10/22/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 295)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 295

Date: 10/22/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

Location: The main performance hall at Chief Sealth High School.  Seattle, WA 

Notes:

I had very little sleep last night, with an early morning wake-up call and a full day scheduled.  Between students and classes I slowly developed today’s improvisation during several attempted takes.  I began recording 4 times throughout the day, but various interruptions stopped the recording process–students erupting into the room, custodians needing to clean, the class bell going off.  These were basic, human occurrences and a good reminder that the world does not revolve around my artistic process.  These frustrating moments provided an hour or so between recordings, and gave me a period of reflection to really define and sculpt the recording documented here.

In today’s improvisation I wanted a busy texture with thinner strings of sound.  While playing this piece I aimed to be able to see through my lines of thought at all times.   I worked on the initial sound-scape that opens the piece throughout the day, becoming very aware of its sound profile and  gained confidence in the chirps and various combinations of colors that could be created in and around it.  I heard this initial sound as the core of the improvisation, and tried not to loose sight of this for a moment during the recording process.  In addition to thicker textures I wanted to explore a wide range, and to pull tones from the mid to altissimo range at will.

The core sound action centered around the following fingering:

(Left Hand) 1-2, Octave, Palm Eb only // (Right Hand) 2-3.  The primary alterations made to the sound-scape were done so by opening and closing the Palm Eb, High F#, and F keys as will.  Other keys were added into this spectrum as I moved towards uncovering other colors.   

-Neil

The image “Montserrat Crying, No. 2” accompanying today’s post by Julio Gonzalez (1938).

10/21/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 294)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 294

Date: 10/21/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

Location: Home studio in Clinton, WA (Whidbey Island)

Notes:

After Simon Henneman’s excellent performance last night, I was inspired to improvise a piece today that weaved pitches together through bending.  This is done with embouchure and air motion in union with false fingerings.  This allows one tone to speak, while the note essentially ready’s itself to move on to another.  In these false fingerings there is a high amount of back pressure involved, which also helps the notes to move with more of a sliding fashion between one another.  I thought about these musical statements as “interrogative” sentences.  To contrast this interrogative sound approach I also used tighter, walking–trills with double tonging between a few selected pitches.  These pitches were directly note-to-note with no bend between them whatsoever.  I interpreted these as sound statements with more of a “declarative” structure.  

The pitch content in this improvisation was improvised but the range was pre-determined.  I used mostly palm key fingerings without the octave key, since these fingerings are much more pliable than their traditional fingering counterparts.  For the walking-trill–the “declarative” statements–I moved between the B–Bb, and G#–F# (in the tenor key of Bb).  The trill took place on the F clutch key with my index and middle fingers in the right hand.  The declarative, trilled sections interrupted the established sound spectrum in the midst of the pitch bends.  After working with the interruptive concept a few times, I began blending the “interrogative” and “declarative” models by using the aggressive walking-trill with the more pliable palm key fingerings.

-Neil

The image accompanying today’s post is a super storm in the North Pole of Saturn (NASA).

10/20/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 293)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 293

Date: 10/20/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

Location: Home studio in Clinton, WA (Whidbey Island)

Notes:

This morning I woke up fairly early, gathered some wood from the shed and walked into my practice room to record.  Because of the early hour, as with my recording last Sunday, there was the strict limitation of low volume.  I decided to work with a phasing piece, using a single fingered actio but divide the improvisation into scope between two sound areas.  I used a multiphonic chord with the following fingering to do this:

(Left Hand) 1-3, Octave, Low B // (Right Hand) 1-2-3, Low C.   Throughout this improvisation I also trilled the Octave key continuously.

The first sound area involved presenting and exploring a range of pitches from the lower partials of the multiphonic up to about an altissimo C.  Some of these sounds were cross-faded, such as the transition between the first pitch to the second.  Other approaches included “dotting” the sound, such as the altissimo C which is presented at 1:38.  The second sound area included pushing the sound colors out instead of phasing between them.  With this approach I would blow into the horn with many different air flow patterns and embouchure shapes, trying to varying them with each execution.  This second sound area was far more indeterminate than the first.

-Neil

The image “Untitled” accompanying today’s post by Burk Uzzle (1975).

10/19/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 292)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 292

Date: 10/19/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

Location: Home studio in Clinton, WA (Whidbey Island)

Notes:

This afternoon while practicing I reached for a balance of pre-determined and indeterminate sound from my horn.  I wanted to explore phasing from one sound spectrum to another, all the while looking for q union between what I needed to hear versus what the horn would offer to me.  During this practice work, as well as my recording today, I maintained a primary fingering throughout with alterations to this fingering.  Many of the sounds explored in this piece were practiced for about a half hour or so before recording, and only after feeling like I had a good grasp of what the horn was offering up to me did I begin this recording process.  I opened the improvisation with the same area of sound I had left off on only moments before in practice.  Mentally it therefore felt as though I was continuing a natural, calm process of searching and working rather than beginning anew.  I began recording in mid-thought.

To approach this improvisation, I listened to the tight clusters, little percussive cycles and melodic figures, and was constantly on the lookout for a hook of some kind.  Once I identified a hook that spoke to me I let this sound lead me to new areas on the instrument.  These included little tone smears, rhythmic cycles, clusters, and more punctuated single pitches, etc.  The primary fingering used during this improvisation was as follows:

(Left Hand) 1-2-3, Octave, Low B // (Right Hand) 1-3, Side Bb.  I freely opened and closed the Side Bb, Low F# key, C, G and E keys in various combinations, playing some of them singularly and others overlaping.

-Neil

The image “Suspension Houses Project, Perspective sketch” accompanying today’s post by Bodo Rasch (1927-28).

10/18/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 291)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 291

Date: 10/18/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

Location: Home studio in Clinton, WA (Whidbey Island)

Notes:

This morning I spent some time reflecting on how much my past study of classical Hindustani music has shaped my musical sensibilities.  But in general I realize how my musical study–those touchstone periods of great importance from my past, return time and time again to influence my current music.  In today’s improvisation, I decided to reference musical concepts from my own past.  This was namely done in three areas:

1.  The use of a fixed scale, the idea being taken both from my study of Indian music, but also my early grade school study of the blues scale.

2.  Drawing on split tone fingerings I have developed in the past, and applied harmonically over this fixed scale.

3.  The use of “interruption,” a common theme in my music throughout the last several years.

This improvisation uses a hexatonic scale (with the root repeated in the next register for a total of 7 pitches). In descending order and in the key of Bb, the pitches were as follows:

 E, Eb, B, Bb, Ab, F, E.

After the initial statement of the scale with a very plain-spoken descent in the notes, I interrupted this sound world by descending the scale harmonically.  The pitches were grouped as E/Eb, B/Bb, Bb/Ab, F, E.  The F and the E each had overtones of the octave above them, with the E also including a very present B in the upper register.  The fingerings for these note groupings were as follows:

E/Eb: (Left Hand) Fork F, 2-3, Low Bb // (Right Hand) 1-2-3, Side Bb

B/Bb: (Left Hand) 1-3, Low B // (Right Hand) 1-2-3, Low C, Side Bb

Bb/Ab: (Right Hand) 1-2, Low Bb // (Right Hand) 1-2-3, Low C, Side Bb

F: (Left Hand) 1-2-3, Low Bb // (Right Hand) 1-3

E: (Left Hand) 1-2-3, Low B // (Right Hand) 1-2, Low Eb

After the statement of these chords in the descending scale, I abruptly transitioned into a static harmonic, and percussive motion with the two chord clusters B/Ab, and Bb/Ab.  I recall using this sixteenth note phrasing with these two specific chords in the past during my 12 Moons project.  I decided to use them none the less as a nod to the theme of “fingerings developed in the past."  I also decided mid improvisation to begin singing the upper notes of each chord into the horn a two different points.  These chords were fingered as follows:

B/Ab:  (Left Hand) 1-3, Low B // (Right Hand) 1-2-3, Low C

Bb/Ab: (Right Hand) 1-2, Low Bb // (Right Hand) 1-2-3, Low C, Side Bb (same as above).

-Neil

The image "The White House” accompanying today’s post by Jose Clemente Orozco (1925).