[J-Moen]

I am truly interested to see how many people use piano to assist in the scale process, or think it is a hindrance. I just started some in depth scale practices to my routine, and I wanted to see if anyone considered piano/keyboard playing to be helpful.

 

[lesacks]

Your poll doesn't actually tackle the question in your post.

 

[J-Moen]

Your poll doesn't actually tackle the question in your post.

I questioned myself before posting, but couldn't come up with a reason how the options provided didn't answer the question. Any suggestions?

 

[lesacks]

Not really, SOTW isn't really a science tool, and polls are rarely useful in answering questions. But your options don't really address "does it hinder / help".
In the many threads about piano in SOTW I've never seen someone post that they've had a problem because of piano playing (appart, maybe, from rsi type issues).

 

[Pete Thomas]

Well, practising scales on the saxophone helps with playing scales on the saxophone.

Practising scales on the piano helps with playing scales on the piano.

So I suppose it all depends on whether you play one or the other or both. Which is all a bit obvious so I don't really understand the poll.

I do use piano to help with understanding of intervals and theory as it is easier to visualise, but I never bother practising scales as I don't need to be a pianist - for me it's just a tool that can help for arranging and composing

 

[jman1977]

It's certainly helpful if you're planning to do something like this:

 

[lydian]

I am truly interested to see how many people use piano to assist in the scale process, or think it is a hindrance. I just started some in depth scale practices to my routine, and I wanted to see if anyone considered piano/keyboard playing to be helpful.

Pete nailed it. Of course piano is a great tool for playing/hearing chords and visualizing intervals/patterns. The only way I see piano being a hindrance is if you play it instead of practicing your horn. It's easy to slip into playing the instrument you're better at and skip practicing the instruments that really need it. So I say plink out a scale type (major, minor, etc.) to visualize the intervals and get the sound in your head, if that helps you. Then shut the piano, pick up you sax and shed. The shortest route to mastering scales is to use your ears and concentrate just on the sax.

Having said that, I do find it very useful to bang out chords on the piano, then play scales/fragments/patterns on sax so I can hear how they fit (or don't fit). But this step comes AFTER you've mastered all the scales on your horn.

 

[HeavyWeather77]

I play piano/keyboards professionally in addition to playing saxophone professionally, and I also teach piano on the college level, so needless to say I've practiced a lot of scales and technique on both instruments! However, I'm a firm believer that genuinely improving one instrument will help with the other. It helps the brain develop a greater understanding of music apart from the physical characteristics of an instrument, and that's great for improvising and composing. It can be tricky to maintain fundamentals on multiple instruments, but I encourage my students to branch out as often as possible if they have the time and energy for it.

 

[adamk]

When I solo on piano my technique isn't as advanced as on my horns.
This limitation actually can create more lyric lines, it's especially true on melodica.

 

[mmichel]

Well, practising scales on the saxophone helps with playing scales on the saxophone.

Practising scales on the piano helps with playing scales on the piano.

So I suppose it all depends on whether you play one or the other or both. Which is all a bit obvious so I don't really understand the poll.

I do use piano to help with understanding of intervals and theory as it is easier to visualise, but I never bother practising scales as I don't need to be a pianist - for me it's just a tool that can help for arranging and composing

+1

I practice scales on both (and I'm much, much worse on the piano), but my skill at playing scales (i.e., which scales I struggle with, how quickly or fluidly I can play them, etc.) are almost completely uncorrelated across the two instruments.

I suppose piano might help at the very beginning, when you're still learning note names and key signatures, but, once you've established this, practicing/playing scales should basically be all ear/muscle memory.

If you're still thinking about note names while playing scales, then you're probably trying to move too fast. Stick with a handful of scales until you can play them without thinking about the individual notes.

 

[JL]

To answer your main question, I don't see how practicing anything on the piano could be a hindrance to your horn playing. Quite the contrary; the piano can be very helpful with ear training (intervals, chords, etc) and to some extent, learning music theory. I'm not a pianist by any stretch, but I can play chords well enough to learn to hear the various chord qualities and even work out chord progressions (slowly). Mostly it's an ear training tool for me, but also a way to visualize the relationship between chords and various intervals. Very useful, imo.

 

[J-Moen]

Thanks for the the responses! This is about what I expected. My thought process was a little skewed. While I didn't think my ability to play a scale on piano would directly translate to saxophone, my intention is ear training primarily to get chord tones, scales, and the like built out. This is also something I can do with my headphones on while I'm working overnight and my wife is trying to sleep.