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Beginner recording Little song i learned this week

-Anton-

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Hi everyone. Thought I'd share what ive learned this week. If you know it then we're friends without having ever met 😉 its got a good bit of pace, and also has some high notes, so I thought it would be good for my progress as well as being something I really wanted to learn. The last scale is a nightmare, I was honestly surprised I actually hit the notes!

Anyway, here it is. Any constructive criticism or tips are very welcome

View: https://youtu.be/XAPGjvu2ANU
 
Hi everyone. Thought I'd share what ive learned this week. If you know it then we're friends without having ever met 😉 its got a good bit of pace, and also has some high notes, so I thought it would be good for my progress as well as being something I really wanted to learn. The last scale is a nightmare, I was honestly surprised I actually hit the notes!

Anyway, here it is. Any constructive criticism or tips are very welcome

View: https://youtu.be/XAPGjvu2ANU
Well done Anton, they only thing I would say is, you seem to be holding your Horn along way from your body, it's almost as if you don't like it. It could just be my eyes,
 
Well done on playing at a good pace and with a good regular beat.

The bit about where you hold your horn would definitely be my prime observation too.
The angle of the video makes it hard to judge how far the sax is from your body, but many people rest the sax on themselves (on their hip, leg, torso)
I have one friend who pushes the sax out like this and comments that it’s a pain in the thumb!

I don’t know the tune! But the sound is (to my ear) a little harsh. How long have you been playing? And do you have a tutor? You may wish to work on a smoother, fuller sound - possible breathe into the sax a little less aggressively, and work on getting the inside of you mouth bigger - drop your tongue inside your mouth?
 
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It's a theme from a nintendo game. One of the Zelda franchise, Ocarina of time is it? Here's the link
 
Nice job, Anton! You are doing very well. I concur that it appears you are holding the horn pretty far from your body. It doesn't look like the strap is holding much of the weight. You might want to pull it up a bit. The strap should fully support the weight while your right thumb merely holds it in position.
 
Hi all. I've recently changed how I hold the sax. I had it more angled towards me, but then when hitting the high notes with barely any buttons pressed I found it put a lot of weight on my front teeth, which happen to be heavily capped after a childhood biking incident. It felt very unnatural. I watched a couple of YouTube videos and having head facing forward was a tip on there. Its definitely improved my playing but my thumb is taking a hammering! I'll try to find somewhere in between. Thanks for the pointer. I've been playing 6 weeks now, an hour or 2 most days, so i think I've made pretty good progress. This is the first song ive solidly learned from sheet music, and im quite happy with it to be honest. I'll be even happier when I nail that end scale! I'll work on making my fingers less flappy too haha. I was a bit frantic. I was recording for about half hour to get that good of a pass on the song haha.

Thanks for the advice and encouragement.
 
Hi all. I've recently changed how I hold the sax. I had it more angled towards me, but then when hitting the high notes with barely any buttons pressed I found it put a lot of weight on my front teeth, which happen to be heavily capped after a childhood biking incident. It felt very unnatural. I watched a couple of YouTube videos and having head facing forward was a tip on there. Its definitely improved my playing but my thumb is taking a hammering! I'll try to find somewhere in between. Thanks for the pointer. I've been playing 6 weeks now, an hour or 2 most days, so i think I've made pretty good progress. This is the first song ive solidly learned from sheet music, and im quite happy with it to be honest. I'll be even happier when I nail that end scale! I'll work on making my fingers less flappy too haha. I was a bit frantic. I was recording for about half hour to get that good of a pass on the song haha.

Thanks for the advice and encouragement.

For 6 weeks that's brilliant playing!
 
Hi all. I've recently changed how I hold the sax. I had it more angled towards me, but then when hitting the high notes with barely any buttons pressed I found it put a lot of weight on my front teeth, which happen to be heavily capped after a childhood biking incident. It felt very unnatural. I watched a couple of YouTube videos and having head facing forward was a tip on there. Its definitely improved my playing but my thumb is taking a hammering! I'll try to find somewhere in between. Thanks for the pointer. I've been playing 6 weeks now, an hour or 2 most days, so i think I've made pretty good progress. This is the first song ive solidly learned from sheet music, and im quite happy with it to be honest. I'll be even happier when I nail that end scale! I'll work on making my fingers less flappy too haha. I was a bit frantic. I was recording for about half hour to get that good of a pass on the song haha.

Thanks for the advice and encouragement.

My 2 front teeth are also crowned (after a roller skating incident aged 12). Your neck strap should be high enough that the mouth piece is presented directly into your mouth, just sitting on your bottom lip, by manoeuvring it with only your right thumb. It tends to need to be MUCH higher than you’d think it needs to be.
For me, there is no pressure on my top teeth at all.
Do you have a tutor? Or know an experienced sax player? I wonder if you’d benefit from an hour with a tutor to iron out some of these beginners wrinkles.
 
My 2 front teeth are also crowned (after a roller skating incident aged 12). Your neck strap should be high enough that the mouth piece is presented directly into your mouth, just sitting on your bottom lip, by manoeuvring it with only your right thumb. It tends to need to be MUCH higher than you’d think it needs to be.
For me, there is no pressure on my top teeth at all.
Do you have a tutor? Or know an experienced sax player? I wonder if you’d benefit from an hour with a tutor to iron out some of these beginners wrinkles.

Well now I keep my head facing forwards and use my thumb to take the weight of the sax there is virtually no pressure on my front teeth, but my thumb does ache pretty badly. It doesn't get so bad I have to stop, but it isn't ideal. I thought maybe it's a byproduct of good posture haha. No tutor. My friend is better than me but even he is mainly self taught, so it is kind of a case of the blind leading the blind. I just do my best with YouTube videos and endless practice. It does take longer to self teach, I don't doubt that, but so far the issues I've had have worked themselves out with practice. I went through a stage of my bottom teeth really digging into the inside of my bottom lip, but after a few days of trying different things with my embouchure I can practice for a couple of hours and still be fine now. Im not just being tight, I'd love some lessons, but I need to keep unnecessary spending to a minimum at the moment, and as I'm really enjoying playing as it is I think lessons can wait.

That's a fine job and big congrats Anton!
Don't forget your best friend (metronome)..

I've been thinking about that. My friend said there are some free phone apps, so I might try one of them
 
I've been thinking about getting backing tracks for some of the songs I can play actually. I think it will teach me to keep time better, for sure, rather than coming in when I please
 
Eugene Rousseau 's book has a section on holding the sax see
Somewhere on the Web he has a video of it but I can't find find it at present.
 
Its funny, after the comments i thought I'd try playing it in a more relaxed stance with it closer to my body during the lower notes and just get it more upright when hitting the high notes that seem to put pressure on my front teeth, but it seems at some point something has changed because now i can play it in the more relaxed stance the whole time, even on the high notes!? I guess I've naturally found a medium betseen the 2. I've literally just noticed when playing all my songs. I'll take that. I'll still read the links though, so thanks 🙂
 
When you say pressure on your front teeth do you mean the top or bottom teeth? either one imo, is a bad habit to get into and neither should have any pressure at all. In fact, people can and will debate on if using a double lip embouchure is proper or not, which involves not just the bottom lip cushioning the reed, but both the top and the bottom lip acting as cushions enclosing the mouthpiece, and thus with no teeth resting on it. Hardly no one will advocate lower teeth applying pressure, but newer players often do this, because lets face it, we are all used to using our jaws throughout life, but not our embouchure muscles...those have to be built up and stabilized, and it takes time, so until they are new players try to cheat/compensate because they want to 'play songs' which sort of fakes them into thinking they are becoming better quicker at playing....I disagree however. on the surface it does, yes...but it can lead to bad habits which inhibit actual growth in the long run.
drop your jaw and force yourself to use your embouchure even though you will be lousy at 'playing' at first (honestly you are going to be lousy at first anyways, unless you are just mystically some prodigy or something...god I hate those....little brats....heh I jest....sort of....)but you will and as you noted already have, improve with more time on the instrument.
If there is pressure on the top teeth, you have your strap set way to high.
Even though everyone's goal is to play music, I'm of the belief your goals right now as a beginner should be to master the fundamentals and with those...you will be able to play music. Depending on sheet music (almost all new players immediately run around in a massive grab of all the sheet music they can get a hold of it seems, and they fail to often realize the real goal should be mastering the playing, not just being mediocre at a bunch of songs.) and trying to take short cuts, seems like it is working, but it honestly will hold you back and stunt you. IMO anyways.
Long tones, correct posture, correct breathing, tonguing, timing, finger dexterity, and articulation with mastery of the full scale of the instrument will get you to where you want to be. You will reach plateaus and seem to not be gaining as much as quick, but then suddenly you will find you can do things and sound better you were unable to do before. It just seems to be the way it works, with almost everything. It is funny because the videos of people playing never show all the hours and years they spent doing the boring stuff to get there.
 
When I started I actually used to use my top lip as a cushion as well as my cotton lip, but I read that the top teeth should always be in contact with the mouthpiece so i changed. The pressure on the top teeth does seem to have corrcted itself now though so it's not an issue. I am still pretty awful at the high notes though. They're not a solid tone at all really. I guess that will come with time and practice
 
When I started I actually used to use my top lip as a cushion as well as my cotton lip, but I read that the top teeth should always be in contact with the mouthpiece so i changed. The pressure on the top teeth does seem to have corrcted itself now though so it's not an issue. I am still pretty awful at the high notes though. They're not a solid tone at all really. I guess that will come with time and practice
High notes are very hard at first. Keep practicing. Long tones are your friends.
 

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