Saxophones Cheap tenor in Australia

[jonf]

35kg. That gives a lot of scope. Maybe buy a proper aluminium flight case and take the Sakkusu, or at least take an alto, also suitably cased.

 

[PiccoloPirate]

Actually, playing the Flute correctly, breath support and control of the amount of air, helps with saxophone playing.
Flutes, and especially, the Piccolo, played softly, in the third octave, and in tune, is when I know it's time to get on with scales and the rest of music. Usually takes a few hours or more, with the little beast.
In fact, my buddy just sent me a video/audio of his granddaughter, playing the C flute. She's been playing for a few months, with the beginning 5th grade band, and has found the spot.
Just lessons in school, said my buddy, and I replied, there are two ways to increase the speed of water, coming out of a garden hose. Put your thumb over the end, and make it smaller, or turn up the water pressure.
Flutes work by controlling the size and shape of the opening between the lips.
So I will be getting back into practice today, Clarinets on hold, Picc for a a bit, then the C Flute.
They live in Upstate NY, and we live down South.
F2F is best, but we'll get her embouchure etc etc, on track.
Maybe find a good student at Eastman, that might help the school's flute players out, and start building a bank account.
Students were amazed, when I was out of the room and say, lips, use your lips.
How can you tell, they ask.
It sounds different, lips vs blowing harder.

I might add, breath control is part of getting some Desmond, in your playing.

 

[Wonko]

Although the embouchure is very different for the higher pitch horns, it's not going to be a detriment, more likely an improvement as you need to have a more developed embouchure and be hearing the pitch to play in tune. These things can carry over to lower pitch horns and help you become a player with better control and intonation.

Interesting!
In a little over a year I will have to stop taking lessons with my tenor saxophone at the music academy where I go (because of their rules). And since I am a slow learner, I still have a LOOOOT to learn ;-)
But saxophonists are the lucky ones in this system, because we can start over with another voice (so bari, alto or soprano in my case). And I have bought a curved soprano a couple of months ago with the purpose of starting the curriculum over again with soprano.
So it is good to read that my assumptions, that this will also improve my technique on tenor are valid.

 

[dooce]

Actually, playing the Flute correctly, breath support and control of the amount of air, helps with saxophone playing.
Flutes, and especially, the Piccolo, played softly, in the third octave, and in tune, is when I know it's time to get on with scales and the rest of music. Usually takes a few hours or more, with the little beast.
In fact, my buddy just sent me a video/audio of his granddaughter, playing the C flute. She's been playing for a few months, with the beginning 5th grade band, and has found the spot.
Just lessons in school, said my buddy, and I replied, there are two ways to increase the speed of water, coming out of a garden hose. Put your thumb over the end, and make it smaller, or turn up the water pressure.
Flutes work by controlling the size and shape of the opening between the lips.
So I will be getting back into practice today, Clarinets on hold, Picc for a a bit, then the C Flute.
They live in Upstate NY, and we live down South.
F2F is best, but we'll get her embouchure etc etc, on track.
Maybe find a good student at Eastman, that might help the school's flute players out, and start building a bank account.
Students were amazed, when I was out of the room and say, lips, use your lips.
How can you tell, they ask.
It sounds different, lips vs blowing harder.

I might add, breath control is part of getting some Desmond, in your playing.

I started as a flute player, pretty serious player in my time - 50 years ago! Yeh, breath support and control etc but the more I played sax, the less I enjoyed the flute and the less I wanted to persevere with it. I know lots of saxophonists double on flute, and I've done a bit of that in my time but sadly, it gives me no pleasure any more. Respect to all dedicated flute players of course, fair play to you, but not for me.

 

[dooce]

Gosh, this is all a year ago, so a quick update.

Packing a sax in a suitcase was totally impractical - an alto would just about fit but would be extremely vulnerable as there would be very little padding around its extremities. I put my Roland Aerophone synth in though and that survived OK. However before I left at the end of November last year, I found a Facebook page for musicians in the area of Victoria that I would be spending most of my 3 months in and explained my situation, hoping that I would find an affordable sax in nearby Melbourne. I was amazed at the response - so many suggestions of places to find/borrow/rent a sax and offers of places to play at jam and open mic sessions.

The one that caught my eye though was a local street band that told me to get along to one of their gigs and introduce myself. So I duly turned up to say Hi, on a blazing Sunday afternoon at a Philip Island winery. But after the niceties, I was handed a sax and told to just join in! So it was that I spent the afternoon marching round the crowd along with a chaotic collection comprising of 3 other saxes, countless trombones, a couple of trumpets, a helicon, clarinets, banjo, and percussion, desperately trying to keep up with a mostly unfamiliar mix of hi-life, calypsos and Aussie folk tunes! But what a hoot - and the sax turned out to be a very nice SA80 mk2, I wanted to bring it home with me.....

Did a rehearsal with them a few days later so I got to know the tunes a bit better, they even let me loose on a solo, and then another gig on a wild beach campsite, surrounded by dancing kids and nicely boozy adults. And that was it unfortunately - no more gigs in their diary before we headed home at the end of January. Amazing how as a musician, you can travel to the other side of the world, fall in with other musicians and just go and make music, no questions asked, no application forms to fill in, no ability test. Maybe its because its Australia, but I hope that if a random Aussie sax-player rocked up over here, he would get the same welcome and treatment. (Probably not the gig on a beach though....😉)

 

[JayeNM]

nevermind.....nice experience you described, tho.