Tip Book

[Dave Tucker]

Hey Troy,
How was your week? Hope you had a good one. I got my 2nd MRI results yesterday. I will have to see a Spinal surgeon. I have a Nerve sheath tumor. Dr say's it's most likely benign. I'll have to see what the specialist say's.

I checked out Puttin On The Ritz. I will keep that one in mind. While I was searching that on You Tube I came across a really nice song called Tico Tico for Alto Sax. That will be a good one to learn for finger work.
This week my lesson was great. I played a duet with the teach. I had a question for my teacher so I took my Henry Mancini song book to my lesson. She had a backing track for Day's Of Wine and Rose's. She sat on my left and when we started I was amazed at the sound coming out of her horn. She was playing a Selmer Series II into my left ear. I got lost a couple of times because i found myself listening to her. She is going to let me play it next week. Moon River is another one from that book that I have practiced allot. This weeks assignment she want's me to put some of my idea's into the 2 songs. Day's of Wine and Rose's I had already added a few note's and dropped a couple to make it sound like what was in my head. She liked it and want's me to do the same with Moon River.
I also upgrade to the Rico Royal #3 this week. They made a big difference in the sound. A much fuller and crisper tone. I guess it's dinner time.
Keep in touch and let me know how your online lessons are going.

Dave

[Troy]

Dave,

Really sorry to hear about the tumor on your spine, but the word benign is a great word! I'll keep an eye out for more posts and updates, but I hope the surgery won't take you out more than a few days. My week was pretty good, thanks for asking! I just got back home a few hours ago after my wife, daughter and I went to visit my parents a couple hours away. My dad is going to have an MRI at the end of the month for his back. It would be sooner but he isn't comfortable getting into the normal MRI scanner because it is so closed in, so the end of the month was the soonest available for the open sided MRI scanner. My dad's 75 and has been fairly healthy all his life and now all the sudden he has some back issues, nerve damage in his arm and hip problems, and just had cateract surgery. I hope he is around for a while myself, not just for me, but for my daugther. My dad can be a son of a gun at times, but he's a great grandfather and father, and I really hope Jocelyn gets to know him well.

I can see by your music selection you've had plenty of time to practice! Tico Tico gave my fingers cramps just watching. I spent too much time on my earlier lessons trying to get rid of the squawk than progressing and I am just now getting to the 1/8th notes. I'm been having problems practicing this past week or so because I have a chest cold and I run out to breath a lot faster and get winded, but I'm about to start practicing again once I finish this post. Being a government holiday, I should have a fair amount of time to practice tomorrow.

I haven't heard Moon River in a while, so I looked it up as well and I really like that song for the sax. The same with Day of Wine and Roses. I have to say, I like your choices in music.

Did you check out which mouthpiece your teacher was using on her sax? With your choices in music, does she think it would be worthwhile for you to switch up mouthpieces to one with designed a little more for blues or jazz? At your level of practice it may be a little premature, especially since you already have a quality mouthpiece.

[Troy]

OK, I just finished practicing because my mouth was so tired I had fake vibrato. But, it was probably the best overall session I've had since day one. I was hitting the forte and piano dynamics well, my timing was pretty good and I was hitting the keys really well. The only problem was I had a great deal of squawks and chirps (a lot more than normal) and touble hitting really easy lower notes, and about 15 minutes before I stopped, I discovered I had my first split reed. How sad is it that my best night playing was with a busted reed? :0)

[Dave Tucker]

How was everyone's week? I had a great lesson. My teacher pulled a fast one on me and swapped horns. She gave me her Selmer Series II to play. All I can say is fantastic. It was so smooth and responsive. I even stumbled onto something new. I was getting the octave notes without the octave key. It also felt like I did not have to try as hard to get the note's. I can't wait until the day I upgrade.
I heard my horn for the first time being played by someone. It sounds pretty good too. But you can hear the difference between beginner and pro horn's.

Dave

[john]

Sure there will be a difference in sound between pro and student horns, let's hope so because there sure is a difference in price!

Still, you can make bigger strides in improved quality with a better embouchure/mouthpiece/reed than you can simply by buying a better horn so keep working on those things and forget about the horn for a little while longer anyway.

When you finally upgrade you will sound that much better, but it's not only because of the new horn!

[Troy]

I hope you all have been doing well!

Johnny, silly question – I see so many professionals playing on vintage saxophones because they have such a great tone. Why can't anybody make the horns like they did in the past? Can they not remember how much zinc they had in the brass or how thick the horn was as it was worked? I don't mean to be a smart Alec, but I don't understand why they cannot recreate these vintage horns that the professionals cherish so much…

I finally ordered the Selmer S-80 C* mouthpiece and some 2.5 Vandoran Traditional reeds, along with the 101 tips book Dave was talking about and a larger reed protector. Thank goodness the reeds will be here in a day or two since I split my last reed the other night. It's amusing because with the slight split, the last reed was giving a very nice and mellow tone without the 'tinny' sound that I disliked that I normally have. I'm eager to see how this Selmer AS500 horn Dave and I both have sounds with the new mouthpiece!

Dave, how did your last lesson go? Are you saving up for that professional level horn in a rainy day fund? Here is a Youtube video of one of the sax tunes I have fallen in love with recently. (http://youtu.be/cf-8Auk-N4o) (Lily was here – Candy Dulfer & Dave Stewart).

I also have a set of saxophone music that's awesome – "Lonely Shepherd Erotic Saxophone (2011)". It is 100 tracks of songs with prominent sax and no vocals. I've spent a few hours trying to track down the actual albums via Window's Media Player lookups and over 10 pages of Google searches trying to purchase it legally, but I can only find sites to download the songs…nothing else. It's a great mix, but I cannot find anywhere to purchase it properly. I don't know if it's someone's personal mix since I cannot find an actual album, but I doubt it because it is too well done. If you find a place to purchase the album, please post it.

[john]

Hi Troy, well, we all get used to them old horns I guess. Progress happens and as you elude to, not always for the better. But I find Selmer and Yamaha still make great horns nevertheless. It's just silly to spend what some people want for the old Selmers. I bought mine for a couple grand 20 years ago and it'll go for 10 sight unseen today!

[Alan Sizer]

Hi Dave,

I've just looked on Amazon for the book & found the following title:
101 Saxophone Tips: Stuff All The Pros Know And Use by Eric J. Morones
is that the one?

Cheers

Alan

[john]

I believe it is.

[Author]

Posts