Chris Curtis Web Site

Time for an update.

I have had a couple of lessons and learnt far more than I thought possible in the hour (total) with a proper saxophone teacher. He is very happy to work to my agenda for him, which was to tell me what I am getting wrong and tell me how to fix it, while still leaving me to do the bulk of the learning.

There’s plenty that I am getting wrong. The first was (as I perceive it) not being firm enough with the sax. He has helped me feel that my embouchure needs to be very much firmer than I thought, and so does my diaphragm - he pointed me to slightly harder reeds and we did some exercises on long notes and blowing through. All of which was a revelation and has made an audible difference very quickly. He has also helped me to work on articulation and breathing, with good effect.

The best, and scariest, experience is trying to play things with him accompanying on the piano. We’ve had a few goes at “Watermelon man” by Herbie Hancock. I can sight-read this pretty well when I am on my own, it is fairly rough when I play it with him listening and I always fall apart at some point when we play together, but boy what a rush! It is a blast - loud, joyful and glorious.

He’s even managed to get me to the beginning of improvising: we did some question and answer work around 3 notes and I began to realise what it is all about - lots and lots more to do, but it feels like it might be for me, rather than an alien universe.

This week, I will have been playing the saxophone for a month. What progress? Quite good really (if I say so myself!) but I am at that depressing stage where I am good enough to know that I am not very good but not good enough to know how to improve. It might be time to organise some lessons with an expert.

Anyway, in a month (practice every day except one), I have learnt the fingerings for all the notes from low C to high C (two octaves) plus one or two notes above and below these. I can sound all these notes and quite sweetly, but not necessarily when I want to or in the sequences I want. In particular, there is a tendency for the low notes to sound an octave high, especially if I try to play one “straight-off” (as opposed to dropping down a scale to it). I can play scales and arpeggios fairly confidently in C, D, E, F, G and A major and I can sight read and play quite a number of tunes and they are recognisable. I can play for 30 - 45 minutes without my lips or mouth “dying” (which happened after ten minutes or so a month ago) I am about 11 chapters (half way) into the John O’Neill Jazz tutor and the first few chapters (which were so hard a month ago) are easy now.

So, a good start, but there is so much further to go. I have to say that I love the sax though. I simply love playing it and cannot wait until I am good enough to play with others or to solo. I am even having thoughts about a tenor to go with the alto!

I have wanted to play the sax since I was small. It is such a cool and expressive instrument. I keep seeing and hearing excellent sax solos (most recently from the guy in Elkie Brooks’ band) and the idea would not go away, so it is time to take the plunge.

I drove over to Crowborough, to the nice people at saxophones.co.uk and talked about an ex-hire sax in perfect condition. An hour or two later I was very excitedly on my way home with a horn in the boot of the car. It is a Trevor James Revolution II Alto. It looks gorgeous and came with a good case, stand, a tutorial DVD, a couple of reeds and some cork grease. I had to buy a box of reeds and a tuner/metronome. I also bought John O’Neill’s “Jazz Tutor”.

The first attempts were both easier and harder than I expected. I was delighted to be able to get notes from the sax straight away, but my lips and face are very quickly tired, I am not always in tune and it does not sound that much like a sax yet. Still, early days.