Originally Posted By: Keith from Oz
On the subject of saxes, perhaps someone could answer this for me. With the upper banks of my Ketron I have a variety of sax options, such as jazz tenor, rock sax etc. Where do the different tones come from on a "real" sax? Is it in the manufacture, the reed or the musician?

And can one go from playing a slow sexy tenor song to a R&R style with the same instrument?

Probably a dumb question, but remember I'm only a piano player. grin


All of the above:

1) sax - size and taper of the bore, density of the brass, amount of copper in the brass, height of the keys, resonators in the pads, plating/lacquer (if any) and some saxes use necks and bells made of sterling silver -- etc.

2) Mouthpiece, tip opening, bore size, baffle, etc. Also, is it made of hard rubber, brass, stainless steel? The mouthpiece on the sax is like the pickups and tone circuitry of the guitar, it's where the tone is generated and there are almost endless variations of design. I've seen some very extended conversations about mouthpieces on the Sax On The Web Forum, and I've known a few sax players who had dozens of mouthpieces.

3) Reed brands (like guitar strings) have different tones and they come in different strengths (hardness), which is also dependent on tip opening of the mouthpiece - also related, the ligature (the device that holds the reed to the mouthpiece). Plus since cane reeds are 'organic', no two are alike in tone or response. Then there are the synthetic reeds, which are more consistent but have a different tone (I prefer cane)

4) Player. The player's mouth is a resonating chamber that creates standing waves that color the tone by reinforcing some harmonics and depressing others. Also, the mouth shape can be changed during the playing to get different sounds, almost like vowel ooh-aah changes.

5) Player #2 - breath support. How tight are the muscles in your lower abdomen and diaphragm. This affects the clarity of the tone. Breath support varies the air pressure (not the speed of the air).

6) Player #3 - embouchure - simply put, how much of the mouthpiece/reed is in your mouth and how firmly are you embracing it

How do you get that blues sound?

All of the above, plus there are other effects you can produce. Probably most relevant here is a growl produced by the vocal chords while playing. It can vary to various degrees between a hum and something similar to clearing one's throat. It produces what I've heard called "dirty sax" a lot.

Then you can flutter tongue.

These are the basics. What makes the sax so versatile is that there are so many different ways to change the tone by either equipment, the player, or both.

Because most of the above interact with each other, it can take a long time to find the combination you like best. Plus you don't hear the sax like others do, so for years, when I was working on tone, I would play in front of a wall to hear the reflections coming back at me.

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