It's very important to get the correct initia pitch if you want your horn to play in tune. The correct initial pitches are (concert pitch) Soprano C Alto A Tenor G Baritone Eb

Actually Santy Runyon originally specified Db for soprano, A for alto, G for tenor and Eb for baritone. The pitches commonly taught today recommended by Eugene Rousseau are C, A, G, D. Jazz players for the most part play on a lower input pitch ( one to three whole tones lower) to achieve the characteristic jazz tone. A recreation of Santy Runyon's theremin experiment has shown that it is impossible to "play" a saxophone using a speaker setup as he described. See this link for details: forum.saxontheweb.net/showpost.php?p=702736&postcount=1 John

I was a student of Santy's, as well as being an Endorsing Artist for Runyon mouthpieces, appearing in numerous ads for them and making appearances on their behalf. In all my many lessons with Santy, he never said anything about Db for soprano. It was always C.

My two cents before another brouhaha breaks out; the speakers of the thirties were of a vastly more simplistic technologic design that the modern throwaway earbud. That ubiquitous bit of equipment is way beyonc anything available during the period Santy describes. I'm sure you know this but if you follow through the way a sax works is that the reed changes its rate of vibration in response to the resonant feedback from the air in the sax. Proper embouchure gives the best effect and the free air pitch represents what comes out with the as designed proper embouchure. Clearly the reed vibrates at different frequencies as the instrument runs through the scale. A 1930's almost certainly variation on a simple cone type speaker (clearly a bit odd but unlikely to have been a compression horn or piezo type) would likely respond to the resonances in the sax body (as it does to speaker enclosure designs). The ear-bud probably stoutly refused to be significantly influenced by external factors to the extent the older type was causing the disconnect.

Stever, Please see Paul Coat's article "Tone Production for Beginning Saxophonists" or the Runyon Article link at the site I posted above for the reference to the Db pitch on soprano. Haduran, if what you are saying is true then if I played a recording of Beethoven's 5th symphony through a cone type speaker in an elongated speaker box it would sound in a lower key. That is nonsense. The timbre or color of the recorded sounds would change with changes in the dimensions in the resonating cavity but the pitches would remain the same. It would be like turning the treble and bass knobs to different settings to change the equalization of the sounds, but the input pitch sent to the speaker electronically would remain the same regardless of the type of speaker used. Does that explanation make sense to you? John

I thanksyou for your courteous response. And you are correct- the Ninth would not change to the Fifth if I played the speaker through a lenght of pipe. But the reed does indeed respond directly to the changes in the resonance of the sax and changes its rate of vibration. Without specific knowledge of the thera whatever device (no disrespect- merely a lack of specific design knowledge) I believe that the likelihood that it responds to the changing resonances within the sax body is far more likely than that a constant fequency input at the meck opening was morphed into a perfect scale by the sax. Certainly your attempt to replicate was a bit of a bust. Is Santy mistaken in his recollection, did he merely create a colorful and not particularly well thought through anecdote to illustrate a point, or is the original freq generation device different than an earbud? Your call.

If your point is merely that a shandard small cone speaker fed an 880hz sine wave with a freq generator at the neck opening would not cause a sax to run a scale through resonant interaction I agree. With white noise perhaps something close but certainly neither scenario would come close to the result described. So the deal, in your opinion is?

I can try white noise with my set-up, but I doubt the result will be any different. The Wikipedia link for theremin says the following: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theremin "The controlling section generally consists of two metal antennas to sense the relative position of the player's hands. These sensors control audio oscillator(s) for frequency from one hand, and volume from the other. The electric signals from the theremin are amplified and sent to a loudspeaker." That means to me that the device was nothing more than a frequency generator. Perhaps it was an electronically driven pitch approximater not unlike the wind driven pitch approximater we call the trombone that can slide between notes. Why Santy Runyon told this story to justify his mouthpiece pitch theory (which I know to be correct) is anyone's guess. John B. Talcott aka jbtsax not to be confused with John B. Talbott who posts at Saxnation about how great Steve Goodson's new neck design is. :) John

Thanks John- the theramin appears to be a sort of oddly controlled freq generator in and of itself. Set up so it generated the proper frequencies depending on hand/ finger position so that it would ...... obviously that would create nice full tones. But that's not at all what the anecdote seems to cover so I'm baffled as well. I clearly misunderstood the deal with the Theremin. and so was out in left field. Feels like home to me . I note you've frequently addressed a desire to have somebody modify Mr. Goodson's neck in many forums....

And he mine . . . : ) Here is the link again to the Runyon Experiment. I have since added a sound clip of the effect of putting an A=880 sound wave into a saxophone using a speaker. forum.saxontheweb.net/showpost.php?p=702736&postcount=1

I know this is in the general discussions but I thought I would add that when dealing with a jazz setup, there are several schools of thought that teach blowing a pitch at least a whole tone lower than when playing a classical setup. For example if you shoot for an a on the classical alto mouthpiece, then you would be blowing a g or lower on the jazz setup. It has to deal with getting deeper into the larynx to create a darker sound.

Going back to the top of this thread-another benefit to doing mouthpiece exercises is to develop the correct air pressure for playing this instrument. Saxophone is the easiest instrument to get a sound out of but it's one of the hardest to get a good sound. Almost any amount of air will provide a honk back at you but the horn takes a lot more air pressure than most of us would want to admit. By playing just the mouthpiece you get an idea of the pressure you should be putting into the horn at all times. Even adding the neck makes it easier to get by with less pressure. Try playing just the mouthpiece with a tuner and do crescendos and decrescendos. I set a metronome at 60. Pick a pitch like an a. Start from nothing without tonguing, crescendo for 4-6 beats, then decrescendo for the same amount. Taper to nothing again. Try not to let the sound just stop suddenly. If you're using the right embouchere pressure and really supporting the air from the diaphragm you'll be able to do this. It's hard. Try this exercise for a few weeks and you'll notice a big improvement in your sound and control. K

I practice my mouthpieces by trying to sound like a police siren. It dosen't help my playing but it drives my dog crazy........Kelsey