Upper Octave G is misbehaving

[nigeld]

The upper octave G on my tenor sax is misbehaving - it sometimes sounds the D above (i.e. palm D).
All the notes around it are OK.
I can slide up or down to it without problems, it is only when it is tongued that it plays D.
It seems to be worse when I have been playing notes above G, so presumably embouchure
has something to do with it, but I am guessing there is a technical issue as well.
I have checked the sax with a leak light and I can't see anything obvious.

Any suggestions gratefully received.

 

[Tenor Viol]

Neck octave pip slightly open?

 

[jbtsax]

Think "tah" when you tongue the note to get the back of the tongue down. A good way to learn to control this is to play high G and then put the tongue in an "ee" shape and slur up to high D bringing it back down voicing "ah". The high A is the 3rd harmonic above low G and on tenors especially is even stronger than the 2nd.

Practice this back and forth but I caution you from walking around saying "ee-aw-ee-aw" where others can hear. You may leave them with the wrong impression. 🙂

 

[Colin the Bear]

We spend ages learning not to do something, then ages more trying to do it again at will.

 

[nigeld]

Neck octave pip slightly open?

Just checked - seems to be OK. I will try with some cling film later.

 

[nigeld]

Think "tah" when you tongue the note to get the back of the tongue down. A good way to learn to control this is to play high G and then put the tongue in an "ee" shape and slur up to high D bringing it back down voicing "ah". The high A is the 3rd harmonic above low G and on tenors especially is even stronger than the 2nd.

Practice this back and forth but I caution you from walking around saying "ee-aw-ee-aw" where others can hear. You may leave them with the wrong impression. 🙂

I have been practicing this. If I over-compensate, the G becomes multiphonic, but I suspect this is due to dropping my jaw rather than the back of my tongue.

It's ironic, because my other persistent problem is second octave D coming out as an A. I haven't had it the other way round before.

At present, it seems that the best technique is for me to visualise placing the note at the front of my mouth, with the front of the tongue slightly raised - This automatically lowers the back of the tongue, but I imagine it is also causing me to provide a faster airstream and more support.

 

[Guenne]

Good Morning,

I'd suggest playing the 2 octaves (up to C) without octave key in everything you normally practice.
This will show you what to do and not to do.
I can mimic my students when they have these problems which disappear once you have a knowledge about voicing the octaves.
There are also some exercises in Ben Britton's Book "A Complete Approach to Overtones" with one and two octaves Major and Minor Scales without OK.

There are different "techniques" to produce octaves, John Harle would say whereas in the lower octaves you need to blow "over the mouthpiece" and pull from a point some meters away and above you, you have to pull for the notes up to A in the second octave from some meters away and more at the same level which will alter your support from pulling in with the higher part of the abdominal wall to a more "hold" of the middle part of the abdominal wall. This will give more support for the different direction of the reed's vibration in the low and high octave.

Cheers

 

[Alphorn]

Good Morning,
There are different "techniques" to produce octaves, John Harle would say whereas in the lower octaves you need to blow "over the mouthpiece" and pull from a point some meters away and above you, you have to pull for the notes up to A in the second octave from some meters away and more at the same level which will alter your support from pulling in with the higher part of the abdominal wall to a more "hold" of the middle part of the abdominal wall. This will give more support for the different direction of the reed's vibration in the low and high octave.

Cheers

Very shortly considered to rate it informative & useful, until I realized I was completely lost. So, what the heck does it mean? How will it help me?

Alphorn

 

[nigeld]

Many thanks for the suggestions. I have been trying out the various ideas and mouth shapes.
I can now get some good G's, but not reliably yet.

The problem has arisen with a change of mouthpiece - I am fine with the old one.
The mouthpiece may have been a bit loose on the cork - a bit of plumbers tape seems to have helped.

I checked the neck octave pip, but it is fine. Sealing it with tape didn't make any difference.

Soft tonguing helps. (If I slur to the note there is no problem at all.)
Lowering the back of my tongue helps some times, but not others.
Practicing slurring between high G and palm D didn't seem to help today - all the G's just ended up as D's. I will try again tomorrow.

I have tried practicing 2 octaves without the octave key, but I have been able to do that for a long time, so it doesn't feel like it makes much difference. Maybe I just need to do more.

Pulling my bottom jaw back more than usual, so that I have a receding chin, helps a lot.
But it's mainly something to do with projection.
If I can imagine the note right then it will play, but unfortunately just imagining a good G isn't enough, yet.

Onwards and upwards!

 

[Colin the Bear]

If it's a new mouthpiece you may need a different reed or place it differently. Try moving it back half a mm or coming down half a step. There also may be some defects on the mouthpiece. Uneven table, tip rail, side rails etc.

Why did you change?

 

[nigeld]

If it's a new mouthpiece you may need a different reed or place it differently. Try moving it back half a mm or coming down half a step. There also may be some defects on the mouthpiece. Uneven table, tip rail, side rails etc.

Why did you change?

The new mouthpiece is an Aizen LS 7*. I have been looking for something a bit jazzier than my Selmer S80 C*.

The tip opening is quite bit wider than the Selmer, so I have already been experimenting with various reed types and strengths. Lupifaro seems good; Rico Royal is OK; D'Addario Select Jazz on that mouthpiece sounds a bit bright for my taste. But I haven't tried experimenting with the reed position, so I will have a go with that.

There are no visible defects, and it sounds very nice, apart from the high G. I just checked that the table is flat, but the side rails may have been a little high. I will have another blow later.

 

[Guenne]

Very shortly considered to rate it informative & useful, until I realized I was completely lost. So, what the heck does it mean? How will it help me?

It means that the Saxophone has some stumbling stones built in. One is G in the second octave.
So the software (the human) to is develop flexibility.....
I could play the note with 3 mm of the MPC inserted, or almost swallowing it, as I can adjust.

Cheers

 

[jbtsax]

One of the things that works for me is to blow the pitch of the note on the air stream before playing it on the saxophone using the same air and shape inside the mouth. Think of it as an airy sounding whistle. This works because when doing an actual whistle, the size and shape of the oral cavity changes to produce the "resonant frequency" of the whistled note. When the frequency of the fundamental of the fingered note is relatively weak, one of its partials has an opportunity to take over what Benade calls "the regime of oscillation". That's when the resonant frequency of the oral cavity can be used to dial in the note to one desired frequency or another. This is exactly what happens when we use altissimo fingerings.

 

[kevgermany]

One thing I found when I first started was the G on tenor. Partly sorted by accurtely tuning the sax to get the mouthpiece in the right position,. Fully sorted by changing mouthpiece. However if yours is loose as you say, then it'll leak, causing all sorts of problems. Same with a loose fitting neck.

 

[nigeld]

One thing I found when I first started was the G on tenor. Partly sorted by accurtely tuning the sax to get the mouthpiece in the right position,. Fully sorted by changing mouthpiece. However if yours is loose as you say, then it'll leak, causing all sorts of problems. Same with a loose fitting neck.

I have checked the tuning, so that should be OK - I once had that problem with my alto, where the mouthpiece was way out of tune and a range of notes wouldn't sound properly.

I have made sure the mouthpiece is now tight on the neck. Plumbers tape is excellent for this.

I shall be sad if I can't get the mouthpiece to work for me, because it is the best-sounding tenor mouthpiece I have found so far, but if I continue to have problems then it will have to go. I am on the list for the D'Addario pass around, so one of them may be a possibility, though I doubt it judging by the comments so far.

 

[Tenor Viol]

@jbtsax's comments about the harmonic dominating are important. On cello, you play harmonics by lightly touching the string at he relevant node and using a light fast bow. Once the string is sounding the harmonic, it will keep sounding even if you remove your finger from the node. The reason being that the oscillaiton will continue until it is disturbed.

 

[Rikki]

Take your sax to a reputable repairer and have him re cork the neck so the aizen fits correctly. Also ask him to test play your sax to see if he sees the same issues. You have changed to an advanced mouthpiece which is also more open than what you are used to. It will take some time for you to realise the full potential of the mouthpiece . You probably require at least initially a softer reed. Don't give up on the Aizen, I changed to a more open Morgan fry Jazz piece, took me a few months before I really began to appreciate just how good a handmade mouthpiece can be

 

[nigeld]

Quite a bit better today. Many thanks for all the helpful suggestions.

I tried moving the reed back a bit. The tone changed, but it didn't stop the problem. I had already gone down half a reed strength compared with my old mouthpiece.

I even tried a different ligature - no change.

I checked my previous Selmer mouthpiece - I can make the problem happen if I try, but normally it is fine.

Mainly I have been playing tongued second-octave B,A,G,F,G,A,B round and round, (sometimes sounding right and sometimes sounding B,A,D,F,G,A,B) trying to see what works and what doesn't.
I have been changing tongue position, mouth shape, lip shape, teeth on and teeth off, support, visualising where the note is formed and visualising where it should project to.

Things that have seemed to help most:
- moving the lower jaw further back than I usually do (chinless wonder look)
- a rather more severe-looking embouchure than I normally have - mouth corners down. (Frowning seems to help too!)
- imagining forming the sound at the front of my mouth and low down in the mouth
- good breath support (surprise, surprise!)

What is clear is that I can produce a G when I do the right thing, but I am still not certain what the right thing is.

Imagining the G note seems to be counterproductive at the moment - it produces the wrong harmonic. I am guessing I need to get the note reliably right before I can rely on my memory to reproduce it. My current memory is of the wrong thing.

 

[Colin the Bear]

If you keep practicing how to do it wrong you'll get good at that. Leave it alone and just play it when you have to as part of a piece /tune etc Scale practice too will help.

 

[jimmylh]

I used to have the same problem with G2 jumping to a D2. It didn't matter which tenor I was playing which let me know it was a me problem. I think it's basically an embrasure, breath support problem. I think it's just showing itself more with the new mp. Mine has disappeared on it's own as I progressed.