Beginner Help needed slurring from D with octave key to G without octave key

[Jeanette]

Help

I am struggling if I play D all fingers down with the octave key and slur to G no octave key the note stays high and doesn't drop down. Can anybody suggest anything to help, it is driving me nuts which obviously doesn't help??

Thank you

Jx

 

[thesaxman71]

sounds like a sticky octave mechanism on the neck of the sax, you can unscrew the bar out the middle holding it in and oil then pop it back in.
if not, then it should be cheap for a tech to fix.

 

[MandyH]

Help

I am struggling if I play D all fingers down with the octave key and slur to G no octave key the note stays high and doesn't drop down. Can anybody suggest anything to help, it is driving me nuts which obviously doesn't help??

Thank you

Jx

Can you play both notes separately, ie can you tongue both notes? If so, then presumably the sax is OK and it's you!
Now, can you sing both notes, adjusting your throat accordingly to sing the higher note, then the lower note, can you slur from one sung note to the other?
Can you slur chromatically down from the upper D to the lower G, by sluring all the notes in between?

I am thinking that maybe you need to relax your throat and embouchure to get from one to the other?
Of course, as you have said, now that you believe you can't, you stress about it and tense up, thus ensuring that you can't, and thus entering the vicious circle!

 

[Colin the Bear]

Personaly I think it is difficult thing you're trying to do. Slurring across the register. If all is well with the instrument I think I'd tackle it by dropping chromaticaly from D to C# then slur down to G.

 

[jbtsax]

Play the low G with a rich full sound and then slur up to the 4th line D while mentally still "voicing" the G (as if singing "AHH"). Then smoothly release the octave key and bottom hand keys to return to the G. Another way to say this is to finger D while mentally playing a G.

"Voicing" the G has two related components, the shape of the mouth and throat, and the speed and direction of the air. An exercise that I use with my students is:

- Hum the pitch of the note you are going to play
- Blow that pitch on just your airstream (like an airy whistle)
- Play the note with the same feeling of the airstream

Think of your air making that note even before it gets to the saxophone. In a way it is like singing into your saxophone as you play. What we do "upstream" of the mouthpiece has a great effect upon what happens "downstream" inside the saxophone.

 

[kevgermany]

you may also be a touch tight on the embouchure, but it's a tricky slur.

 

[Jeanette]

Thanks all, I'll have another go tonight and check for sticking octave pip, I think though it is more down to me and "voicing".

Jx

 

[AlistairD]

The other thing to check is for lazy fingers. Make sure all the fingers on your right hand are coming up together.

A

Sent from my GT-N7100 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

 

[griff136]

+1 on John's (JBTSAX'S) and AlistairD's comments
an alternate method you could also try slurring from palm D instead. that way you haven't got to "go over the break" as clarinettists would say.

in the end if your sax is fine then it's down to practice practice practice

 

[Jeanette]

I think the sax is ok, I can always get my tutor to play it, I'll just as Griff says have to keep blowing without getting wound up by it.

Thanks for all the tips.

Jx