Saxophone India
Observations on improvised music. A musician's blog dedicated to everything about practicing and enjoying music through Jazz.
Monday, September 7, 2020
Rick Beato - Ear training - A review
Thursday, August 27, 2020
Arrangements and Reharmonizations
Now that I've been arranging and reharmonizing jazz standards for about 10 years I've decided to make some available online. I have had good feedback for my work, and have also included many of my pieces in recent albums.
For now I will be including only the IREAL Pro chord sheet. If you are interested in more, do mail me. I can provide PDFs, a lead sheet and recording. Small donations are most welcome of course.
Here is one of my latest works. Lucky Southern by Keith Jarrett. As with most of my pieces I like to take the edge out of chords by employing a lot of Minor 11, SUS and Major 7th sounds.
There are no changes in the melody so it can be played as is. I do however tend to play it in an open even 8ths feel rather than a Latin jazz groove.
Feedback is most welcome.
Friday, May 29, 2020
Transcribing and pattern recognition - what we can learn from chess
Wednesday, April 25, 2018
Sight reading
It is an important skill to practice, but you must know how. Blindly reading through material day after day will probably not make you a good reader. There are several areas that you will need to focus on and master in order to do this.
Many good articles have been written on this topic so it is going to be difficult for me to add to what is there already. Bill Plake and jazzadvice.com have been my goto for material for years. This is not the only topic you should read about on their sites. They are excellent tried and tested resources, and they should be followed regularly. The third article comes from stringmagazine.com
Personally, my aim when working at sight-reading is A: to stay calm and concentrated (this by itself can perform wonders), B: prioritize, scan to see what you do need to play and what you don't. I'm actually quite good at this now! C: learn to recognise patterns that you can practice separately. There are so many rhythmic combinations that come up time and time again. Learn to recognise them and apply them when you see them. It will save you alot of time in the long run.
D: practice without your instrument. Learn to take a sheet of paper and sing it. Sometimes adding your instrument just complicates something that with a bit of logical thinking you can read quite easily. Sit quietly and simply hum and tap it out till you get it. E: rests can be tricky. If you find these difficult, take them out and sing or play the rhythm without them. Add them back in when you feel comfortable where the pulse is.
And finally F: Be prepared to take notes. Mark on the paper where the beat falls. Most of my sheets are covered with annotations to help me. I find this helps alot.
Those are at least my tips!
More from the experts:
https://www.jazzadvice.com/5-steps-to-mastering-sight-reading/
http://billplakemusic.org/2012/01/19/a-few-tip-for-improving-your-sight-reading-skills/
http://stringsmagazine.com/3-ways-to-improve-your-sight-reading-skills/
I'm back!
See you soon!
Sunday, October 22, 2017
Scribd
I can highly recommend the 6$ or so it costs. It's really worth it. So many books are there as well as PDF documents to go through.
Right now I'm going through Greg Fishman's "Lobster Theory" of Jazz analogies for study. It's a wonderful book and I will review it here.
Happy reading!
Wednesday, September 6, 2017
Joe Allard - The Master Speaks
Thursday, August 31, 2017
Alto mouthpiece comparison - Selmer Soloist vs Otto Link 7*
Firstly both are really nice pieces. I like them both but they are very different.
The Selmer has a very rounded, slightly closed sound, yet very mellow with a kind of warm, breathy fuzz around the edges. The sound is quite spread and if there are any criticisms it's that the sound is not quite as focused as I would like. It lacks a bit of definition and you have to push it a bit for that. It helps to use harder reeds. Softer reeds get overwhelmed and the sound starts to deteriorate.
The Otto link has alot more definition and edge to it than the Selmer. It has a more focused sound but is therefore less warm than the other. I would say for a kind of "West Coast" feel the Selmer is nicer, as has a bit more character to it. The Otto link probably suits a more modern sound, yet it still has plenty of warmth and never gets too harsh. The link has a hard time with harder reeds. They get tough to blow so half a strength down on the Selmer is needed.
Hopefully I'll have time and post a short demo.
Sunday, August 27, 2017
Getting the most out of charts
Try this experiment. Take a standard such as All the things you are. First thing in the day, play it without any warm up with a backing track. Maybe record yourself to see how you are doing. The next day, instead of playing immediately, spend 15 minutes quietly with the score. Go through each chord. Visualize each arpeggio. Where are the difficult areas where you suddenly slow down? Go back to that section. Spend some time on it. What are the basic guide tones? How could you approach a line given those notes.
I think we can already see without too much trouble that if you were to do this the results would be alot better once you tackled the piece.
So why not do this more often? Maybe before a gig perhaps? Maybe as a warm down after you have finished for the day? Many possibilities are there. If you are going to use the chart for a piece then why not use it properly!
Monday, August 21, 2017
Inspiration - can it be worked on?
We all know to be able to perform at the highest level, the hours dedicated to honing our art have to be there. Without them we are simply unable to express what we would like, even if the ideas come. Technique should be just where we need it, in the right place at the right time.
What about inspiration? Can this be worked on? I think the answer is yes. Chess grand-master and legend Garry Kasparov in his new book Deep Thinking, says that in order for anyone to perform at their best, absolutely everything must be in place. That must include not just what we can control such as work and preparation, but the things that we can't foresee such as, innate abilities and talents that are simply part of us and can be opened to given the right circumstances. Those moments of 'genius' that we can't explain must be there too.
We have all been there. What happens when we play at are best. Can we explain it? Usually not. Mostly what happens in these cases is that we are in a zone way beyond something that can be calculated in terms of hours. We no longer think, and the endless calculations needed to improvise at the highest level no longer apply.
So can this be cultivated? The ability to be open to those special moments? Probably the easiest way to see it is when things don't go well. What has usually gone wrong? Maybe we are not able to concentrate, maybe we are unwell, are tired, distracted, thinking of other things, trying too hard. The list is endless.
So perhaps the answer to working on the inspiration part of music is to make sure as much as possible that everything is fitting into place when we need it. Have we slept well, exercised, eaten the right things, spent time away from distractions, warmed up before the show? Maybe these simple things can go a long way to help us reach the places we would like to.
Thursday, August 3, 2017
Weekly Jazz Lick - No 5
I love playing ballads and here is a little lick one can use for the ending of a phrase, either in a solo or embellishing the melody.
Wednesday, July 26, 2017
Listen to the silence - Inner time feel
Once we started, many kids wanted to try on their own and even try harder examples with longer gaps of silence. I also noticed that it was rather calming and almost meditative, so I thought I'd try it for myself later in the day.
Practicing on my own I started to explore further the value of this. The first thing I noticed, was as with the children it was very calming and gave me a strong focus on both what I was practicing later and as well as a greater awareness of my time feel in general.
Before I knew it an hour had past. I tried 2 measures on 2 measures off, different tempos and longer exercises, and even practicing basic rhythm exercises during the silences.
Since then I've been doing this every day as a warm up and even with the limited time I've done this I can tell it's something I'm going to use for a while. Firstly it sets the tone for your practice. It give you a sense of focus and quietness to start your work. Secondly it's clearly good for your inner sense of rhythm. I've seen the benefits of this exercise written about elsewhere.
Lastly and maybe more importantly it seems to give a sense of focus on your playing in general that is unlike other rhythmic exercises. One of the more striking things I noticed was that I was more often accurate when I didn't count, but just "felt" the beat. When I tapped my foot or other parts of my body, surprisingly I was often wrong. However, when I was able to stay quiet enough to listen to the silence in between the gaps, rather than physically trying to beat the rhythm out, I was more often correct.
I'm not yet sure what this indicates, but definitely it opens your ear and feel to something new and interesting. I will write more on this later once I've had the time to explore it further.
Friday, July 21, 2017
Buying saxes online
I'm going to try and answer this so that it may help interested saxophone players in future. I am also going to try to answer this in a way that can be helpful to anyone, whether they know about saxophones or not.
Firstly there is an easy way to answer this without having to delve into models and technical issues.
Imagine you were buying a car:
Would you buy a car online without having seen it, let alone tested or driven it?
Would you buy a car not knowing the person selling it?
Would you buy a car not knowing the correct price to pay?
Would you buy a car that was an an unknown model or company to you?
Would you buy a car from a website that doesn't specialize in cars?
I think you can see where I am going here!
Ask your self those questions and put sax instead of car and you have the answer pretty quickly. One doesn't even need to start thinking of saxophone brands let alone looking at details such as specific models and other issues.
I hope that has helped.
Thursday, July 20, 2017
Half Diminished Chords - Jazzadvice.com
Here is another great article by Forrest on Half Diminished chords. I'm posting this as it's an area many people have troubles with - including myself over the years. This article is a good one to get you on your way with these troublesome chords. Follow this and you will a lot better at tackling them in any key.
I like what he says here "Most standards tend to hang around certain keys and therefore, use the same few half diminished chords. What we end up with is seeing the same four over and over, while rarely encountering the other eight, making for a world of pain when we do."
Sounds familiar? - have a go at this and it will be sorted once and for all.
http://www.jazzadvice.com/how-to-not-suck-at-half-diminished-chords/
For something a bit more advanced once you have the basics down have a look as this article again by Forrest. He looks specifically at Bill Evans to find a multitude of ways to be creative on a minor ii v i.
http://www.jazzadvice.com/a-lesson-with-bill-evans-14-techniques-to-master-the-minor-ii-v-progression/
After that if you still have trouble THEN the aptly named!
http://www.jazzadvice.com/why-you-still-suck-at-half-diminished-chords/
YAS 280 vs YAS 62 ii
Here are a few things to note:
I recorded these with a stock mouthpiece. It has no brand and came with one of the horns. It's to show like the reviewer at SH woodwind says, you can literally stick any mouthpiece on these horns and they sound quite good. (for that reason there are a few tuning issues - I've never used the mouthpiece before)
The reed was a used Vandoren Java strength 2
I used a RODE NT3. The only effect was a little reverb.
https://soundcloud.com/mattav/body-and-soul-yas-62-ii-test-comparison
https://soundcloud.com/mattav/body-and-soul-yas-480-sax-comparison-test
How do I feel?
Aside being a little uncomfortable on the new mouthpiece I feel that considering that, they play pretty well and fairly similarly. I was afraid to push too much higher up and as the sound on this mouthpiece was a little brittle, but they both handled it really well.
The YAS 62 ii is clearly a little warmer and has more depth to the sound. A bit fuller and a little more bite in the sound. Still the YAS 280 has a good clear sound, warm and pleasing, though with a little more of the metalic edge than the other. Both are clearly playable in my opinion. I'd be happy to receive feedback from others.
Tuesday, July 18, 2017
Yamaha alto saxes - cheap vs expensive
To answer that fully is probably beyond the scope of this blog. There are lots of technical articles on these horns and a good start is here at SH Woodwind. http://www.shwoodwind.co.uk/Reviews/Saxes/Alto/Yamaha_YAS475.htm Excellent technical reviews of most modern saxes. Here is a YAS 475 for example. Check out others if you are interested in buying a horn. It's really a great read. For something a little simpler have a look here: http://www.bestsaxophonewebsiteever.com/yamaha-saxophone-overview/
So what about Yamaha Altos. Let's say YAS 480 vs a YAS62 II? What do I say?
The YAS 480 is a great horn. It's well made, plays in tune throughout and has a good clear tone. It's probably on the brighter side of saxophones in terms of tone, and with a solid mouthpiece it can give a very decent tone. I've used mine with a variety of mouthpieces and been happy with them all. The sax has a solid feel to it, the key-work fits great in the hands. Overall a solid sax and for the price you really can't go wrong. I've played mine in lots of gigs.
The YAS62 II - Having owned a great YTS 62 II this wasn't a difficult choice when one came my way. I only stopped playing the tenor because of wanting to focus on Alto but it was a great horn with a wonderful sound. The 62 is basically an improved 480. Immediately the action and handling feel very similar and it makes you feel right at home from the get go. Tone wise as you would expect from a more expensive horn, it is fuller and somewhat less bright especially higher up, but still has alot of power and projection like the cheaper model. The lowest note are fuller and have more snap or punch to them than the less expensive sax.
Again if you prefer a more mellow saxophone maybe this is not your thing, but in my experience you can play pretty much any way you like, and with the right kind of mouthpiece for your individual sound you can set it up to your way of playing. I use a Selmer Soloist C* and I'm very happy. It's got alot of clarity, with a smooth warm tone which plays well from bottom to top.
I've made some recordings with both which I will post here. As always the ears are the best judge. I will add to this post in due course. For now here are some from the web:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9cirfzmGCs
Bob Reynolds - From 5:33 - Watch this great video. Later he plays his YAS 62. Wonderful tone for someone who says he doesn't play alto.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ct0w-gVTqmg
Greg Vail demonstrating the YAS 480
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FI88dv_CdTk
Greg Vail demonstrating the YAS 62 III
Monday, July 10, 2017
What scales ARE and what they are NOT - Jazzadvice.com
http://www.jazzadvice.com/scales-are-not-the-secret-short-cut-to-jazz-improvisation/
Tuesday, July 4, 2017
Video teaser
Some recordings can be found here:
https://soundcloud.com/mattav
Saxindia - Older posts
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
If you want to play the Sax better (or teach) - You must watch this!
http://lessons.bobreynoldsmusic.com/join/becoming-a-member/
Update -
If you are clicking on this link and it says WE ARE FULL. Unlucky for you. Check again and have a look for the next time around. Fabulous stuff from Bob Reynolds.
YouTube - Jazz Solo Transcriptions
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNiLO7lxizg
Now having searched a little, I've have found a huge selection. Anyone wishing to study famous solos has a large choice. Personally I like the ones that play the original and scroll. Even if you don't end up working them out it's a great little study tool to have a listen and follow. I've linked some of the ones I like:
Kevin Hayes - It Could happen to you
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hi8DR1XDW6o
Wynton Marsalis - Struttin' With Some Barbecue
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MyMiq13Kc5Y
Miles Davis - Straight No Chaser
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLfsQSpefbA
Miles Davis - Seven Steps to Heaven
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MajA3cs94Wc
Kenny Barron - Someday My Prince Will come
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E28gAG9K4rs
Charlie Parker - Just Friends
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4u8-V5q91Xk
Monday, June 5, 2017
Stella By Starlight
Matt Littlewood - Piano
Holger Jetter - Double Bass
Sreenath Sreenivasan - Drums
Stella by Starlight - Victor Young - Arr Matt Littlewood
https://soundcloud.com/mattav/stella-by-starlight-victor-young-arr-matt