Saxophone beginners Nearly gave up today

[PiccoloPirate]

Good book to play thru.
Record one part on a smart phone and play along with the second part.
Might help put music in your mind, as opposed to noodles. 😜

 

[mizmar]

I watched a piano tutorial video recently where the teacher said she knew someone who would record themself 50 to 60 times per practice session (!). Seems a bit excessive to me but if you have a good setup maybe it would be really easy.

Recorded her self playing what? Whole concerto? Or phrase by phrase?

I use a Zoom H2n with one big button for record stop-start and one for playback. It takes nothing to record-listen. And every now and then I reformat the SD card, so don't even do any cleaning up. If I'm trying to get - mostly, for me - timing right over a few bars, I can record and listen etc. A good few times.
I do that for flute more than sax because teacher requires pre submission recording.

 

[thomsax]

I have to "restore" my tone/sound often. No recording, I just listen and trust my own ears. My tone/sound is not soo pretty. Me and my sax and set-up is more or less designed to play electric blues, rock & roll .... music. I do differnt tone/sound exercices when I restore my tone/sound.

 

[jazzdoh]

Glad you are not giving up, try not to be hard on yourself, 6 months is not a long time, you will get better.
We all have bad days, I still have bad days after nearly 50 years of playing.
As others have said recording is an art in itself, and I am a numpty at it myself, trust your ears and you won't go far wrong.

 

[jonf]

The main take-out of all this is don't use your phone to record yourself. It's a phone, with a microphone designed to capture spoken word, not a quality recording device, but more than anything, voice recording apps are intended to make the human voice sound clearer on a crappy device. They focus on the parts of the audio spectrum most relevant for this, and are therefore always going to make non-voice recordings such as the sax sound really awful.

If you do want to record yourself, a basic proper recording device such as a Zoom H2 is a much better bet. They cost about £60 used. Listen to it back through either decent speakers or proper hifi headphones. You'll get a clearer picture of what you sound like, although it'll still be significantly influenced by domestic acoustics.

 

[cappers]

Saxophones are tricky with acoustics. Once a conductor mentioned aspects of my sound that I couldn't hear. After some time I found out that I could hear them when playing against a wall. Since then playing long tones against a wall became a part of excercise.

@Woodpad Playing against a wall does help; the bathroom is tiled so there is a lot of resonance. Good for long tones but not for neighbour relations!
I hope it was more a case of an inadequate recording device than inadequate playing

Good book to play thru.
Record one part on a smart phone and play along with the second part.
Might help put music in your mind, as opposed to noodles. 😜

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Thanks @PiccoloPirate I have Creative Duets for Saxophone (Santin & Clark) which I use with my teacher, backing tracks included.

I like to 'noodle' because it helps me 'hear' and become familiar with the notes, intervals, changes etc. Experimenting with pentatonic and blues scales and combining other notes/scales I know.
I also like drone tones to noodle with, find it very meditative. @Pete Thomas' Vol 2 Beginners Impro has been very helpful.

The weird thing is how my fingers often play a sequence of notes but I'm not consciously thinking "play a G now, repeat that F# A D - F# A G phrase, blow a long C...etc" and it sounds reasonable not just a random collection of notes.

Band rehearsal tonight for a gig in the park on Sunday. 🙂

 

[Pete Effamy]

It’s good to check your tone by either recording or playing in a nice acoustic, but to develop your tone, nothing beats a pretty dead room. My clarinet professor at college purposely chose one such room for lessons.

 

[cappers]

It’s good to check your tone by either recording or playing in a nice acoustic, but to develop your tone, nothing beats a pretty dead room. My clarinet professor at college purposely chose one such room for lessons.

I have found a small studio a few minutes walk away from me, with a sound deadened practice room. It's run by a music teacher (guitar and flute) and I am going to book a few sessions.

 

[Colin the Bear]

How could a tiny speaker replicate the full spectrum of sound that comes out of a saxophone?

However, all the clipped, mistimed, off key ramblings are yours and it's useful to hear them back. The difference between what you played and what you thought you'd played can be revealing and informative. Sometimes you can hear what you should've played and that can help.

Have another listen in a week or so when you've forgotten what you were trying to do and can hear what you did.

 

[PiccoloPirate]

Creative Duets, according to the web, is R&B.
The Voxman, is 1600-1750 music.
Studying/memorizing, early music, creates a foundation for modern music.
Life without R&B, would be tragic.
Same without Afro-Latin. 🎶🏴‍☠️🎶

Some say the definition of noodling, is just moving your fingers, hoping, something musical happens.
Best to create a musical phrase,
first in your mind, then try to find
it on your horn.

Nice to have a keyboard/melodica handy.

 

[mizmar]

I was doing something else altogether when this came up...

Use the Audio Recorder in GarageBand for iPhone

Record your voice, an instrument, or any other sound using a microphone in GarageBand for iPhone, and play it back with a variety of audio effects.

support.apple.com

would that be better sound quality than the iPhone?

 

[cappers]

.......

Some say the definition of noodling, is just moving your fingers, hoping, something musical happens.
Best to create a musical phrase,
first in your mind, then try to find
it on your horn.

Nice to have a keyboard/melodica handy.

Initially my 'noodling' was simply blow, move my fingers and see what sound come out. I found it useful as it helped me find my way around the horn.

Over time I have started to hear and recognise intervals and nice note juxtapositions. My fingers often go to play a note without actively thinking about it. I can hear in my head very slightly in advance what I think it should be, if that makes sense. Today I was trying to play bluesy type riffs, think of a simple 2 bar phrase and tried to play it. For me, although this practice is somewhat unstructured, it's enjoyable and something my teacher recommended.

I did another recording today using TE Tuner. I still sound rubbish but not as awful as rendered by the voice app on my phone 😳

I have an old Casio CTK 1200 keyboard and that has been invaluable for understanding chords etc.

 

[ghostler]

The difference between what you played and what you thought you'd played can be revealing and informative.

Years ago in junior high school, I saw a colouring book page I did in 1st grade that my mother had saved. Then I thought my crayon work was perfect, filling in the various spaces.

I was surprised how amateurish it looked, more like scribbling. If I had a tape recording of my playing on the clarinet in 1965 as a 6th grader, it would probably appear like scribbling to me today.

 

[ghostler]

Good book to play thru. Record one part on a smart phone and play along with the second part. Might help put music in your mind, as opposed to noodles. 😜
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After all these years I still have the Volume II of that series on my bookshelf. I bought it in the 1970's. It is a fun book to play. With today's recording technology, one can record their sax playing in the one voice, then play against it with the second.

 

[Targa]

Years ago in junior high school, I saw a colouring book page I did in 1st grade that my mother had saved. Then I thought my crayon work was perfect, filling in the various spaces.

I was surprised how amateurish it looked, more like scribbling. If I had a tape recording of my playing on the clarinet in 1965 as a 6th grader, it would probably appear like scribbling to me today.

Give it another five years and enter it in an art competition.

 

[Dr G]

After all these years I still have the Volume II of that series on my bookshelf. I bought it in the 1970's. It is a fun book to play. With today's recording technology, one can record their sax playing in the one voice, then play against it with the second.

It was possible to do that with yesterday's recording technology as well. 😉

I recall having a portable cassette recorder in the late '60s.

Still, I encourage beginners to find others to play duets with. Whether you sight read them then rehearse for a couple passes, or prepare both parts before playing together, there is great benefit from the intense listening that comes with playing live. From there, the partners can explore phrasing, dynamics, intonation.... There's so much to gain from playing live and in the moment.

Just last week, my daughter was home from college and we broke out a pair of my flutes, picked a random book from the shelf, and started playing duets that we'd never read before. Great fun at all levels.

 

[Jeanette]

Good book to play thru.
Record one part on a smart phone and play along with the second part.
Might help put music in your mind, as opposed to noodles. 😜

View attachment 29384

I've got that book, used to play duets with my tutor. I have occasionally done as you suggested and recordered one part to play along with 😁

 

[JSL]

Recording can be very tricky. And what you record and hear on a cell phone is not likely to be an accurate representation tonally. How did you listen back? Through the cell phone speaker would be a poor choice. That said:

I seriously thought if that's what I sound like after 6 months with a teacher and diligent daily practice then I should give up.

6 months is a blink of the eye in terms of learning a musical instrument. It sounds like you've made significant progress in such a short, tiny span of time, so keep it up! It really takes years to get fairly competent on the horn, with a good sound, and no matter how long you've been playing, there will always be room for improvement. I had a teacher once who said something like "the main reason so many people give up playing music is due to a lack of patience".

 

[mizmar]

Really, medium/high end phones are greatly improved regarding recording. IPhone even supports garage band.

For listening
The other day I had a bout of tec gas.. in thinking about the H2essencial.. but got a pair of Shure SE215 IEMs instead. Much nicer than anything else I've tried and infinitely better than the built-in speaker...
... And no Bluetooth latency

 

[Colin the Bear]

Remember also that we do this because we like doing it. Not to be good.

If I don't play for a while, picking up a horn reminds me that I should have picked it up earlier.

Playing can improve your emotional and mental health and there's some evidence it improves brain function.

It's my reason to be alive at the moment.

Some one came up after the gig last night and told us we should be available on the NHS. I'm still buzzing.