I am a happy camper today. Last night I was finally able to start practicing on tenor again after about 6 months of working the alto and trying to get my breath support back and embouchure. I was also having problems with asthma but the horn practice is greatly improving that problem. Too bad horn playing doesn't fix old age too. LOL Until now I have only been able to blow the tenor for 5 minutes before having to sit down short of breath with my head spinning. But last night I was able to get in an hours practice in 15 minute intervals. A big milestone for me. I love my YAS62 but I love my 1947 Conn Pan Am tenor lots more.
Also, I sat down and figured out that I can cover 6 of the main "traditional" blues keys with only 4 blues keys on sax: F#, A, D and G.
Concert Keys:
E - F# on alto
A - F# on tenor
C - A on alto or D on tenor
G - A on tenor
F - D on alto or G on tenor
Bb - G on alto
I believe in practicing blues in all keys but concentrating on these 4 keys and switching horns between alto and tenor gives me a leg up on improv for now.
BTW, I highly recommend the "Know Before You Blow" playalongs by Santorella Publications for practicing blues across many keys. I have both the alto and tenor editions and they include blues scales, licks and a playalong for each of 10 keys. They all use the 1 1 1 1 - 4 4 1 1 - 5 4 1 1 progression so they give a good base of material. Swing, shuffle and jazz-rock styles are illustrated. While that sounds simplistic, some of my other books use such stylized jazz chord progressions that it's hard to transfer the material to any other chord progression.