[padam11]

When I play with my lip tucked slightly in, low F# to low D play controlled and fine (as well as everything else frankly), and when I play with my lip slightly out (2 diff schools of thought), low F# to D mostly play fine (with a little warble here in there) although it sounds very different (subtoney, if that's a word), but when I play those notes using my natural embouchure (lip cushioning the teeth/middle), it's extremely volatile and generally warbles/cuts a ton like a vibrato. My preferred tone comes best with this embouchure. I have a feeling it's because of my air support, but I make sure to breathe in completely in the stomach/sides and just exhale w/ diaphragm. I do long tones and stuff. I've been ignoring it for years, just switching between the other two lip positions. I feel like there could also be a leak (low C# and down play just fine), but I don't generally like blaming stuff on gear. I'm at a loss of how to fix such a thing. Any information will be appreciated

 

[Pete Thomas]

When I play with my lip tucked slightly in, low F# to low D play controlled and fine (as well as everything else frankly), and when I play with my lip slightly out (2 diff schools of thought), low F# to D mostly play fine (with a little warble here in there) although it sounds very different (subtoney, if that's a word), but when I play those notes using my natural embouchure (lip cushioning the teeth/middle), it's extremely volatile and generally warbles/cuts a ton like a vibrato. My preferred tone comes best with this embouchure. I have a feeling it's because of my air support, but I make sure to breathe in completely in the stomach/sides and just exhale w/ diaphragm. I do long tones and stuff. I've been ignoring it for years, just switching between the other two lip positions. I feel like there could also be a leak (low C# and down play just fine), but I don't generally like blaming stuff on gear. I'm at a loss of how to fix such a thing. Any information will be appreciated

It could be a combination of air support and lip pressure (which are the basic ingredients of sound production on saxophone). I do exercise that transition slowly (on one note) from one extreme of embouchure to the other. In this case from lip oou to lip in (and back). I also do it with mouthpiece position in mouth, ie from lots of mouthpiece inside mouth gradually to very little.

These are incredibly good exercises and will get you in c complete control of your sound 9especially if combined with other "transitioning" exercises e.g. dynamics and pitch.

 

[saxoclese]

You may want to play on different mouthpieces to see if the same effect takes place. When I studied the "warble" on a low C of a C melody sax I discovered that using one mouthpiece made the warble hard to produce changing the embouchure and "voicing", but playing another mouthpiece made the warble hard to turn off by changing the embouchure and voicing.

As a repair tech I have found unstable lower stack notes to also be related to key heights that are too low---especially on Mark VI tenors.

 

[Admitone]

As a repair tech I have found unstable lower stack notes to also be related to key heights that are too low---especially on Mark VI tenors.

I'm having problems with low notes on a Mark VI, and will give the key heights a try.

Thanks for the tip.