Saxophone beginners Middle D help please

[Hep]

Under my poor tuition, my wife is learning sax on a Yamaha Alto with a 4C mouthpiece and a two-and-a-half Vandoren Juno reed. She has problems with middle D which I have just learned to replicate.

On her sax, moving legato from B to D I can often either close off the air-stream completely or produce a high overtone. The legato can be played consistently by putting the mouthpiece too far into the mouth, but of course the tone is honky.

Attempting D she has often produced no sound (accompanied by a red face) or a high overtone. She wants to move the mouthpiece way into her mouth to play middle D which means a complete repositioning on the fly. I now understand what has been happening.

I've read the threads "C to D Legato arrgh!" and "Middle D is week - why?" and we will try those suggestions during this afternoons practice.

However I remain suspicious of her mouthpiece and reed.

Any suggestions or comments please?

Hep

 

[kevgermany]

I'm assuming no problems playing the D on its own. What happens going down from E to D? Or from D to C or B? If that's OK, chances are the sax is OK.

I bet @jbtsax will have better suggestions, but I'm guessing she's not giving enough breath support and is too tight on the reed. Theoretically there should be no adjustment in lip tension between the B and D. Suggest getting really comfortable with the D, then the B. And listen to the breathing changes needed. Then work on D to Be being smooth. Then tackle it the other way, B to D. Here it gets a little harder cos the keys must go down together. But if she has the breath support and lip tension right, it'll come.

It may also help going up half a strength on the reed.

 

[nigeld]

For what it's worth, my experience with dodgy notes is that if I don't believe a note is going to sound right then it doesn't. I think what happens is that I assume it will be wrong and back off or freeze up, so that I am not providing the right breath support and embouchure. Then it goes wrong again and my expectation of failure is, of course, strengthened. My way of getting over this has been to find a relatively "safe", reliable way to practice the note (e.g. just play long tones on the D and each of the notes around it in turn, or play B,D,C,D detached, or play E,D,F,D slurred), play this enough to know that I can do it and how the note should feel, and then move out from there into the problem territory and keep practicing a few minutes each day until it works. If things go wrong, I go back to the safe zone until I feel more confident again.

 

[Hep]

Thanks for the thoughtful response Kev.

She has had trouble with middle D however approached. The legato B to D is where I finally found my technique could let me down. Until then, I had just put it down as something all beginners had difficulty with as I could play the middle D ok.

I now think it is instrument related. After trying some of the suggestions in the posts, I put her on my tenor and there her D is sweet.

I cope on her alto, but it is harder. My lower lip has to remain right up at the very beginning of the lay whereas I would normally be able to control the reed further back towards its tip. Also I haven't been able to play bottom C, B and B flat raising the possibility of a leak though I have stripped the instrument and been over the adjustments a dozen times.

I have ordered number 3 reeds as you (Kev) suggested.

More suggestions or comments from anybody would be welcome please.

In the meantime I am learning to read transposing four notes down rather than four notes up to play along with her while we swap instruments. 🙂

 

[Justin Chune]

I bought a Yamaha YAS 23 and played it for a while with the 4c mouthpiece that came with it. The mouthpiece is just fine. A move to a softer reed would be my advice, and if your wife still gets red in the face, have the sax checked over.

As a matter of interest, I'm playing Juno reeds on my clarinet and liking them a lot. Best of all, they all play well out of the box.

 

[Colin the Bear]

Sounds like a leak to me. Lh stack, Bis maybe or G# not closing fully are always worth a look. Maybe body or neck octave mechanism out of regulation.

 

[nigeld]

Attempting D she has often produced no sound (accompanied by a red face)

I think this probably means that the reed has closed up against the mouthpiece, sealing the gap.
Some possible reasons:
1. The reed has gone flabby - try another reed.
2. The reed strength is too soft - try a harder reed.
3. Blowing too hard and closing the reed - don't over-blow or try a harder reed.
4. Clamping the reed shut with the jaw.

1 and 2 are relatively easy to check and fix.
3 and 4 are about technique, but they might occur because of trying to compensate for a problem with the sax. The fact that you can't play bottom C or below suggests something is wrong.

My alto misbehaves badly if the mouthpiece is not pushed the correct distance onto the cork. I'm guessing this isn't the problem in your case, but might be worth checking.

A powerful small torch can act as a good leak light to check that the pads are sealing. Or you can look down inside the body of the sax and try to see if light is leaking in through the closed tone-holes.

It might be also worth your wife trying @jbtsax 's mouthpiece and neck exercise to check the embouchure - Play some long tones using just the mouthpiece and neck (i.e. detached from the saxophone body) and adjust the embouchure so that it sounds Ab Concert.
Then try attaching the neck to the sax and use the same embouchure to play a D.

Producing a high overtone when slurring from B to D is a different problem I think.

 

[Ivan]

Has sax been checked over by a tech?

 

[jbtsax]

Try fingering low G and hitting the octave key forcefully while watching the neck octave key. It should not raise or bounce. If it does, remove the neck, place your thumb between the octave key ring and the neck tenon and push down on the octave key pad cup. This increases the distance between the post on the body and the ring of the neck octave mechanism. If you go too far and the neck octave doesn't open, put a popsicle stick between the pad and the octave pip and push the ring back toward the tenon.

 

[Hep]

Wow! Thanks everybody. I'm overwhelmed by the response from all you kind and helpful people. I didn't expect it.

It looks to me as though I now have plenty of leads to check out before trying to locate a technician somewhere near me.

 

[Hep]

Using a torch as suggested by Nigeld, it has taken only two minutes to see that the problem with low C and below is leaks. Thanks.

I'll keep checking out everybody's suggestions.

Oh! And a leak on the little pad above the B key. I'll try adjustment on this one but it looks like the sax needs to be re-padded.

 

[Hep]

And playing the the neck alone, not attached to the body of the sax, the mouthpiece feels fine.

So. All of you were right. And a problem that has been troubling me for weeks looks like has been solved in a day with your help.

 

[Hep]

The local conservatorium to me has pointed me to a repairer only an hour away. I will take it there.

Thanks all.