11/11/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 315)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 315

Date: 11/11/2013

Instrument: Soprano saxophone

Location: The art studio on my wife’s family property.  Burien, WA

Notes:

This morning my wife and I drove back from Portland, OR and stopped off at her families house in Burien on our way home.  Her parents have a small house on their property which her father uses as an art studio.  The studio is a small, cabin-like environment with wood carvings, old radios, paintings and old family fixtures.  We lived in this studio during a few points in our early marriage to save money, and I came to enjoy the simplicity of the room.   It’s comfortable size made for easy practicing.  This afternoon I snuck off to the art studio for a half hour or so and recorded today’s improvisation.

This piece used a very similar sound and textural approach to another 12 Moons improvisation recorded last summer in Anacortes, though this piece was far more aggressive.  I played with a full-mouthed embouchure shape with my lips against the ligature.  I centered the piece around a single fingering with some slight momentary key flicking with the High G altissimo side key, Side F, and G key in the left hand.  This single fingering was as follows:

(Left Hand) 1-2-3, Low Bb // (Right Hand) 1-2-3, Low Eb, Low C

I wanted to pull out a series of honking multiphonics with a natural grittiness that really only wanted to speak with a full flood of air, and the improper embouchure shape.  During the improvisation my reed began to fracture on the upper left corner, and by the end a good chunk of the tip had been lost.  This is very unusual, but was a result of the massive force of air being put into the instrument along with the slap tonguing.  The fracturing of the reed happened slowly and I hadn’t noticed it until near the end of the piece.  This opened up new sound territories in my air flow, which I explored with the full, open air column sounds that close the improvisation.

-Neil

The image accompanying today’s post by Michael Rodriguez, on view at the Vertical Art Gallery, Chicago in May of 2013.

11/10/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 314)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 314

Date: 11/10/2013

Instrument: Soprano saxophone

Location: The rec room of my childhood home in Edmonds, WA

Notes:

This morning on our way out of town, I stopped by my families house and recorded a short improvisation.  We work up early to get a jump on the day, and my wife and I had several hours of driving ahead of us.  Today is her birthday, and with a busy day planned there was very little for me to practice.  These days are rare as I almost always carve out a good chunk of time to practice regardless of the day’s obligations, but now and again a day of little playing can be good medicine for an overworked mind.  I came to the horn very easily and quickly settled on what was to be recorded.  My mind was already prepared for a long day, and my improvisation reflected not impatience but urgency of thought.  Also of note, today’s post was written in Portland, Oregon.  It’s often the case that my descriptive post is written in a different location than my improvisation is performed, but today’s geographical distance is the furthest since documentation during my Bad Luck band tour last Spring.

In today’s improvisation I worked with the phasing of sound from the extreme altissimo register into the mid register, back to the upper register, and finally an equal balance of both registers.  I used both standard breathing and circular breathing during this piece.  There was no particular key center or fingering model followed, but rather I used a very loose embouchure and articulated gently but deliberately against the reed with my tongue while exploring this phasing model.

-Neil

The image “Body Echo 26” accompanying today’s post by Hugh O'Donnell (1990).

11/09/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 313)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 313

Date: 11/09/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

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

Notes:

During my practice session this afternoon I worked out of my favorite saxophone book, “Top-Tones for the Saxophone” by Sigurd Rascher.  This book has been a constant companion nearly every day of my professional life, but I’ve taken the last month or so off from it.  It felt fresh and new to be using it again, and I quickly gravitated towards some of my favorite exercises.  My improvisation today was truly the outcome of having focused heavily on these areas in my practicing today.

Pages 8-9 fundamentally changed the way I thought about the saxophone when I started working with them several years ago.  These two pages include one very brief exercise on Rascher’s term “Tone Imagination."  His aim is for the saxophonist to play a pitch, and in their mind hear a second tone, and then move to this new tone.  This is an incredible exercise, because it forces the player to "hear” harmony without it’s actual existence.  This brings imagination to the music, but also draws attention to perfect intonation and harmony as something of the mind which can secondarily be fulfilled in reality.  This opened my up to so many possibilities inherent in textural playing.

I then moved on to pages 10-11, which focus on the intervals of the octave, perfect fourth and perfect fifth.  The player, again using imagination and careful control over their mind, is to play the exercise, but simultaneously aim for 5 areas: Perfect Intonation, Balanced Dynamics, Smooth Legato, Uniform Tone Quality, and Continuous Vibrato.  Before working out of this book, I thought I had the ability to focus on more than one musical area at once, say for example the melody I was playing, and intonation.  These are both of fundamental importance, and our teachers have always told us to mediation of these areas constantly while playing.  It wasn’t until I began working out of this book that I realized there were only fleeting moments where I could actually focus on both in equal measure.  In reality, it was predominantly one or the other, with little moments of overlapping.  I am still not able to focus on all 5 of Rascher’s musical areas at once, but I am able to isolate about 3-4 in almost equal balance, depending on my level of focus.  

Finally, I worked through pages 10-13, which begin the main thesis of the book–the overtone series.  The work in the book that precedes these pages helps the musician to strengthen their embouchure muscles and air flow, but more importantly their mind.

After finishing with this book, I began improvisation and quickly came to zone in on what would become today’s improvisation.  I recorded this piece at an extremely low level of volume.  I used two multiphonic fingerings and worked to balance melodicism with steady tempo, lower octave drones, and eventually an increase in tempo.  The first fingering had an ascending melodic shape in triplets with the pitches Eb, Bb, Db, all in the alstissimo register of the horn.  The second fingering used sixteenth notes with a subdivision of 4, the last of which accented a Db in the altissimo register.  As the piece evolved, I began slowly increasing the tempo in the second fingering with each return to it.  I kept the triplet melody in the first fingering at the original tempo.  In the last minute or so of the improvisation, I finally began increasing the tempo of the first fingering, while continuing to increase the tempo of the second.  With the steadfast focus on balanced recurring elements in this improvisation, I wanted this small of area of tempo imbalance to compliment it.  

Fingering 1 had a C (quarter step sharp) pitch articulated constantly in the mid register.  Fingering 2 had a Bb pitch articulated constantly in the mid register.  The fingerings were as follows:

Fingering 1 (triplet figure with ascending pitches Eb, Bb, Db)

(Left Hand) 1-2, Low B // (Right Hand) 1-2, Low C, High F

Fingering 2 (sixteenth note figure with every fourth pitch articulated with a Db)

(Left Hand) 2-3 // (Right Hand) 2, Low C

-Neil

The image “The Inside Story of the New York-New Jersey Vehicular [Holland] Tunnel” accompanying today’s post by Fotograms (1924).

11/08/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 312)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 312

Date: 11/08/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

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

Notes:

I arrived at today’s improvisation after variety of different approaches.  My initial aim was to perform a piece with a slow quarter note pulse with indeterminate intervalic pitches, punctuated by short double-tonging chromatic lines.  I then planed to abruptly shift into eight notes, and finally sixteenth notes, with the double-tonging phrases increasing until they shared equal balance with the sixteenths.  While practicing, the concept was more successful when each of three sections (quarter notes, eighth notes, sixteenth notes) were isolated.    To work at weaving the three tempos together, I tried abrupt shits in tempo, gradual increases in tempo as well as dynamic phrasing, however I felt none of these transitions did the piece justice.  

I eventually began improvising with more free phrasing, and started the improvisation from the outset at a quicker tempo with more overall energy.  I decided to continue to incorporate the double-tonguing chromatic lines intermittently, and settled on the approach of only a limited escalation in tempo from start to finish.  I also continued on with the use of wide intervalic pitch material, and also worked to develop shorter, more melodic phrases with natural pause points..  But most importantly, I decided to balance wide shifts in dynamic level from pitch to pitch.  With this approach a note may be played very muted, but the pitch that follows may be accented more heavily, slightly more, much more, etc. Finally, as the piece evolved I began gradually adding more and more of the double tonging figures between the single pitches.

-Neil

The image “Radiogram of Circle” accompanying today’s post by Bela Kalarova (1962-63).

11/07/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 311)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 311

Date: 11/07/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

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

Notes:

In today’s improvisation, I worked with a fingering system that emphasized natural dynamic shifts in volume inherent in the fingerings themselves.  I used a series of three fingerings, noted below as Series I, II, III.  Within each Series there were two actions, written as Action a. / Action b.  In each Action, the fingerings played were identical, but the key being trilled would change.  During each Series, I would try to blow into the horn in an identical fashion to explore the inherent differences in sound from fingering Action a. b.  In Action a, the dynamic shift was extremely pronounced, with clusters or individual pitches coming out noticeably louder.   Despite the fact that the fingering were the same, in Action b. the dynamic shifts were far less noticeable.  Again, the only difference between Actions a. and b.  was the key being trilled.  

The fingerings used were as follows:

Series I

Action a.)

(Left Hand) 1, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C. 

For the duration of the above fingering series, trill the F key in the right hand constantly.

Action b.)

(Left Hand) 1, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 1-2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 1-2, Low C.

For the duration of the above fingering series, trill the F key in the right hand constantly.

Series II 

Action a.)

(Left Hand) 1, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 1-2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C.

For the duration of the above fingering series, trill the F key in the right hand constantly.

Action b.)

(Left Hand) 1, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 1-2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 1-2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 1-2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 1-2, Low C.

For the duration of the above fingering series, trill the D key in the right hand constantly.

Series III  (Same root fingerings as Series II)

Action a.)

(Left Hand) 1, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 1-2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C.

For the duration of the above fingering series, trill the F key in the right hand constantly.

Action b.)

(Left Hand) 1, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 1-2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C. 

(Left Hand) 2, Octave, Low Bb, Palm F only // (Right Hand) 2, Low C.

For the duration of the above fingering series, trill the D key in the right hand constantly.

-Neil

The image “The Confrontation” accompanying today’s post by Sylvia Plachy (1965).