| Scales are important, they are one of the most | | | | say five notes, and run them up and down, over and |
| important things you can practice on saxophone, but | | | | over again. Just to be clear, you don't repeat the note |
| they are not magic. If you aren't looking for the right | | | | at the top or the bottom, this is a smooth continuous |
| things, just playing through them won't give you any | | | | exercise. This can help to isolate those tricky |
| special abilities at all. | | | | transitions on the horn. |
| There are two reasons to play scales on saxophone- | | | | The other reason to practice scales is improvisation. |
| and each requires a different sort of practice. | | | | You need to learn all these different sets of notes so |
| Fortunately, if you are clever, you can combine them. | | | | you can follow chord changes. This is trickier to |
| The first reason is technique. When you are playing a | | | | practice; if you are playing a solo you don't want to |
| song, it is too easy to hide inconsistencies behind the | | | | just be running up and down scales, but you need to |
| natural expression of the music. Scales leave you no | | | | know them intimately. Start out by making sure you |
| room to hide. They are like a control group for you to | | | | know all your major scales. Ideally you could play |
| experiment with your technique on. Any error is laid | | | | every mode from every scale at the drop of the hat, |
| bare. | | | | but just getting comfortable in all the major key |
| Use a metronome, most of the time but not all the | | | | signatures is a good start (I'm not going to talk theory |
| time. You want to develop good rhythm and make | | | | here, if you don't know what I'm talking about then you |
| sure you are playing notes evenly. Practice with all | | | | aren't ready to practice this stuff yet anyway.) Do the |
| different sorts of articulation and again, make sure you | | | | same thing for melodic minor, those scales are just as |
| play evenly. For example, if you are playing slur two, | | | | important. Practice all the scales from the top of the |
| tongue two, a lot of people will tend to rush the slurred | | | | horn to the bottom, you don't want to be confined to a |
| notes. Varying dynamics is a good idea too. Play loud | | | | one octave range per key. Here is a challenging |
| and soft and practice crescendos and diminuendos. | | | | exercise to try. Get out the metronome, turn it on and |
| Also, practice both swinging and straight eighths. This is | | | | then pick any note from any scale and start playing up |
| a good time to get your technique together for those | | | | from that note on that scale. After four beats keep |
| fast bebop runs and that sort of thing. If your fingers | | | | playing up but switch to the next scale on the cycle of |
| are having trouble (if they aren't having trouble you | | | | fourths. When you get to the top of the horn turn |
| need to get more ambitious: play faster) practice micro | | | | around and come back down, but keep switching keys |
| scales. That is where you take just a part of a scale, | | | | every four beats. |