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Arban's Equivalent for Saxophone?

16K views 23 replies 14 participants last post by  Saxophone Strange 
#1 ·
Hi,

Is there a book for Saxophone that is similar to the Arban's Method books for Brass, or the Marcel Moyse book for flute?

I am particularly after a book offering many technical excercises and tone excercises also.
I have been looking around on the internet, and the Londeix Mechanical Excercises books look interesting. Does anyone know about these books?

Thanks for your help.
 
#2 ·
Try the universal method for sax. It is very old and still technically relevant to the sax. Might need to hit Ebay for this one, or give Eble a try, he can find almost anything.
 
#5 ·
BPSAX said:
Hi,

Is there a book for Saxophone that is similar to the Arban's Method books for Brass, or the Marcel Moyse book for flute?

I am particularly after a book offering many technical excercises and tone excercises also.
I have been looking around on the internet, and the Londeix Mechanical Excercises books look interesting. Does anyone know about these books?

Thanks for your help.
The Londeix mechanical exercises won't help you tonewise. The best way I can describe them is that they offer a systematic approach to working all intervals: all half steps, all whole steps etc (but he doesn't cover altissimo), with various alternate fingerings. When practicing you'd do trills or tremolos with several articulations....very mechanical but very good IMHO to develop muscle memory and consciousness about intervals (eg minor thirds, major thirds important to arpeggiate) starting on any note. You don't actually need the book to practise that but it gives sometimes interesting tips (like depressing this or that key as an alternate fingering).
 
#7 ·
The deville is the one I was thinking of. It is derived from other woodwind technique books of the day and also string technique books. Considering it is one of the first, it is amazing how good it still is.
 
#8 ·
Chris S said:
I was going to suggest that also. It's by Chris somethignortheother. I don't have a copy anymore.

The Ferling Etudes might also be worth a shot.

-Chris
That Ferling book is great- I've worked on it on sax, clarinet and flute. Real good stuff in there.
 
#10 ·
There are plenty of good method books out there but the one that is the most parallel to the Arbans as far as content and "organisation" is, like Carl wrote, "The Universal Method".

My German copy is titled (ironically in English) "The Best Method for Saxophone".
 
#12 ·
A real good thing to help you work on your tone would be to get some duet books and record yourself playing one part, then replay it on your stereo as you play the 2nd part. You can get almost any woodwind books (flute and oboe etudes are good) or you can get some really good sax books too. I have a few jazz and be-bop duet books that I use very often in my lessons.
I would recommend "Complete Jazz Duets" by Dr. Charles Colins, "Clark Terry Plays Charlie Small's Duets", Bugs Bower's "Bop Duets" or "Jazz Conception for Jazz Duets" BY Lennie Niehaus. Some of these are old....maybe hard to find.
I too wholeheartedly recommend "The Universal Method" book by DeVille. It is still MY text, after 36 years of playing. You will never outgrow it.

I find that one of the best ways to aid in developing the tone, intonation and ears of my students is by playing duets. I usually see fairly dramatic improvement with this. I encourage my students to do just what I am suggesting to you. I also record them for my students, if they don't have the means to record themselves at home.
 
#13 ·
BPSAX said:
Hi,

Is there a book for Saxophone that is similar to the Arban's Method books for Brass, or the Marcel Moyse book for flute?

I am particularly after a book offering many technical excercises and tone excercises also.
I have been looking around on the internet, and the Londeix Mechanical Excercises books look interesting. Does anyone know about these books?

Thanks for your help.
May I suggest a visit to the SOTW Bookstore?
 
#20 ·
"The Universal Method For The Saxophone" - Paul Deville can be found for free on pdfdrive.com

" the universal method for the saxophone "- Paul DeVille can be found for free on a wonderful website PDFDrive. Com along with thousands of other books of all genres.
" the universal method for the saxophone " by Paul DeVille can be obtained for free at a wonderful website pdfdrive.com along with thousands of other books in PDF format in all genres.
 
#22 ·
This is still a popular question years later. The answers are still good ones too.

I have the DeVille Universal Method on one of the music stands all the time.
A page or two always makes me feel like I am making some progress somewhere.
It's also available via IMSLP (though they have it listed with the wrong author) or via the Internet Archive, in case you're worried about downloading it from pdfdrive.
In addition, in case you're worried about the legality/ethics of downloading it, don't be. It was first published in 1908, which means that, in the US at least, it has long since passed into the public domain.
 
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