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Mouthpieces Jody Jazz Super Jet Alto 6

Konstantin25

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40
Location
Hungary
I am about to buy a new metal mouthpiece for my alto. I heard about Jody Jazz Super Jet.

Can you please give me some youtube videos of rock / r’n’r tracks where there’s that cutting edgy bright alto sound? Maybe ‘50 or ‘60 records. Please some players name. Unfortunately I don’t know them just heard some old rnr parts on TV ad and love this alto screaming.

Thanks.
 
Yes that’s what i call alto sound why was invented the sax 🙂

Brilhart Level Air has a brilliant steep baffle - may this is the secret for the crispy tone with overtone beeps

I pondering how it perform in low region

From 1969 - Paul Butterfield Blues Band with David Sanborn on alto saxophone playing a Brilhart Level Air...

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqudh8NPxAo


Enjoy...!!

Greg S.
 
Great records.

Funky / Blues area that is i looking for although genres are mixin.

please if you know some more tracks high&low octave changes within where full range used (with metal mpc)

Not quite 50s or 60s or rock or r'n'r but the great Hank Crawford from the early 1970s not playing a Brilhart Level Air...and Dave Sanborn's original influence...

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6vhhlgtSGw


Enjoy!!

Greg S.
 
Yes, they were very similar for sure. Unfortunately, both the Brilhart and Dukoff are fairly hard to come by these days but there are plenty of mouthpieces with a pronounced step baffle. Reed choice does make a big difference too. I always found Hemke to be pretty bright, and Jazz Select - filed. If you can play on a relatively soft reed, you'll get more buzz too. Sanborn, like a lot of similar US players uses La Voz med reeds. There is no golden rule though - Marienthal uses Vandoren blue box.
The Level Air is made now by Beechler, badged as an ARB. If you read about this mouthpiece there is every chance that it's close to the original, though I have never played one. I do know a guy over here that does, and he certainly makes that early Sanborn sound reminiscent of him on the Gil Evans stuff.

ARB Metal Saxophone Mouthpieces
 
Hi Greg, hope you are well. Is this definitely Sanborn? Sound-wise not especially like him and he would have been 25yrs old at this point.

Greetings Pete, I hope you are managing to dodge the COVID19 - sure is Sanborn on alto. I think Gene Dunwoodie or Trevor Lawrence is playing tenor on the album. There is a transcription of the main solo (24 bars over C7 chord) in Hal Leonard Artist Transcriptions David Sanborn Collection published in 1989 on page 14 of the book. Sanborn was born in 1945 recently celebrated his 75th birthday...I think he started using a Bobby Dukoff mouthpiece circa 1980 after his gold plated MK VI with high F# was stolen along with the Brilhart...I got my two vintage Level Airs (alto and tenor) a few years ago from Dave and Teresa Hoskins a.k.a. JunkDude...


I'm a big fan of the Gil Evans stuff Sanborn played on...

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Dee_0DHg2I


and a bit of Hendrix...

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjFuOYgik-o


Greg S.
 
Do you already developed a "bright sound concept" and you are able to play in way to produce a bright sound?

A bright mouthpiece doesn't give the Sanborn vibe if you are not able to play in a very way close to the way Sanborn plays.

Brilhart Levelair, Dukoff D?
They were just the brightest mouthpiece you could find 50 years ago...

Now in 2020 you have more options but "bright" is generic...
There are several type of "bright".
Ok, when the sound gets bright, you also have the volume/loudness... and be sure that at the end of the 60's many studio players moved to bright/loud pieces because they started to hit big stages with high stage volumes and they needed a different sound
1) to have a better perception of what they were doing (since the stage volumes where outrageously loud)
2) to get a sound to cut through the mix easier.


The process flow is:
---> developing a sound concept ---> learn how to get that sound (breathing, embouchure, technique, intention...) ---> finding out which hardware can make you to get the job done... easier.



Your initial question is very much like when classic guys started to listen jazz and they think the only different thing to change to move to a french sound to Phil Woods or Cannonball is to buy a kind of Meyer-ish mouthpiece. But it's not and they realize it after they have bought a Meyer-like piece.
Then... metal mouthpiece doesn't mean "bright".
You'll probably wonder how much you can bright and aggressive a "plastic" mouthpieces... and skills.
 
The comparison is well made... my only complain is that Jay's sound concept doesn't fit every mouthpiece.
Other technical considerations:
- Coles 4038 is good for certain type of sound... it does not sound transparent.
Few modern ribbon microphones are definitely more transparent but it's not the case of the Coles 4038.
- Rigotti reeds make everything sound... like a Rigotti sounds.

When I've recorded A/Bs my main concern is to show how the mouthpiece sound.
And not how I sound on the mouthpiece or how much the reed I use makes me confortable on that mouthpiece.
In most of cases, I've recorded multiple samples (with the same mouthpiece) but moving from a reed to another on every sample... try to hit every note of the instrument, at different dynamics.
 
@Konstantin25 ; hi...
If it has to be a metal mpc then skip this ; otherwise you may want to check out the PPT " Hooligan " alto mpc. There is a thread devoted to it including soundclips from Pete himself . Hope you find what you want...
 
Yes, they were very similar for sure. Unfortunately, both the Brilhart and Dukoff are fairly hard to come by these days but there are plenty of mouthpieces with a pronounced step baffle. Reed choice does make a big difference too. I always found Hemke to be pretty bright, and Jazz Select - filed. If you can play on a relatively soft reed, you'll get more buzz too. Sanborn, like a lot of similar US players uses La Voz med reeds. There is no golden rule though - Marienthal uses Vandoren blue box.
The Level Air is made now by Beechler, badged as an ARB. If you read about this mouthpiece there is every chance that it's close to the original, though I have never played one. I do know a guy over here that does, and he certainly makes that early Sanborn sound reminiscent of him on the Gil Evans stuff.

ARB Metal Saxophone Mouthpieces

Could you inform me come across one Brilhart or old Dukoff ...

Do you think soft reed makes more noise (overtones) maybe? Which one model the softest?
 

Similar threads... or are they? Maybe not but they could be worth reading anyway 😀

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