Are you tuning to concert pitch???
Are Online Tuners Accurate?
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The value of something like this Peterson Strobe Tuner (around $5,000) is that you can see whether the upper partials in your tone are in tune as well, which relates to what many have mentioned here, your overall tone quality. While a single meter tuner or online tuner (one needle that centers when the fundamental note is played), will show you the fundamental, your tone could still be atrocious beyond belief. Only good tone produced by a good embouchure on a good reed can produce the other overtones necessary to play in tune with others. Note that severely crappy tone can make it difficult to even peg a single meter tuner.
This is the big mistake band directors make because they are in a hurry to tune the entire band - going down the row of students, each one plays their tuning note. They can lock in the fundamental, but they're tone can clearly sound terrible. This is almost always due to embouchure (but can be worn out reeds, guitar strings etc., that are no longer able to produce the overtones). And this is why 30 students who all pegged the fundamental can still sound like a band out of tune - because they are. The out-of-tune overtones do not line up and the band will sound like mush to the listener.
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This is the big mistake band directors make because they are in a hurry to tune the entire band - going down the row of students, each one plays their tuning note. They can lock in the fundamental, but they're tone can clearly sound terrible. This is almost always due to embouchure (but can be worn out reeds, guitar strings etc., that are no longer able to produce the overtones). And this is why 30 students who all pegged the fundamental can still sound like a band out of tune - because they are. The out-of-tune overtones do not line up and the band will sound like mush to the listener.
Wow. Got a swag of answers. Thanks to all.
I'll say something about four things I picked out of it all:
Drones
What's a drone I know like bagpipe drone and such.. long monotonous sound... but it's a device, we can buy it? they sell them for wind instruments or something? or it's a bit of software makes droning sounds for us?
Embouchure tight.
Right on. I'm so tight it hurts my face muscles. I am right at the beginning still trying to develop an embouchure that will play all the notes from lowest to highest. And just following instinct it seems I have to do that. I will try and play more relaxed if I can do it and still get the note and not have air leaking.
Reed Soft.
Another hit. I am using Rico 1.5 and the three I just bought all work for me where the 20+ reeds I have on hand have provided only one that works for me. And they're all 2's. So that's why I bought the Rico 1.5's to experiment. And they seem to work.
Play over music.
I never do this. I have a big library of all kinds of music scavenged from all over the place and I favour the old show tunes, often marketed as 'jazz favourites'. But I have a go at anything. And what I do is just keep going through them playing what I can and as yet there's very few I can play through because of, mainly, struggling with those lowest notes (but that's getting much better with these reeds) and the high D etc and my poor fingering technique.
So like what i'm saying is if I tried playing over something I wouldn't be able to stay with it.
Play by ear.
Meaning playing pieces I've learned. I never do it. I don't even try to learn them. Always read.
I think all you guys go to gigs and play by ear perhaps pieces you never even heard before and extemporise and whatever.... I know what you're doing, I've been there, in my head, in my dope smoking days especially, listened to it, loved it, been transported by it. Even after those days Just a couple of years ago a jazz quartet playing locally.
But I have never done it and I think will never do it.
I'll never get there. I read these old tunes and try to play them and do an awful job and somehow get an enormous amount of pleasure from it. But I don't think you guys would call it 'playing' at all.
So like I say that just so's you can appreciate I'm in a very different scene. Attempting perhaps a very different and far more pedestrian and ordinary thing.
I don't aim very high. But I get something out of it alright.
I'll say something about four things I picked out of it all:
Drones
What's a drone I know like bagpipe drone and such.. long monotonous sound... but it's a device, we can buy it? they sell them for wind instruments or something? or it's a bit of software makes droning sounds for us?
Embouchure tight.
Right on. I'm so tight it hurts my face muscles. I am right at the beginning still trying to develop an embouchure that will play all the notes from lowest to highest. And just following instinct it seems I have to do that. I will try and play more relaxed if I can do it and still get the note and not have air leaking.
Reed Soft.
Another hit. I am using Rico 1.5 and the three I just bought all work for me where the 20+ reeds I have on hand have provided only one that works for me. And they're all 2's. So that's why I bought the Rico 1.5's to experiment. And they seem to work.
Play over music.
I never do this. I have a big library of all kinds of music scavenged from all over the place and I favour the old show tunes, often marketed as 'jazz favourites'. But I have a go at anything. And what I do is just keep going through them playing what I can and as yet there's very few I can play through because of, mainly, struggling with those lowest notes (but that's getting much better with these reeds) and the high D etc and my poor fingering technique.
So like what i'm saying is if I tried playing over something I wouldn't be able to stay with it.
Play by ear.
Meaning playing pieces I've learned. I never do it. I don't even try to learn them. Always read.
I think all you guys go to gigs and play by ear perhaps pieces you never even heard before and extemporise and whatever.... I know what you're doing, I've been there, in my head, in my dope smoking days especially, listened to it, loved it, been transported by it. Even after those days Just a couple of years ago a jazz quartet playing locally.
But I have never done it and I think will never do it.
I'll never get there. I read these old tunes and try to play them and do an awful job and somehow get an enormous amount of pleasure from it. But I don't think you guys would call it 'playing' at all.
So like I say that just so's you can appreciate I'm in a very different scene. Attempting perhaps a very different and far more pedestrian and ordinary thing.
I don't aim very high. But I get something out of it alright.
A drone is just a steady low tone to play over. Lots of free tracks out there such as this:Wow. Got a swag of answers. Thanks to all.
I'll say something about four things I picked out of it all:
Drones
What's a drone I know like bagpipe drone and such.. long monotonous sound... but it's a device, we can buy it? they sell them for wind instruments or something? or it's a bit of software makes droning sounds for us?
Embouchure tight.
Right on. I'm so tight it hurts my face muscles. I am right at the beginning still trying to develop an embouchure that will play all the notes from lowest to highest. And just following instinct it seems I have to do that. I will try and play more relaxed if I can do it and still get the note and not have air leaking.
Reed Soft.
Another hit. I am using Rico 1.5 and the three I just bought all work for me where the 20+ reeds I have on hand have provided only one that works for me. And they're all 2's. So that's why I bought the Rico 1.5's to experiment. And they seem to work.
Play over music.
I never do this. I have a big library of all kinds of music scavenged from all over the place and I favour the old show tunes, often marketed as 'jazz favourites'. But I have a go at anything. And what I do is just keep going through them playing what I can and as yet there's very few I can play through because of, mainly, struggling with those lowest notes (but that's getting much better with these reeds) and the high D etc and my poor fingering technique.
So like what i'm saying is if I tried playing over something I wouldn't be able to stay with it.
Play by ear.
Meaning playing pieces I've learned. I never do it. I don't even try to learn them. Always read.
I think all you guys go to gigs and play by ear perhaps pieces you never even heard before and extemporise and whatever.... I know what you're doing, I've been there, in my head, in my dope smoking days especially, listened to it, loved it, been transported by it. Even after those days Just a couple of years ago a jazz quartet playing locally.
But I have never done it and I think will never do it.
I'll never get there. I read these old tunes and try to play them and do an awful job and somehow get an enormous amount of pleasure from it. But I don't think you guys would call it 'playing' at all.
So like I say that just so's you can appreciate I'm in a very different scene. Attempting perhaps a very different and far more pedestrian and ordinary thing.
I don't aim very high. But I get something out of it alright.
Nothing wrong with hacking through sheet music but improvisation is loads of fun! Start simple, maybe a slow blues in Bb or playing a pentatonic scale over a single chord jam track.
This seems to be my worst note on my Amazon sax the rest are much closer and half of the chromatics are on the green
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Thanks for that. I'll get the track or similar and try it. ' a pentatonic scale over a single chord jam track ' ? Didn't even know such things existed. Thanks. I'll give it a go.
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