05/25/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 145)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 145

Date: 05/25/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

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

Notes:

After spending time working with a variety of textures during my practice session today, I arrived back at a familiar technique of singing into the horn while playing.  This technique is relatively simple with some pitces, but depending on what range is chosen the horn can fight back with an incredible amount of back pressure and physical discomfort.  Today I worked in this uncomfortable range and allowed my body to become acclimated to it’s new physical reality before recording this improvisation.  I sung a static drone and worked to maintain it from start to finish, though I drifted about a quarter step flat by the end of the piece.  I sang a concert Db in middle register and used a single fingering to cull out a variety of colors from my horn.

The fingering was as follows:

(Left Hand) B-A-G keys, Low Bb, Palm D // (Right Hand) E-D keys

This fingering natural speaks a concert B in middle range, making the sung pitch a whole step away from what my ears heard as the pitch center.  Keeping my ear focused on the intervalic relationship of this whole step and trying to keep it in tune was a focus throughout the piece.  Weeding out all the other sounds at times and trying to zone on a simple two-note harmonic relationship helps me to maintain better intonation.  As the piece evolved I also created rhythmic and melodic cycles by opening and closing the B key (left hand) and the side C key (right hand) one at a time.

-Neil

The image “Screw You Peek-A-Boo” accompanying today’s post by artist Yuri Masnyj (2003)

05/24/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 144)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 144

Date: 05/24/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

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

Notes:

After an amazing afternoon spent outside in my yard watching birds darting around the trees and overhead, I went inside and was transported to a very different place.  It dawned on me that I needed to take care of an insurance issue, and my high spirits suddenly became plagued and ill by searching online and making phone calls.  This improvisation was a response to the aftermath of this abrupt shift and my attempt to transition myself back to a place of calm and control.   I decided to work with delicate textures, using only a few pitches in the difficult altissimo range of the horn. 

This improvisation uses primarily the pitches Ab, Bb, and occasionally C.  I tried to play these pitches as carefully as possible, and they were recorded at a very low volume.  When returning to the Ab at the end of a phrase, I would use my embouchure and the slow depression of keys closing to bend the note evenly downward some distance.  There were pitches that seemed to naturally speak on their way down, and at a few points during the piece I paused and held one of these lower tones out to let it resonate

-Neil

The image accompanying today’s post by artist Kunie Segiura

05/23/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 143)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 143

Date: 05/23/2013

Instrument: Alto saxophone

Location: Practice room B at South Whidbey High School.  Langley, WA (Whidbey Island)

Notes:

Today I worked with non-tempered pitches that had a siren-like call to them, surrounded by undulating tones that were muted and presented at a steady pace beneath.  There were two siren calls, the first being in the upper register with very bright and present tones, and the second being in the upper-mid register with more of a subdued quality.  I thought of this improvisation as occupying two words, the first being the siren pitches and the second being the lower tones.  I attempted to keep the lower world, with it’s twisting, cyclic sounds coursing nearly at all times, whereas the upper siren-calls would only step into the forefront occasionally.  

There was a single fingering used during this improvisation, with side keys added or taken away to create the cycles.  The siren call in the upper register used the follow fingering:

(Left Hand) B-A-G keys, Octave, Low Bb // (Right Hand) E-D keys.  Flick open and closed the Low C to allow the pitch to pop out at a high level of volume.  This create the notes (in the alto key) of High C, and High D (quarter step sharp).

The siren call in the upper-mid register used the same fingering, but had the Low C held completely down.  The undulating lower register tones used primarily the low F# and A, and were made with the above finger creating a cycle by opening and closing the Palm Eb and Side C one at a time in repetition.

-Neil

The image “‘61 Pontiac” accompanying today’s post by Robert Bechtle (1968-69)

05/22/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 142)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 142

Date: 05/22/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

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

Notes:

This afternoon I worked with fixed scales that had a bluesy quality to them.  Eventually I began  transitioning the use of tempered pitches to more pliable ones with false fingerings.  My improvisation today use a fixed scale with six different findings.  This created a 7 note scale with non-tempered, de-tuned pitches.  Some of the fingerings used make it possible to play a minor third, or minor second simultaneously. For example, with the pitches Bb and B the melodic variation between the notes was achieved with movement in air flow and embouchure with a single fingering.  

The fingerings (from lowest to highest and in the tenor key)

1.  C# (slightly sharp) (Left Hand) B-A-G keys, Octave, Low Bb, Palm Eb // (Right Hand) F-E keys, Side F#, Low C. 

2.  D (quarter step sharp) (Left Hand) B-A-G keys, Octave, Low Bb, Palm Eb // (Right Hand) F-E keys, Low C.  

3. F (quarter step sharp) (Left Hand) B-A-G keys, Octave, Low Bb // (Right Hand) F-E keys, Low C.  There is also naturally a minor third F to D chord with this fingering that speaks at times.  

4.  F# (quarter step sharp) (Left Hand) B-A-G keys, Octave, Low Bb // (Right Hand) F-E keys, Side F#, Low C.

5-6. Bb and B (Left Hand) B key, Octave, Low Bb // (Right Hand) F-E-D keys, Low Eb.  To achieve each pitch bend with embouchure.

7.  C# (Left Hand) B key, Octave, Low Bb // (Right Hand) F-E-D keys, Low Eb.

-Neil

The image accompanying today’s post is of Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei, who released a new music video today.

05/21/2013 (12 Moons Solo Project Day 141)

12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 141

Date: 05/21/2013

Instrument: Tenor saxophone

Location: Small Theatre at Chief Sealth International High School.  Seattle, WA

Notes:

The physical landscape outside looked like a perfect grey scale today, and the radio was filled with harrowing stories from survivors of the devastating Tornado in Oklahoma.  This improvisation is dedicated to those folks now recovering.  This sound exploration surveyed a mood of melancholy that I carried with me through most of the day.  I seemed to feel every physical motion and mental experience very personally today and with an unusual amount of sensitivity of thought.  In my improvisation I tried to capture this depth of mood as best I could, exploring brooding melodic figures mixed with the constancy of a continuous, slow trill in the lower end of the instrument.  

This is an unusual melodic and harmonic action, in that the continuous whole-step melodic figure in the low end was achieved but pressing and releasing the octave key.  This created a muted figure that was only audible at a low volume.  At the same time, the fingering produced quiet bends in the upper register from a Concert Eb to an E.  This forced me to split my mind completely, focusing simultaneously on maintaining an even tempo in the slow trill, and bending, warping and sliding melodic figures in the upper register.  It truly was a marriage of two completely different trains of the thought.

The fingering was as follows:

(Left Hand) Fork F, A keys, Low Bb // (Right Hand) F-E keys, Low C.  To create the trill, open and close the register key with the thumb.  The melodic shapes above are achieved with the embouchure.  Other rhythmic and melodic cycles were made by opening and closing the side Bb, C and High F keys while also trilling the B key in the left hand.

-Neil

The image “White Painting” by Albert Kotin (1950’s).