Help with the next step please.

[Tenor Sax]

Having completed my scales with a past teacher. Played in a Local City band over 7 years and then left the Sax (Tenor) for 5/7 years. Having* returned to the Sax I find myself in a state of limbo. In a kinda halfway house. My previous teacher passed away seven years ago. I tried going back to a new teacher, I don’t think she knows where to start with me as I’m past beginning so no idea what to do.
I currently play to backing tracks and Ballads on open mic circuit. Probably would like to do improvisation and Jazz but no Teachers in My area. Any body know of an online teacher.

 

[mizmar]

I can't answer your question. But..
.. almost every YouTube sax teacher now does online stuff; and most online teachers have a YouTube channel as an advert / loss leader. You can spend time watching and listening to them to see who's style, sound, attitude you like or aspire to and then give one a try.

 

[Yansalis]

Adding to the above, look for reviews in forums of various online teachers. You are ideally situated to find a really good teacher to take you to the next level in your playing. There are some out there with fine reputations, as well as, of course, a bunch of duds.

 

[Tenor Sax]

Thanks Mizmar and Yansalis. It’s the duds I need to avoid having already wasted time and money.

 

[mizmar]

"duds"? Or mismatches?
Like the man in the earlier "I like this guy" thread; not a dud, nothing wrong, just not my cup of tea.

 

[ellinas]

A good teacher that has experience with adults should be able to "evaluate" your playing and challenge you to new paths. Adults need a whole different approach, sometimes a tailor made one.
Since you're not a beginner you could consider online lessons.

 

[Colin the Bear]

Just play the thing and be musical.

 

[Wade Cornell]

Most unusually I'm agreeing with Colin. If your goal is to improvise and you have the ability to sing an improvisation then it's just practice in playing what you would sing. This can take a very long time to master, but there is no need for a teacher or any shortcuts...just lots of playing time and applying yourself to making the horn your voice.

if you can't hear what you'd like to play then it's the academic method, which is nearly the opposite and requires instruction. You are reading a chart to give you the chords, then practicing playing riffs and arpeggios that fit (without necessarily knowing what's coming out of your horn). It's a lot of finger memory patterns that can be cut and pasted depending on the chord structure. We are not all the same, so each player has to work with their degree of musical talent.

IMHO improvisation is composing on the fly and not merely regurgitating cut and paste phrases. A good improviser tells stories and communicates to an audience. The academic method is mostly about being able to play well practiced finger memory bits very quickly and trying to impress rather than entertain.

 

[BUMNOTE]

I think you need to sax teachers,there are plenty in the area who teach online and also are teaching 1 2 1,as for duds it is about finding one who suits your needs.Bumnote.

 

[nigeld]

You could try searching on

Search for music teachers in your city

MusicTeachers.co.uk is a nationwide music school, centred around our website. We have many high quality, professional and certified teachers around the country who are all ready to offer you a brilliant musical experience.

musicteachers.co.uk

 

[BigMartin]

I can highly recommend Jazzwire.net. Sort of an online learning community. Study a song for about 3 weeks, guided by weekly video lessons. Submit recordings (or videos) of what you're working on (even if its just technical exercises or looping a couple of bars of the song), and get feedback from staff (mostly Jeff Antoniuk) and other students. Standard of teaching is excellent. Very much geared towards stright ahead jazz, standard songs and jazz vocabulary (licks etc). @Wade Cornell would hate it. I love it and my playing has improved enormously since I joined. Depends what you're looking for. There's a joining fee and then a monthly charge ($50 or so) which amounts to about the cost of a lesson.

 

[Wade Cornell]

I can highly recommend Jazzwire.net. Sort of an online learning community. Study a song for about 3 weeks, guided by weekly video lessons. Submit recordings (or videos) of what you're working on (even if its just technical exercises or looping a couple of bars of the song), and get feedback from staff (mostly Jeff Antoniuk) and other students. Standard of teaching is excellent. Very much geared towards stright ahead jazz, standard songs and jazz vocabulary (licks etc). @Wade Cornell would hate it. I love it and my playing has improved enormously since I joined. Depends what you're looking for. There's a joining fee and then a monthly charge ($50 or so) which amounts to about the cost of a lesson.

It's unfortunate that Big martin thinks I hate Jazz from the 1950s/60s. I grew up on it and loved it. I still enjoy the music. The question is about teaching and what one learns. One hopes that an individual wishing to learn an instrument has a notion of what they would like to play. For some reason in sax circles there is a culture of teaching the style of playing and the tunes of the 1950s/60s. There is no demand for this type of playing today so it's kind of a "tribute band" mentality where the student is encouraged to "ape" the style via an academic approach. Never mind that the people at that time were trying to play in a new style and weren't playing in the style of players form 60 years previously. Music and the arts move ahead. If you simply love that style, and have no desire to express yourself in any other way, then "go for it". There is however a whole world of music that has happened since then and is happening now. You can be a part of that and play something that is alive , fresh and communicates to people of today.

Without going to too much of a diatribe the problem with imitating the style of 60/70 years ago is that the basis for much of the playing is to use show tunes from that time or before. These are songs that few people today know. In the 1950s everybody knew these tunes, so when playing a variation in "the jazz style" everybody understood your clever twists and turns on that melody. It was fresh. The style, inflections and use of riffs and arpeggios were picked up by academics and to some degree codified. What was spontaneous improvisation then can now be taught... but it's not the same. What's being taught today is unfortunately very much removed from that idea of spontaneous improvisation. Teaching technique has meant that the heart and soul of what was happening back then is gone. It's become a race of who can play the fastest and string together well practiced (finger memory) riffs and arpeggios that fit the chord structure. It's not much fun for an audience to hear players trying to outdo each other in technique with the only intent being to impress. Music back then, and now, is about having something to communicate to an audience. That's been lost in the academic translation.

Having fun and a goal can be good, and the sax culture of playing "standards" in the style of 60+ years ago, can provide that goal and satisfaction in achieving higher levels of technical playing. It is however a clique that has no audience and in most ways more similar to working out in a gym where you're developing muscles and comparing yours to others. Outside of the gym nobody cares.

 

[BigMartin]

It's unfortunate that Big martin thinks I hate Jazz from the 1950s/60s. I grew up on it and loved it. I still enjoy the music. The question is about teaching and what one learns. One hopes that an individual wishing to learn an instrument has a notion of what they would like to play.

Indeed, and the OP, @Tenor Sax, exprssed a wish to learn jazz but was having trouble finding a teacher.

There is no demand for this type of playing today

I would sugggest that's an exaggeration. The demand may be small, but it's there and I'm part of it. I enjoy it more than any more modern style of music that I have encountered so far. I also love classical music from much longer ago than the 1950s. OK , I'm old fashioned, but when I look around the modern world I'm kind of proud of that.

There is however a whole world of music that has happened since then and is happening now. You can be a part of that and play something that is alive , fresh and communicates to people of today.

If I'm doing it and others are, then it's alive. Why should I be a slave to current fashion?

Without going to too much of a diatribe the problem with imitating the style of 60/70 years ago is that the basis for much of the playing is to use show tunes from that time or before.

I don't consider it a problem.

In the 1950s everybody knew these tunes

Really, tunes like "Confirmation" or "Ornithology"?

What's being taught today is unfortunately very much removed from that idea of spontaneous improvisation. Teaching technique has meant that the heart and soul of what was happening back then is gone. It's become a race of who can play the fastest and string together well practiced (finger memory) riffs and arpeggios that fit the chord structure. It's not much fun for an audience to hear players trying to outdo each other in technique with the only intent being to impress. Music back then, and now, is about having something to communicate to an audience. That's been lost in the academic translation.

That depends very much on the teacher and on the students. It doesn't correspond to my experience on the site I recommended. And, as for communicating to an audience, which audience are we talking about?

It is however a clique that has no audience and in most ways more similar to working out in a gym where you're developing muscles and comparing yours to others. Outside of the gym nobody cares.

Tell me again that you don't hate or in some way resent it.

 

[jbtsax]

I'm not going to jump into the argument again (been there done that) but from the perspective of a career music educator, one of the most important reasons to keep performing the great jazz tunes of the past is to expose the younger generation to music they would not otherwise hear. The years I taught a jazz ensemble at the high school level, I tried to program a "mix" of songs for the students to learn and perform. In many cases the students liked the old standards as much as or more than the newer pieces geared more toward their age group.

 

[Wade Cornell]

Indeed, and the OP, @Tenor Sax, exprssed a wish to learn jazz but was having trouble finding a teacher.

I would sugggest that's an exaggeration. The demand may be small, but it's there and I'm part of it. I enjoy it more than any more modern style of music that I have encountered so far. I also love classical music from much longer ago than the 1950s. OK , I'm old fashioned, but when I look around the modern world I'm kind of proud of that.

If I'm doing it and others are, then it's alive. Why should I be a slave to current fashion?

I don't consider it a problem.

Really, tunes like "Confirmation" or "Ornithology"?

That depends very much on the teacher and on the students. It doesn't correspond to my experience on the site I recommended. And, as for communicating to an audience, which audience are we talking about?


Tell me again that you don't hate or in some way resent it.

I don't hate or resent listening to the music that was played and recorded in the 1950s and 60s. I have a large collection of that music. What I don't wish to hear are players who don't understand what those players were doing and how they were in step with the time in which that music was conceived. I still listen to the music and players of that time. I don't wish to listen to "tribute players" who "ape" what those players were doing but can only do it in a technical manner.

I'm also very much a fan of Classical music, but also enjoy 20th and 21st century classical music in the same way. Do I wish to hear someone today trying to compose in the style of Brahms who just follows his style of melodic and harmonic progressions? Heck no! But we can hear an orchestra play his music, and that's the only way we can hear the original as there was no method of recording a performance in his lifetime. Written music was the only way of hearing a composition repeatedly.

Jazz does NOT = only the style form the 1950s/60s. One can play jazz in a contemporary manner. For example Jan Garbarek, who has filled the Albert Hall to capacity. That's being contemporary and having an appreciative audience.

The OP did not specifically state what sort of jazz he was interested in, however you ( Big Martin ) seem to presume that it MUST be the style you prefer. Please check your prejudices. Nobody is taking your toys away, and there is no need to continually tell everyone how much you love what you play. Others will make choices that suit them.

I am curious however why you seem to find it so offensive that anyone would mention that there are other styles that one can play. Once again please check your prejudices and leave a little room for others who respect your choices but don't need to be bulldozed by your single mindedness.

 

[Colin the Bear]

50 70 years? Some folk are playing tunes that were being played before the Romans came here. That Bach chap still seems popular too. Old hat if you ask me, and don't get me started on Mozart.

I don't know how I got interested in 20's 30's 40's stuff. Maybe watching old films.
Hoagy Carmichael, Irving Berlin, Duke Ellington....

I'm having a De ja vu moment. Haven't I typed this before?

Old stuff is tried and tested. New stuff comes and goes. I'm off to buy a loop pedal and play some Ellie Goulding...not.

 

[BigMartin]

I am curious however why you seem to find it so offensive that anyone would mention that there are other styles that one can play

I don't. But I do find some of your statements about those of us who do study that music (eg that it's the antithesis of creativity) a little insulting. I'l leave it there.

 

[aldevis]

I'm not going to jump into the argument again (been there done that) but from the perspective of a career music educator, one of the most important reasons to keep performing the great jazz tunes of the past is to expose the younger generation to music they would not otherwise hear. The years I taught a jazz ensemble at the high school level, I tried to program a "mix" of songs for the students to learn and perform. In many cases the students liked the old standards as much as or more than the newer pieces geared more toward their age group.

Totally with it.
A music teacher asked some 13 yo "what's your favourite tune?".
"Doxy"

From a child's perspective everything is "old"
Adele to Bix Beiderbecke

This is the only advantage that I can see in the consumption of streamed music: the lack of distinction between genres and between ages

 

[Tenor Viol]

With regard to teachers - there are different styles of teaching and teachers suited to different groups of students. My teacher teaches up to diploma level and has a mix of youngsters and adult learners.

You need a detailed discussion with teacher: not all will offer what you want or need.

I accept the reality of living in rural Shropshire that almost nothing is 'nearby'. My singing teacher is nearly 40 miles away, but at least my sax teacher is local. The orchestra I play in now is 25 miles away.

 

[Tenor Sax]

Thanks all for the input. Certainly a lot to digest and consider.