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When playing the bell notes, of low Bb, B, C and C#, I have trouble producing these notes cleanly when I “tongue” into them. I can slur into them no problem. I’ve been practicing and am able only to hit them cleanly about half the time. When I don’t hit them cleanly, I produce a brief, but annoying squawk. I’ve gone to the lowest hardness of reeds I can. Any lower, and I begin having trouble with the high, left palm key notes.
My inconsistent, “tonguing” of the bottom notes occurs across different mouthpieces as well. There are no leaks in my horn, and I’m careful that I’m not accidentally grazing a palm key, for instance, and creating a “player-created-leak”. I know it’s a matter of practice, but if any has any ideas on “how to” practice to rid me of this annoyance – any ideas of how or what I should work on, that would be great.
btw….I poked around to see if there was this exact subject, but found a few that were close, and similar, but not exact.
Thanks.
Yes, it’s a very common problem. Reed and mouthpiece are important. It’s a combination of that and the way you blow the air and the releasing of the note with the tongue. Have a nice big supply of air from your diaphragm and just as you blow it, release the tip of your tongue from the reed.
Think of your air supply as a big gushing giesier of water and the tongue works to open and close this water supply. If your sax gets enough air it will play these notes for you. Doing this technique may sound loud and ugly at first but keep at it and hopefully you will gain more of this required control.
Hope that makes sense and helps!\\Johnny
Yes, I can picture this. This is very helpful. I will begin work on this tomorrow. Thanks very much!
Finally!!! Yes. It worked surprisingly faster than I had anticipated. I worked on it this morning, and my success rate immediately jumped to a nearly perfect hit rate within just the first hour of dedicated practice. Thanks again Johnny!
That’s good. I still struggle with it myself because of the mouthpiece use. I know I could do a better job on the low notes with a different one but then I would lose out on what I get on the high notes and all-round tone, so I compromise on those low notes…that;’s why I usually gliss down towards them!
Glad to hear it’s working better for you.
Johnny
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