As a "Late Bloomer" are you going for it or just h

[Torachan]

G'day all.

I think we have all read through the "something about you please" thread. Pretty inspirational stuff I thought. It's great to think that people haven't let age get in the way of starting something new.

My question to you all is about your ultimate goal/s in playing/learning the sax.

Are you planning on being a professional? To annoy the neighbours (my goal when I was about 12 lol)? For your own enjoyment (although I think that to lock yourself away without sharing your skill however limited is a bit selfish... music is needs to be shared)?

I have already asked the reason why people started the sax but I think it would be good to find out where people plan to go with their sax.

(ps there are no smileys as my firewall kills them otherwise there would be heaps .... and if there were a BEER smiley .... )

[Torachan]

As I started the thread I think it's only fair that I answer it first.

I would love to one day be able to "tour" Japan... well "tour" may be the wrong word. But I would love to play in a few clubs in Japan. Getting paid would be really good but I guess just the experience would be awsome.

At the moment I can play Star Spangled banner, fre a jaque and When the Saints come marching...... kind of anyway... I recognise the tunes but my fiance struggles to... I call it artistic license others atribute it to lack of talent but I think that they are being narrow minded. (insert smiley please)

Anyway that's my goal

[retread]

I restarted after almost 40 years with two goals:
Make music, by myself and with others.
Get progressively better at it.

It's become fun again after some serious struggle. I have no idea what will happen, but I'm sure enjoying the journey.

[paulwl]

I have been playing paying gigs (including some very good-paying ones) since the age of 24 (I'm now 37). But "professionalism" is something I never stop striving for. No matter how professional you are, you can always be more so.

[kbraun]

My goal is to get back most of the mastery of the instrument that I once had. I'd like to get back to performing. I think the professional - not professional distinction is not well thought out. I know amature players that are much better musicians than those whe get paid or even get paid a lot. When I played for a living I played often. I don't want to do that again. I don't want to travel, stay up late with some pretty strange people, etc., etc. That said, I know that without that sort of intensity it will be practically impossible to get that fantastic can do attitude and skill set that come from playing in public 3, 7, 10 or even more times a week. I just want to get to a point were I can say to myself, if I wanted to return to that I could. But then I'm thankful I don't have to and I certainly won't be doing it.

[LarryG]

I just want to get better every time I practice. I want to play on a stage at some point soon, with any kind of band that will have me.
I have signed up for Jazz Vermont this year, and am REALLY looking forward to it. The thrill of playing for other people, with other people, and having them enjoy it is like no other feeling in the world. I did it many years ago, and I can and will do it again.
Playing with "play along cds" for my friends and family has had its own rewards. They tell me they can see the progress I am making, and want me to keep playing. That's good enough for me.
My next step is going out to the local band practices and try to meet some people to play more consistently with.
If all of this were to fail, at least I would be enjoying my time playing the tenor, and not just wasting time in front of the tube or the computer for that matter!

[Tom Goodrick]

I got back into playing horns when my Dad died and the trombone I loaned him was returned. Along with it came some pictures of him playing in a Dixie band the the folks at his nursung home enjoyed. He was obviously having fun.

I had sworn off playing horns as an old fashioned waste of effort. I had been playing nothing but a very nice synthesizer for several years. I had synthsized all the horns I used to play - trumpet, flugel, trombone, tenor sax, and alto sax and even many I had not played like flute and soprano sax. There was no need to keep my lip in shape for the brass. I could walk up and hit high C and higher any time I wanted, holding it much longer than any real player could. I was working having fun developing arrangements for jazz band and orchestra. i would work up some arrangements, record them on the keyboard's floppy disks and then copy them to tape cassettes. I was a reasonably good professional in my 20's and 30's. The results of my work on the keyboard were professional though I just did it for fun.

But the trombone I had loaned by Dad was a very good one - a King 2B. Both Dad and I had longed to get a horn like that when I was playing. Dad had an opportunity to buy one at a low price. Then he had a heart attack and the doc told him to stop playing the horn. I bought it from him at a reasonable price. I enjoed it although by then I was not playing much, just some concert band work and most of that was on trumpet. But I bought a four-track reel-to-reel tape unit so I could make multitrack recordings. (It had a special synchronization feature so you could hear one track while adding another.) I would put on one background track with an organ and then add horns. It was fun.

After having mutiple bypass surgery, my Dad was told he could play the trombone again if he wanted to. He was going to buy one but I told him I'd loan him 'ours' as long as he wanted it. He played it for about five years before his death. It brought him a lot of fun.

So I examined the horn when it was returned and decided I could not just put it in the case and pack it away like my other instruments. Besides, being retired, I had plenty of time on my hands. So I decided to get my lip back in shape so I could play the horn well like I used to. Then I opened my other horn cases and tried each of them. Surprisingly, a flugel horn that was the oldest of all was in the best shape. I good Bach Trumpet was usable but badly tarnished by the acids in the case. My low-cost student tenor sax had turned to dust in the case. It was worthless.

On my last pro jobs, I was playing lead horn in front of keyboard, bass and drums using each of those horns. The sax took the load off the lip for the trumpet and trombone. I felt if I ever did any more playing in public, I'd want to do that same thing for several reasons. I was tired of playing sideman for leaders who could barely read music but were good at counting money and selling the band. I wanted to pick my own music and run the gigs myself. I invested in a new tenor sax. In the two years since then I have played from 4 to 9 hours a week. At first it was very heavy duty work - 3 to 4 hours a day. That hammered my chops into shape. I had set a goal of six months to get into shape and start putting a group together.

But as time has gone by, I find myself enjoying the practicing in its own sake. I have a room all for the music with everything set up all the time. I just walk in and start playing. The keyboard provides rhythm and some recorded backup. I look out the window through some nice trees and a nice lawn with a view of several houses at a lower level. It is a nice view. The big house is on a big lot so I don't bother the neighbors. I usually play when they are at work.

I find I am in no hurry to get back into the business. I do not have any fond memories of the business. It was all just hard work and a lot of long late hours. I paid my dues. I think it could be different this time around, but I know that's fantasy. Sure, I could turn down any job I did not like. But, the guys I get to work with me could not be so choosy. I'd have to play a lot of poor places just to keep the band together - once I got a good band together.

The view out the window is great and so is the sound.

[Torachan]

Nice one

[altoist]

Tom,
I wish that synthesizers sounded like saxes. The keyboard interface
is better for one who wants to master Western music. Alas, synthesizers don't sound like saxes!

It's funny that so many late bloomers are really restarters and not
late bloomers at all.

To the original question. I'd like to achieve mastery over the instrument. Since there are players who are better than I'll ever be
who still seek to improve, I should define what I mean by mastery.
I'd like to be able to play any tune I can sing or hum by ear, and I'd
like to be able to read well enough that I can crank through a tune in a
fake book in the first or second pass. Probably, when I reach those
goals, I'll have new ones, but those suffice for now. When I achieve those
goals, I'll be able to play with others somewaht effectively.

Of course, I'd like to have a pleasant sound too!

[ynotsaurus]

I started learning the alto 3 years ago and decided try out the tenor half year later. I was 39 then.
Right now I am in a Saxophone Quartet playing the tenor. But this is, for me, a mean to my ultimate goal - to be able to play gigs and solos in bars with or without pay. (We get paid by shopping malls for playing quartets and all preceed goes to a trust fund for helping school music projects).
My difficulties right now is remembering all the licks and riffs I practiced. Just don't know when they apply. I am good at memorizing melodies and play them out in a few tries with my horn. But as far as improvisation is concerned, nothing comes into my head. Most of the time I'm like the Yellow Pages, Let my fingers do the Walking.
Would appreciate if someone can offer me some advise on this.

Regards :)

[rcwjd]

Hello All

Like many on this thread, I played during secondary school and college, and then life and career paths intervened. A few years ago I had a client who became a friend who also is a pro jazz musician. We started jamming together and he encouraged me to continue - including sitting in with his group occasionally. Now I am enjoying playing even more than ever - and have the luxury of more time to do it.

One of the best things I discovered is the thread elsewhere on this forum "Post A Soundclip of Your Playing." It is located within "Member Recordings ..." A group of us regularly select a tune, record it, and post it for comparison by each other. We have improved measurably just by this because of regularly practicing and playing new tunes - and because we get the positive criticism from our peers. We have players who have been playing for 6 months, and those who have been playing for much longer, and we all have fun. Check out the thread and join us.

[NotPortlyNJ]

LarryG and I have similar goals: get good enough to jam with some like-minded musicians. I, too, am going to Jazz Vermont this year. It should be a great experience, especially since I've only just returned to sax just over a year ago, and the last time I played in a group was in high school 20+ years ago.

[Doctormyeyes]

I'm hoping to get good enough to impress the ladies! :-)

[goodsax]

I started on an old C-melody at the ripe old age of eight a little over 55 years ago. About a year later, on my 9th birthday, my poor folks managed to scrape enough loot together to buy me a Holton Collegiate alto and I was off and running, so-to-speak. I used to ride a bus every Saturday for about a year from South Central LA to Hollywood to practice in my teacher's Latin dance band. I played in junior HS when I was 10 and 11 years old and at 12 - 16 played all four years in the HS concert and marching bands, taking my senior year off from marching band to play football. I entered Fullerton JC when I was 16 and played lead alto in their dance band for awhile. This is the short version of how I got started playing sax - notice, no clarinet or flute.

I joined the Navy shortly after my 17th b'day, so my sax playing became greatly reduced for the next 21 years, playing when I could by sitting in with other groups at various ports and duty stations, but never doing any serious gigging. I retired from submarines in '78 and pretty much set the sax aside to concentrate on deciding what I wanted to do as a civilian and on somehow making a living. For the last over 23 years I've been in the medical device manufacturing business with very little to do with saxes until one evening when two of my old church musician buddies showed up on my front porch after a separation of about 45 years. I won't bore you with details about that reunion, but suffice it to say it motivated me to buy another alto sax just to be able to jam with these guys again for old times' sake.

Well, that led to a long run at buying and selling altos, tenors and sop's on eBay until I found the SAT colletion that pleased me the most, and one of those friends asked me to take care of the church's vintage Conn baritone for the indefinite future. That's how I wound up with the complete SBAT collection. Somewhere amidst buying all the saxes i picked up a clarinet and took a couple of lessons with the idea of possibly doubling one day. I still have it and the goal of getting good enough to double.

So, after a long hiatus from playing sax, I now find myself playing in two community concert bands and may be asked to join a large dance band as soon as next week. Needless to say, for an old guy I'm very excited about my newly reprised musical career, modest as it may be. And, I take it very seriously, shedding dilligently between band rehearsals and concerts, and monitoring info sources such as this forum for technique improvement tips, to be the best musician I can be. I doubt I'll ever get much beyond playing in community bands, but one never knows, and I'm doing my best to be ready should that call ever come. I'll be retiring from the manufacturing business in a couple of years and will have more time to devote to my love of playing sax in and for various musical organizations.

Just the ramblings of an old sax pro wannabe...

[LarryG]

Hey NotPortlyNJ, congratulations. This will be my first time at Jazz Vermont as well. Really looking forward to the challenge.

One of the best things I discovered is the thread elsewhere on this forum "Post A Soundclip of Your Playing." It is located within "Member Recordings ..." A group of us regularly select a tune, record it, and post it for comparison by each other.

I will check it out rcwjd. Thanks.

[Saxophrass1968]

I have been playing on and off for a while. At 35, I am now picking it up once again and practicing. I find that if I put the horn down for a while, I can just pick up where zI left off and go further. I have played in concert bads and a local big band. Now, as I start playing again, my ultimate goal is to d it prefessionally. I plan to take classes at a local college (classes like music theory and such). and studying again with a teacher. I know this will take a lot of time, but in the end, it will be worth it for me. Is it a far reaching goal? Maybe. But, I love to play, I love playing in bands and gigs. Also, I do not have any kids and my significant other is very supportive. He is a graphic artist after all so he understands where I am at. Anyway, that is where I want to go with my playing. Goals are not impossible, people only make them that way. :D :D

[Lexy]

Well, I guess you could call me a late bloomer. I'm 37 now, and I started playing the sax at the beginning of this year and fell in love. I started playing the violin when I was 6 and played in various school orchestras etc. I was one of the annoying kids that could get a nice sound out of any instrument I picked up...later in life I realised I could sing...and classically trained in that area. Mind you, my singing has moved on from classical now and I mainly sing jazz and folk instead now.

However, getting back to the sax...I only bought a sax because my neighbour played and she wanted someone to play duets with. I tried her alto and could get a sound out of it, so thought "why the hell not" and bought an alto. However, since then, I have invested (rather heavily) in a Yanagisawa T991 and it is a beauty! I still love my alto and still enjoy playing it, but I ADORE my tenor...

My neighbours and I have a band (there are 8 of us - 2 saxes (sometimes 3), 2 electric guitars, 1 acoustic, 1 bass, 1 drummer...and keyboards). We're not great...and it's all just jamming. We don't have any songs particularly that we play. We always record what we do (via computer - we have a rather snazzy set up that one of the guitarists works) so that we can listen back to it later on and we always ensure that we have fun. However, I find it a right bugger to play with guitarists as I find they play in really awkward keys for us sax players...we've said we're going on strike until they play in Bb or Eb!!! Anyway, even though we're not great, it's really nice to play with other musicians rather than just by myself in my front room, desperately trying to sound like Andy Sheppard!!! Mind you, since I got the Yani...my sound has improved hugely - watch out Sheppard, I'm comin' ta git ya!

My point is, and I didn't really know I had one, but it appears I do, is that I would never really have picked the sax as an instrument as I've always been a string player or a vocalist, but since I did, it has become a serious obsession...mouthpieces...necks...different saxes...I'm having to work all the overtime I can get just to afford my new hobby.

Mind you, one day, my hope is that I will be able to play with a "real" band and perhaps do a gig or two without feeling like a total fraud! :lol: :lol:

[jimsuderman]

I am 47 and am just getting started (literally). My son returns home from college tonight with a sax he picked up for me from a good friend of his. I have read a lot about the sax and about playing, while I've been waiting. I played the trumpet back in junior high school but was never very motivated. I enjoy listening to the sax and so I decided to try it after reading about all those who started 'late in the game'. My motivation is primarily for my own enjoyment but I would like to some day play with my son, who plays the guitar.