Hi from north London

[Rick Dashrix]

Hello, struggling 49 year old noobie sax player here, with a cheep china tenor sax I bought in May.(then was busy with work and couldn’t practice much, the sax is sooo loud lol) I always wanted one since I was a kid but they were so expensive till now. I have trouble hitting the low B and Bflat notes, and G and G sharp makes horrible duck noises, sometimes octave change too makes duck noises. I’m guessing that’s normal for a beginner right?. The rest of the sax seems to play fine, it’s just the player needs fixing lol.

I can play only bits of tunes so far, a bit of madness, one step beyond, a bit of summertime, a bit of pirates of the Carribbian theme, and recently a bit of tequila (that was fun, thank you Johnny !!!).

(OMG music is soooo hard, it looks like somebody dipped a spider in ink and let it crawl about on paper lots…….and I really don’t understand why a C note on my sax is a different note on another instrument, that’s just bonkers….)

Any advice , help , encouragement, notes for cool tunes would be greatly appreciated. (letters not dots is best lol) I like rock and some classical stuff.

Lip stopped hurting now, so going to try greensleaves, or give up and play more tequila lol, Laters 😉

[john]

Hello there, normally when someone asks if it’s me or my sax that’s giving me problems with certain notes I’m pretty sure it’s the player and not the sax…unless it’s a cheap one made in China!
Seriously, some of these aren’t even playable. I had a friend of mine bring back a couple of them and one was so bad it didn’t even play. I thought I’d get my sax repair guys working on it but they refused because they said parts break easily and are basically unreplaceable so nothing could be done. One of them was quite playable but still not an enjoyable one to play.

If you’re getting most of the notes then the good news is yours may not be a total waste. Sorry about the bad news… as you progress you will want to try a better made horn. It doesn’t need to cost you much more than what you paid for yours Chinese one, just get a used one made by one of the good companies of which there are several.

As for the rest of your comments, yes, these are typical beginner things that slowly melt away as you start to understand them, ie: transposing the different saxes, reading music etc.

Stick to learning how to play the major scales, but read the notes as you do, this will instill the reading concept early. One note at a time is how you do it, next thing you know you’ll be playing an entire song… crawl, walk, then run.

[Michael]

Hey Rick9102, I know all too well what you mean, I just uploaded a song to the blog without even realizing that the sheet music where I learned it from was in the wrong key; growing pains for you. It was given to me by a local band director who had just the title to the song and the notes on the scales, all hand written. He probably just assumed I would know what key it was in and, not knowing any better, I used a back track for a modern version of that song that my wife had with her. A prime example of those typical beginner things. Well, at least I can play by memory now and I’m starting to walk.

[Author]

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