Beginner Embouchure for altissimo

[Tommy Ng]

Hi all,

I am learning altissimo now (G and A) and found that I need to bite the mpc pretty hard and alter my usual mouth cavity shape a bit to get it. Do i do it wrong?

cheers

tommy

 

[Guenne]

Hello,

no, I don't think you have to bite hard.
Yes, probably, as there is no "usual mouth cavity shape" as far as I understand, as the cavity changes with the sound, volume, pitch you want to produce and of course the "hardware" you are using.
Did you you work on books like "Voicing" by Don Sinta or the Rascher, Rousseau books on overtones?

Greetings,
Guenne

 

[aldevis]

Hi all,

I am learning altissimo now (G and A) and found that I need to bite the mpc pretty hard and alter my usual mouth cavity shape a bit to get it. Do i do it wrong?

cheers

tommy

Biting shouldn't be the way to go. There are few exercises on harmonics that would help you a lot. G can have tricky fingerings, A should come out easily.

 

[Tommy Ng]

Hello,

no, I don't think you have to bite hard.
Yes, probably, as there is no "usual mouth cavity shape" as far as I understand, as the cavity changes with the sound, volume, pitch you want to produce and of course the "hardware" you are using.
Did you you work on books like "Voicing" by Don Sinta or the Rascher, Rousseau books on overtones?

Greetings,
Guenne

Hi,
Thank you for your reply. I don't have any books to refer to. I just follow the fingering posted on website and try it myself.

 

[Tommy Ng]

Biting shouldn't be the way to go. There are few exercises on harmonics that would help you a lot. G can have tricky fingerings, A should come out easily.

Hi,
Thanks, Yes, I do find the G is a bit hard to get as compared to A.

 

[aldevis]

Hi,
Thanks, Yes, I do find the G is a bit hard to get as compared to A.

Let's talk G
You should be able to do it with the low C fingering.
Finger a C1, then make it sound (without biting) C2 G2 C3 E3 G3. It is not easy and there are many threads on the subject.
Front F key + high F# should give you a clean one.
Exercise:
F3 (with front F) - F#3 - G3 (lifting your 2nd finger)

Of course, without biting.

 

[Morgan Fry]

Hi all,

I am learning altissimo now (G and A) and found that I need to bite the mpc pretty hard and alter my usual mouth cavity shape a bit to get it. Do i do it wrong?

cheers

tommy

Only a little. You will need to alter your vocal cavity. By if it is much different from that you use for palm keys, it's because you're doing those wrong too. Practice your overtones with a double embouchure, that will keep you from biting too much.
Hth
Morgan

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk

 

[kevgermany]

Good stuff on these notes in Pete's Taming the sax, vol 1, starting on page 96. I think there's a good description in Rob Buckland's book as well.

 

[Guenne]

Hey,

there is a guy in the german forum nicknamed noten-schussel who posted his fingerings some weeks ago.
I find them very useful, as they are not the best-speaking fingerings, but you are better able to play scales and arpeggios with them.

[Eb] XXX | [G#] XXX 8 für E'''
0XX | 0XX 8 für f'''
00X | X0X 8 für f#'''
X00 | X0X 8 für g'''
0X0 | XX0 8 für g#'''
00X [C side] | X0X 8 für g#''' (sicherer)
0XX | XX0 8 für a'''
0X0 | 0XX 8 für a#'''
0XX | XXX 8 [D palm] für a#''' (sicherer)
XXX | 0XX 8 für b'''
[Eb] 00X | 0XX 8 [D palm] für b''' (sicherer)
000 | X0X 8 für c''''
000 | [G#] XX0 8 für C#''''
00X | XX0 8 für d''''
00X [C side] | X0X 8 für d'''' (sicherer)
00X | 0X0 8 für d#''''
X00 | 000 8 für e''''
X0X | X0X 8 für f''''
[C] XX0 | XXX 8 für f#'''' und
0XX | 0X0 8 für g'''' (alles Selmer Mark VII Tenor)

(X = gedrückt, 0 = offen)

"Für" means "for", "sicherer" means "more stable". X is closed key, 0 is open key.
Note that the left part is the right hand.
His is using the fingerings on his Mark VII, but they work great on my Bauhaus M2-DL too.

Cheers,
Günter

 

[kevgermany]

Thanks Günter I think that'll really help people.

You missed one translation: "alles" menas "all [for]"

As you've got A# in there and no H, I take it that B is the English/american meaning, not the German one.

 

[aldevis]

[Eb] XXX | [G#] XXX 8 für E'''

???

[G#] does not make any sense.

 

[Guenne]

???

[G#] does not make any sense.

Hi,
maybe.
But works great on my Bauhaus with it's unuseable "normal" E-Fork-Fingering.

Cheers,
Guenne

 

[aldevis]

Hi,
maybe.
But works great on my Bauhaus with it's unuseable "normal" E-Fork-Fingering.

Cheers,
Guenne

Maybe I just don't understand: with the RH keys down, [G#] should not move. Am I missing something?

 

[Colin the Bear]

Clear as mud.

 

[Guenne]

Maybe I just don't understand: with the RH keys down, [G#] should not move. Am I missing something?

Right,

Was missing that, hehe. I asked noten-schussel about that.

@colin:
Sorry, I don't understand.

Greetings,
Guenne

 

[Colin the Bear]

Well.... my natural instinct would be for the left hand to be on the left and trying to translate from german and transpose the hands is making smoke come out of my ears.

 

[Guenne]

Well.... my natural instinct would be for the left hand to be on the left and trying to translate from german and transpose the hands is making smoke come out of my ears.

Hi,
yes, that happened to me too.
But you get used to it.
On the other hand, these fingerings work very well for me. And if you have memorized them, there is no need to look at the ****ty diagram. No German needed IMHO 🙂

Cheers,
Guenne

 

[Colin the Bear]

Hi,
****ty diagram. No German needed IMHO 🙂
Guenne

Excuse your French ;-)

 

[Guenne]

Hi,

the reason for G# is that he says he uses the flute fingerings from Eb to F#.
Because of the different shape of the bore compared to sax they sound a semitone higher.
Of course you don't have to push G# for high E.

Cheers,
Guenne

 

[photoman]

Good stuff on these notes in Pete's Taming the sax, vol 1, starting on page 96. I think there's a good description in Rob Buckland's book as well.

I have Rob Buckland's book, as a PDF and Pete's Video.

Does anyone know if Pete's book (Vol 1) is available as a download? I can't see anything about in the store (unless I missed it). There also only seems to be graphics of vol 1 and vol 3 - and no vol. 2.