mini course

[Anonymous]

i’m following the mini improvisation course.

I’ve only been playing the sax for 5 yrs now, and i must confess it took me several goes this week listening to ‘tequila’, to be able to count in the 7 bars to work out when to start playing the sax.

So a time saving practicing tip, set your music to start playing from bar 8 and use an ap, which allows you to set up a loop so you can practice playing any number of bars over and over that are problematic.

When i started learning to play the sax, i downloaded ‘tequila’ 5 yrs ago, and i could never count in the 7 bars, i always lost track after a few bars, and never started at the correct place. So i gave up on ‘tequila’ way back then.

I’m already familiar with how to do all the embellishments, as i started working on how to play embellishments from last December.
It took me 3 months to play one exercise sheet stuffed full of embellishments – which paid off. In the past i’ve played the odd embellishment in music sheets but to no avail, to get into embellishments proper, you need to keep practicing lots of them on a single sheet.

I can just about play ‘tequila’, but i reckon i would have to spend several weeks, to play it properly, at the pace i work at.

[john]

well that’s pretty good Walley. a few weeks to nail something like that is good, we all work at differnt paces…it’s not a race.
as for the count in, there are a few different ways to do it and it’s not as easy teaching you thru an email or post like this but I’ll try…
once we can get the count it’s a matter of counting each beat but if you’re having trouble I’m assuming then that you’re not able to count along with the beat.
next thing I would try is to listen to the chord pattern and how the guitar is playing it;
G G F..G G F..G G F..G G F
1 2 3 4
the chord pattern above represents 4 bars; listen to the guitar play two G chords on beat 1 and 2. then an F chord on beat 3 for two beats…this makes one bar.
This pattern is played throughout not only the intro but the entire song except when it goes to the bridge part just before the “tequila” shout.
So, spend time listening to the guitar in the intro until you can understand how that sound of two G chords and one F chord makes for a whole bar.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the Tip.

It depends on the backing track, backing tracks in music/cd books vary considerably, i find some are more technically difficult to count in, and when to start playing the sax.

Some tracks i’ve come across, you have to listen out for a specific instrument playing a certain note when to come in with the sax.

I can handle tracks that have a clear drum beat, or a clear bass beat,
or a clear left hand on the piano….

[Anonymous]

i listened to ‘tequila’ several times tonight, and i’ve cracked it now, i can now count 1 2 3 4 in time with the ‘1’ on every bar in the backing track, and i can pick out the drum beat on the ‘2’ and its right because when i hear the music in bar 31, i know if i’m behind or ahead in the backing track. Whereas before when i played the sax i was always out of step with bar 31, so i new my timing was out.

One of the great fun things about playing music, is the satisfaction of working on a problem area in a music sheet and mastering it. That’s the real buzz, you’re playing something you couldn’t play before.

You can get a buzz out of playing something properly to someone else when you get a good response from the person you’re playing to, but it’s not the same kind of buzz.

[john]

Bar 31? Do you have my latest version?
if not you can download it from the video page link:

Tequila Saxophone Music

[Anonymous]

yep, i clicked on the two download buttons from your e-mail,
one for the backing track and the other for the Eb sheet.
At bar 31 on the sheet (ie where you see 6 1/8th notes in middle E),
and it ties up with the backing track. (4th line down, 3 bars across).

[john]

I don’t have bar numbers on my update so am wondering if you do on yours or you’re just counting bars from the beginning even tho they’re not written on the sheet?

[Anonymous]

I’m counting the bars from the beginning on the sheet, and it matches up with the counting of the bars in the backing track, when i play the sax.

When it comes to playing with backing tracks, sometimes you can play various parts of a music sheet and they can fit anywhere in the backing track which makes it difficult to know exactly where you are in relation to the track, other times, you can be playing a part of the music sheet, and it sticks out like a sore thumb, that you’re playing the wrong bar in the backing track.

Tequila is an odd tune, which makes it attractive, is it rhythmic or is it melodic? or is it both? In either case you could sing words to it…

you left foot in, shake it about
you right foot out, knock it around

[Author]

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