong chops (that I once had) with easy-blowing reeds. And I use Rovner dark ligs to darken down these reeds which both tend to blow brightly.

4. Sometimes a custom neck will change the free-blowing characteristics of a sax. But sometimes it doesn't. Send $300 to Phil Barone and find out if you want.

If the surprisingly anal folks on this forum that like to argue about acoustic are right, then the little octave tube in your sax is there to simply make the opening "happen" near the center of the tube. That may promote wave propagation better than if the opening happens at the side wall. If I understand these intelligent but odd folks correctly, the player might notice that notes played with the octave key open may form more easily because of this. But others claim that on some saxes, this makes no difference at all as far the player is concerned.

If it was me, I would avoid doing anything to my sax that I couldn't undo myself. I doubt there are many music shops that would have an exact replacement for a "Wet-Leg" octave tube that you decided to knock out with a hammer and punch. Plus, an old vintage "Wet-Leg" deserves better than to be disfigured on a hunch.

[Jeff Foster]

4. Sometimes a custom neck will change the free-blowing characteristics of a sax. But sometimes it doesn't. Send $300 to Phil Barone and find out if you want.


k:

Better yet, call Phil. He actually talked me out of buying one of his necks. He won't take your money unless he's relatively certain it will help you.

[Dr G]

i had a friend a bit crazy ...

People tend to hang out with like-minded people...

Why trust the people that designed your horn? I'm sure your friend is much more skilled.

[Gordon (NZ)]

I don't play saxes before I work on them, unless there is a special, specific reason to do so.
I do play after I have serviced them, i.e. after removing leaks. I always use the same mouthpiece. Every one of them is free blowing except the very worst of the Chinese ones, which probably have a totally inappropriate taper in the bore. (If it is not free blowing, then I go back to work to find the leak I have missed.)

I don't mess with octave vents. (Except to occasionally correct the Selmer Paris model which was acknowledged to have faulty design, but that was to specifically correct a reluctant G in the second octave, not general freeness of blowing.

So... Try a decent mouthpiece. If that doesn't help, then look for leaks!

Hear, hear to Enviroguy.