This Stops 95% of Saxophone Students Improving

#saxophone #bettersax #saxlessons
Jay Metcalf discusses key things that saxophone players can focus on in order to improve their playing and get better results faster.

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[ianbegley]

I just moved into a semi-detached house and for the first time ever I can let my horn scream without the fear of bothering my neighbours. It made such a big difference.

[LowReedExpert]

3:00
Best thing my sax instructor ever had me do was start practicing with either earbuds or earplugs in. Being shy/overly considerate with ones volume destroys the sound more than anything. Take it from me, a guy who when playing trumpet was easily over powered by the saxes because of how timid I was playing

[mistersplu]

For me, the best thing to improve my rythm was to record myself playing and then listening back to it, it really makes a difference hearing yourself play without having to concentrate on actually playing.

[drwallysax]

Great tips - VERY much agree with these. Air and Rhythm, without these nothing works (on the saxophone). I'm such a metronome-fanatic, I'm actually working with a Sydney design house to develop my dream metronome (will it tick? or tock? time will tell). Good luck with the workshop, looks like fun! Happy Friday, Jay!

[JamesExcell-InterJex]

I'm a saxophone teacher. And this is so helpful to use as a resource.

Keep up the great work! You're not just helping beginners with this video. You're helping teachers like me! 👍

[peterankin]

Well said jamie, i live in a small apartment in spain i hate annoying my nieghbors while practicing so i played low, but now i drive to the country side and play with full sound the difference is massive, great advise.

[DougKnechtelArt]

You nailed it! Tone and rhythm. They’ve been my mantra for 30+ years as a music educator!

[FancyFeast]

I've been playing for 3 days. I notice every now and then I hit that golden buttery tone that I've heard in my favorite tracks, and for those short moments I am in space, floating.

[gianlucawork]

So true, so true: sound & rhythm. They are my daily struggle. 🙂. Long notes, play in-tune, like what you hear, metronome (beats 2 and 4), whenever possible and when not possible, play-a-long with backing tracks or exercises (niehaus books, for example); without forgetting your tips ;-) thank you Jay

[victorescobedo]

It's amazing how advices that seems simple, are so important and could defined our sound.
Thanks again Jay, for your help, in loving this instrument that even gets to be a great companion.
Keep up the good work.

[clivenazareth]

That's great advice, I started using a metronome after this and the sound is a huge improvement.

[MistaImpala]

As a person who is going to lead alto chair in my Jazz Band I need this, so thanks!

[JettSax]

THIS VIDEO WAS NEEDED!!!! Thanks for putting this on Youtube! As a college saxophone music major, I believe that every young musician should watch this video!

[thesaxconservatory]

Great tips! I always tell my students that AIR is the basis of everything. I tell them to push air through the whole length of the saxophone (not just to the reed), and I tell them that if their siblings/parents/people in their house aren't being annoyed when they're not doing it right!

[dewindoethdwl]

I play in a small sax choir. I was on tenor but the baritone player retired so I stepped in. Wow, I discovered I was rhythmically illiterate. I’d obviously been relying on the baritone & my tenor colleague for a handrail. Practice with a metronome and a simple drum machine has been the cure. I’m now really enjoying the baritone, driving the tunes reliably and my tenor playing has benefited.
Just do what the man says🎉🎉

[Kirktracy]

Thanks for another great video, Jay. Incidentally, I’ve been spending some of my music listening time focussing on the drums/rhythm section and dancing to the sounds to embody them more. Time feel and sound is definitely a work in progress…

[latinkeys]

This has got to be the most important things i have ever heard from a saxophone educator. Even me and i have been playing for years sometimes forget. My neighbors stopped complaining years ago so I must be singing ok lol. Love your vids, Jay

[billganon]

Killer tips Jay. I had a 1:1 recently with a fantastic old timer who plays with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band in New Orleans (gift from my wife). One of his first requests was to hear me play a soft low C and B with perfect articulation and steady sound. Many of my attempts did neither. The secret....LOTS OF AIR! You can't push the lower bell notes out ...loudly, or (and especially softly), without LOTS. OF. AIR.

[probablynoturdad]

I just started learning on tenor, but I also play drums and keyboard with at least okay, basic facility, as well as a little flute. I think you're spot on about many sax/horn players often not having that percussive sense of rhythm, and you're right that its because many players have to use so much brain for their embouchure (as well as the fact that you cant watch your hands closely like drums and keyboard); it's a matter of the players habits of perspective.

To add a powerful solution to a logistical issue, learning and playing some piano or a keyboard with weighted keys, if you have one or can buy one, is probably the most useful tool you can get when it comes to learning on the sax. It helps shape your perspective on how you think of and feel time with your hands. Making music where the tension, suppleness, posture, and weighting of your hand is the absolute primary factor for sound production gives you the opportunity to really focus on the most pertinent information when it comes to rhythm and your hands: distance, velocity, and resistance, as well as the posture of your hands, arms, and shoulders as they relate to your capacity for movement.

To be able to predictably execute actions in time on an instrument, you have to develop an intuitive, predictive knowledge of how long it takes you to make a sound, and to make sure that the distance your fingers have to travel is as uniform and as little as possible if you want to be efficient and relaxed. If you remove your embouchure from the equation and make sounds with just your hands on an instrument that resists your fingers more than a sax, it can help your hands get stronger and give you a more acute sense of the relationship between time, space, and your hands connection to your brain and instrument. Plus, you can learn scales and chords on the keyboard while you're getting your hands strong, which is a super powerful tool for visualizing chords, scales, melodies, etc. And if you get a keyboard with a headphone jack, you get another instrument you can play that won't piss your neighbors off as much!

Getting a pair of drums sticks and a practice pad can also be super useful too, plus it's a cheaper solution than a keyboard. Firstly, it'll humble you on what a drummer really has to figure out to become good at drumming, and why being a good drummer is hard: you really gotta know how long it takes a very complicated striking mechanism, your hand interfacing with a stick to strike something, and you have to know it by memory. How do your remember something that you can't measure or qualify with words? Find the easiest, most predictable sensations to pay attention to in order to build muscle memory. The most dominant, consistent information that drummers have to become well acquainted with is the tension and posture of your hands, and how that correlates to how far away your stick is. Doing a pattern thousands of times gives you that intuitive sense of the relationship between the tension in your hand, the way you hold the stick, and how long it takes to produce a sound, as well as how you have to hold your hand in order to be able to do even strokes in quick succession. You sound like doodoo on drums no matter what until you figure that relationship out, and that necessity makes you learn if you really want a good sound. Same thing applies to the saxophone, its just that you have more excuses because you've gotta blow on an often finicky reed on a complicated looking instrument that you cant't directly look at while your play.

To sum all this up: ultimately, if you wanna learn really good time, and if you wanna make music you wanna learn good time, then it really behooves you to learn good time and sound production on another instrument to the point where you can execute the basics consistently; it will make you stronger at thinking about and growing your physicality with your instrument. You stop trying to become a saxophone player and start trying to become someone that plays their body to make music, which I feel like is the first step on the journey to really having a musical voice.

Thank you for the solid content! Your stuff has been real helpful for me figuring sax stuff out.

[chrisparker]

I try to think of the metronome as my drummer, my buddy, who's laying down a simple beat because he wants me to be able to lock into it. Thanks Jay -- I need both these reminders all the time!