This ebook, An Alexander Technique Approach to Alto Saxophone Technique, is published on this website in a PDF format. It is very detailed and practical, and it will give you the physical tools you need to take the limits off of your ability to create the accurate saxophone technique you want without sacrificing your body.
This ebook is also for sale on all AMAZON websites in a KINDLE format.
Located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.A. (MOVEMENT THERAPY)
THE GREATER THE TECHNIQUE AND POSTURAL CHANGES YOU CHOOSE TO MAKE ON THE ALTO SAXOPHONE, THE MORE INTENSELY YOUR EGO MAY PUSH BACK. Another way to say this, is the longer you have not been able to do what you want on the saxophone, the harder it may be to accept and take the steps to discover you can do what you want to do.
All you have to draw on is your history on the alto saxophone of what you could do or couldn’t do. It is extraordinary how much you can define your future by what the past has been like. Simply, if something was too hard on the saxophone, it will always be too hard on the alto saxophone.
What is the way out of this depressing/despairing situation? There is a definition of insanity that says if you do the same thing over and over and expect different results, then you’re insane.
BUT WHAT IF YOU DO SOMETHING DIFFERENT AND EXPECT THE SAME RESULTS, ISN’T THIS ALSO INSANITY? This is how the ego works. It tells you that even if you do something different on the alto saxophone, it still won’t work. The result of this thought is one of two things.
You won’t do something new on the saxophone, which guarantees you’ll be stuck where you are on the instrument, not being able to play the finest pieces with ease.
Or you’ll attempt to do something new that works, but it won’t work. What do I mean? IF YOU DO SOMETHING DIFFERENT WITH YOUR TECHNIQUE ON THE ALTO SAXOPHONE, AND IT SHOULD WORK, BUT IT DOESN’T WORK, THEN YOU HAVE SET YOURSELF UP FOR FAILURE.
What do I mean? There is a famous saying that is true, “The truth shall make you free”, but is this true? Let me restate a truer version of this saying, “The truth shall make you free, only if you believe the truth shall make you free”.
Within the following, “The truth shall make you free, only if you believe the truth shall make you free”, are the seeds of your incredible power to save or screw yourself.
I believe that you are so powerful, that your thoughts and beliefs and choices are so powerful, that you can prove anything not true that is true as long as you choose to. Think about this statement. It means that when you are offered a way to be the incredible alto saxophone player you are capable of, that you are offered a technique able to accomplish this, you have the power to make a technique that will work not work.
Can you take an alto saxophone technique that works and without any faith in it working make it work? Yes, only if you practice the new technique daily until it begins to sink in against your will. So, despite yourself, you get it done. (Isn’t this a cruel way to learn?)
This isn’t usually what happens. If you don’t have faith that you can do what you’ve never done on the saxophone, you usually conveniently stop practicing the new changes.
The ultimate gift to yourself would be accept that the changes you want to make to your alto saxophone playing will work, that you will ALLOW them to work as quickly as possible. Stand up to that part of yourself that tells you he or she is on your side, because he or she is telling you the truth for your own good – that you don’t have what it takes.
One of the most profound gifts you can give yourself, is to realize you have the power to accept or discount the truth. YOU ARE SO POWERFUL, THAT YOU CAN ALWAYS CHOOSE WHETHER TO WIN OR LOSE, NO EXCEPTIONS.