Saxophone

• the rare Saxophone sopranissimo, in B flat, instrument developped at the point by in 2002, sometimes called " soprillo"

The most used are the soprano, the viola, the tenor and the baritone. They compose the Quatuor of saxophones. In the quartets of saxophones, the soprano is sometimes replaced by a second viola.

The majority of the current saxophones are instruments known as transposing instruments, i.e. the note played on the instrument does not correspond to that played piano. Thus for example when an alto saxophone plays a C , the note sounds like a E flat of piano.

Sax had conceived two series of saxophones: a first whose instruments were granted in C or F , was intended for the symphony orchestras, the second series (that which we know today) was granted in B flat and E flat and was to be useful for the Fanfare S soldiers. However, the musicians of orchestra having been sulky the Sax instruments, whereas they found many outlets in the lately reformed military musics, the instruments in C or F fell little by little in disuse: they are not manufactured any more after 1930 by the independent factors of saxophones.

The saxophone comprises three register S: serious, acute medium and , on a Tessiture of two octaves and a fifth. In many modern musics and current, one uses also the overshrill whose notes are obtained starting from special Doigté S making it possible to make sound a particular Harmonique.

From its late invention, and even if Type-setter S like Bizet or Ravel recognized its merits and sometimes used it, the saxophone occupies a rather marginal place in the Classical music and is seldom represented in the symphony orchestras. However, there remains incontestably the instrument king of the Jazz, and the Modern music did one of its instruments fetishes of it since the years 1980, as a soloist as in small units.

History of the invoice of the saxophone

The Belgian Antoine Joseph Sax, known as Adolphe Sax (1814 - 1894), sought inlassablement to improve the musical instruments, and more particularly the wind instruments; he improved of it the accuracy, the quality of sonority as well as the facility of play (he deposited 33 patents).

The very first saxophone built by Sax, with Paris, in 1842, was a saxophone baritone in F. This very first saxophone showed all the characteristics of the current saxophone: metal tube with conical borer, nozzle with simple sheer and system of keys Boehm, but it still had the general form of a Ophicléide.

In 1844, the saxophone is exposed for the first time to the industrial Exposure of Paris. The February 3rd of this same year, Berlioz, a large friend of Sax, directs at the time of a concert its choral Hymn which includes the saxophone. In December, the saxophone makes its beginnings of orchestra with the Conservatoire of Paris in the opera of Georges Kastner, the Last King de Juda .

The March 21st 1846, Sax deposits its patent for “a system of wind instruments known as Saxophones” which comprise eight instruments. The complete reorganization of the regimental musics and the adoption by the French Army, in 1845, of the instruments of its invention (saxhorns, saxophones, saxotrombas) placed Sax in position of monopoly of supply of these instruments.

The patent of Sax expires in 1866. The Millereau Company then makes patent the Saxophone-Millereau, which has a bass clef # bifoquer. In 1881, Sax extends its original patent: it lengthens the house to include B flat engraves and also upwards extends it by adding F # and ground using a fourth key of octave.

Between 1886 and 1887, the Association Of the Workmen invents the key of Trille C for the right hand, the system of half hole for the first fingers of the hand, the ring of adjustment of agreement and the double key; improve the articulated ground so that the treble clef can be maintained while any finger of the right hand is employed, improves F # forked and adds serious B flat. Lecomte will invent in 1888 the simple key of octave as well as rollers for the model semi B - C low.

The company Adolphe Sax & Co were repurchased by the company H.Selmer & Co in 1928 (the first saxophone Selmer model 22 was born in 1921). Since then, the Selmer company took part in the improvement of the manufacture of the saxophones, which was worth to him to conquer the US market and to be essential in Europe. The other old factors of saxophones (Dresser-Cramp, Millereau, Gautrot, Couesnon) present at the end of the 19th century, were gradually supplanted by international marks: Adler, Huller (Germany), Yamaha and Yanagisawa (Japan).

Outline of the repertory of the 19th century

After its invention which dates from the beginning of the year 1840, the saxophone very quickly appeared in the orchestra and especially in the partitions of opera, which could be explained by the position of director of the incidental music held by Adolphe Sax him even (a kind of music military used in the large scenes) with the Opéra of Paris.

After the Anthem crowned or Hymn of Berlioz and the Oratorio the Last King de Juda of Kastner, works carried out for the first time in 1844 and 1845, Halévy includes the saxophone in his opera the Jew wandering (compound in 1852), in African the created in 1865, Ambroise Thomas in Hamlet (1868) then in Francoise de Rimini (1882), Bizet in his Arlésienne (1873), Delibes in Sylvia (1876), Massenet in the King de Lahore (1877) Hérodiade (1881) and Werther (1886), Saint-Saëns in Henri VIII (1883), of Indy in Fervaal (1895), etc

But the cabal drawn up against Sax is too strong, and the instrument, with rare exceptions , has evil to bore within the famous orchestras. In fact, the only field where Sax managed to impose its new instruments was that of the military musics, in full reform under the impulse of the aide-de-camp of the Emperor Napoleon III, Marie-Theodore de Rumigny, which admired the work of Sax. But on the liking of the many political upheavals of the time, and the graces or disgraces from which the inventor profited, the saxophones in turn were imposed, prohibited or tolerated within these musics (from where the periods of ostentation and the bankruptcies known by the Sax company).

The most favorable period was without question that between 1857 and 1870, where Sax is named professor with the Military College attached to CNSMD of Paris. It will form there tens of instrumentalists of talent, who will essaimeront within the various musics of the army. And it will make write by his friends and colleagues various parts of contest, whole of saxophones which will make the joys of the Parisiens music lovers during several years. It published itself these signed parts Jean-Baptiste Singelée, Arban, Demersseman, Mohr or Savari. But this exclusive soldier of the use of the instrument did not have only beneficial effects in term of image. Nowadays, one can make go up the generally accepted ideas against the saxophone with the traditional musicians of this period.

The death-blow was the release of the Guerre of 1870, which saw the Military College emptying its pupils, recalled to serve in the armed forces by their respective regiments. This one was then closed definitively and all the efforts of Sax were useless: the saxophone had to await the opening of a class for Marcel Mule in 1942 to know the recognition of French official circles again. Followed one period of decline which would have been able to be fatal if the relay had not been taken on the other side of the Atlantic by Elise Hall, which developed the first repertory soloist for saxophone, then by the musicians of Jazz who tamed little by little the new instrument until it becomes the emblematic icon of their music that we know nowadays.

The explosion of the popular saxophone

In 1906, the four-bit byte of Tom Brown took his first steps with the circus of the Frères Ringling with the the United States. In the beginning, the musicians were multi-instrumentalists in the style of the very popular spectacles Minstrels on the other side of the Atlantic, but in 1914, the unit becomes the Brown Brothers Saxophone Sextet . With a going repertory of Made green (sextet of Rigoletto ) to the first draft of the " jass" ( That Moanin' Saxophone Rag , Spalling hammers and Chuckles ), they had an enormous popular success with discs, rounds of Music-hall and even of the musical comedies assembled for them.

In 1917, Rudy Wiedoeft and its Frisco Jass Band also had much success thanks to its participation in comedy-musical the Canary Cottage where, in spite of the presence of high-speed motorboats like Eddie Cantor, the saxophonist was clearly the attraction of the evening. After this success, the recordings of Wiedoeft met very many people. American, very fond of delicacies public of this new instrument relatively easy to learn, lance fashion of the saxophone with reviews such as Sax-O-Trix and The Saxophone Re-examined . It imposes the presence of the saxophones in the orchestras of varieties, an opinion which was not divided by holding of the style New-Orleans, but which quickly became of rigor because of the popular request. During this period, there are even orchestras entirely composed of saxophones which act as Fanfare S at the time of the popular demonstrations in the American cities.

The Saxophone in the Jazz

Although the only instrument truly created by/for the Jazz is the battery, the saxophone is for the general public, the instrument emblematic of this music. Confined for his beginnings with a repertory “fireman” or military “ It suffices to add " militaire" with a word to make him lose its significance. Thus, the military music is not the music ” said Clémenceau, the saxophone could have seen its quickly stopped instrumental career.

To gain will have its noble letters and it popular that one knows to him, the instrument has to cross the Atlantic to be adopted by this new music which was formed then in the Afro-américaine community: the Jazz. Initially used in a rudimentary way in section, the role of the saxophone changes dimension quickly. The first outstanding figure which impels this change with the saxophone is Coleman Hawkins member of the Fletcher Henderson band since 1923. He invents a new manner of using the saxophone, makes an instrument soloist impossible to circumvent and develops of it a “sound” which remains the chart of vistite saxophone near the general public. The novelist Alain Gerber in " Charlie" fact of saying to one protagonists that " the inventeur" saxophone is more surely Hawkins than an obscure romantic Belgian … It covered is bold but does not retranscribe any less suitably the destiny of this instrument, indissociable of the history of the jazz. This association is all the more strong as certain saxophonists marked the history of this music. Exceeding the framework of simple instrumentalist, they returned this music in a state different from that in which they had taken it: Coleman Hawkins, To ballast Young, Charlie Parker, Stan Getz, John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman etc

It is because the Jazz was at that time a popular music that the saxophone became too. The saxophone by its soft power, its expressivity easily adapted to the Rhythm and Blues, the Rock and all kinds of other popular musics (Bossa Nova, Reggae). It became an instrument familiar of the General public as well from a sound point of view as visual. So much so that in the rare “traditional” pieces popular containing an intervention of saxophone like the Bolero of Ravel, the public pains to identify the saxophone like tel.

Influence on the classical music

The saxophone carries out its entry in the world of the classical music of the Twenties thanks to type-setters like Darius Milhaud, strongly influenced by this music from America ( the Creation of the world ), Germaine Tailleferre (first version of its first Concerto for piano and orchestra), Maurice Ravel (Boléro) and Manuel Rosenthal ( Saxophone Marmalade ) which, among others, used this new color in their compositions. The Swedish Ballets even assembled in 1923 the only ballet " jazz" of Cole Porter, Within the Quota , a few weeks only after the first of the Creation of the World . The success of orchestras of Jazz in France such as the Orchestra Scrap Iron Jazzerinos, Jim Europe' S 369th Infantry Hellfighter' S Band and later the Orchestre Billy max inserted definitively this new instrument the French popular music and consequently in the modern music.

At the 20th century, one can still quote Cardillac (1926) of Paul Hindemith, the Suite of the Lieutenant Kijé (1934) of Prokofiev, Jeanne d' Arc with roughing-hew (1935) Honegger, the Concerto with the memory of an angel and Lulu of Alban Berg, and other orchestral partitions including/understanding one or more parts for saxophone due to the feather of Ravel (orchestration of the Tables of an exposure, Boléro), Milhaud, Kodály, Ibert, Jolivet, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Franz Schreker, Benjamin Britten, Frank Martin and Luigi Dallapiccola among so much of others.

The saxophone is also present in a certain number of concerting pages written per so many large well-known type-setters like the Rhapsodie of Debussy (orchestrated by Roger-Ducasse), the Concerto COp 109 of Glazounov, both Ballades of Frank Martin, the Choral varied COp 55 of Vincent d' Indy, the Concertino da camera of Jacques Ibert, the Légende of Florent Schmitt, the Concerto of Lars-Erik Larsson and astonishing it Concerto for two pianos, choruses, quartet of saxophones and (1934) orchestrates Germaine Tailleferre, that by less famous authors such Jean Absil, Henk Badings, Eugene Bozza, Gaston Brenta, André Caplet, Raymond Chevreuille, Marius Constant, Will Eisenmann, Henri Tomasi, Pierre Vellones, Henry Woolett and many others. Let us stress that these partitions are very seldom carried out in concert.

With regard to the Chamber music, the saxophone is not more an instrument which one often has the occasion to listen in concert. At the 19th century, that could be still included/understood, because in Paris, the teaching of the saxophone lasted only 13 years (class of Adolphe Sax, of 1857 with 1870) and only in… 1942 began again! Even if certain type-setters had been tempted to compose for this new instrument, one can understand that they moved back in front of the fact that there were (too much) few good interpreters to play their works; but currently, it is not any more the case. The second reason is the following one: the sax being one of the very last acoustic instruments of to be invented orchestra, it is obvious that the large type-setters of the traditional or romantic era could not entrust their inspiration to him. Let us pass on the question of knowing what Schubert or Beethoven would have drawn to quote some type-setters who did not forget it.

For saxophone and piano, one finds sonatas and various parts, in particular of Jean Absil, Eugene Bozza, Alfred Desenclos, Alexandre Gretchaninov, Paul Hindemith, André Jolivet, Charles Koechlin, Gabriel Pierné, Alexandre Tcherepnine, and others Jacques Castérède and Henri Tomasi, of which some were especially written for one or the other of the two larger saxophonists of the 20th century: Marcel Mule, a French who gave many concerts in the whole world and created inter alia the concertos of Pierre Vellones, Eugene Bozza and Henri Tomasi; and Sigurd Rascher, American naturalized German musician who also illustrated himself on all the continents in a repertory especially conceived for his ease in the register Suraigu, for which the concerti of Glazounov and Ibert and the Ballade of Frank Martin were written.

Among other partitions for saxophone and various instruments, one will retain especially Hindemith ( Trio for sax, viola and piano ), Webern ( Quatuor COp 22 with clarinet, violin and piano ), Villa-Lobos ( Choros n° 7 Sextuor Mystical and a Nonette ), Caplet (a sextet entitled Légende ), Stefan Wolpe (a quartet with percussion, trumpet and piano), Hans Werner Henze ( Antifone for 13 instruments), etc

Today, of many contemporary saxophonists work to reinforce this great richness of repertory through their concerts, recordings, critical and different editions. Let us quote, among them, the French Serge Bertocchi, Nicolas Prost, Vincent David, Jean-Denis Michat, the English John Harle, the Japanese Nobuya Sugawa, Switzerland Marcus Weiss, and the Americans Paul Cohen, Taimur Sullivan and Paul Wehage.

The contemporary repertory

Many creators use all the family of the saxophones with happiness, as testifies to the books of repertory such " 125 years of Music for Saxophone" of Jean-Marie Londeix and " Saxophonists and Their Repertoire" of Indiana University Near.

The Russian Edison Denisov composed a sonata for alto saxophone and piano which is generally regarded as one of the pieces center of the contemporary repertory, like several other parts of chamber music and 2 concertos. The French Antoine Tisné composed a great series of works for saxophones, starting with his famous " Music for Stonehenge" and continuing until the end of its life with a series of works for Paul Wehage (" Shades of Feu" for saxophone and orchestra, " Psalmodies" for Alto saxophone and Organ, " Monodies for a Sacré" Space; for saxophone alone, " Offertorium for Chartres" for alto saxophone and string quartet, " Labirythus Sonorus" for Quartet of Saxophones). Luciano Berio used the saxophones in many works inter alia: Its operas: will vera It storia , Outis and " Cronacca LED luogo " , its part for voice and small instrumental unit: Calmo , Canticum Novissimi Testamenti for 8 votes, 4 saxophones, 4 clarinets or as a soloist in: Sequenza IXb , originally written for the clarinet, then developed for saxophone and orchestra under the name of " Riti or VII" Way;.

The American School Miminaliste was particularly attracted by the saxophones in particular Philip Glass (" Einstein one the Beach" , " Concerto for Quartet of Saxophones and Orchestre" , " Glassworks") and John Adams (" Nixon in China" , " Fearful Symmetries"). Steve Reich even dedicated to the sax soprano his first " phasing piece" opportunely named " Reed Phase". As for Terry Riley, he plays itself of it in " Poppy Nogood and the Phantom Band". The saxophonist Jon Gibson worked much with these type-setters. Also registered in the current minimalist, Tom Johnson builds bonds between mathematics and music, and develops erudite constructions in his " Rational Melodies" , or " Kientzy Loops". One must also quote unclassable the Moondog, that the principal representatives of this movement (Riley, Glass and Adams) regard as their source of principal inspiration.

The School known as " of Bordeaux" , influenced by the teaching of Jean-Marie Londeix produced many works for the saxophone: " The ash égaré" of François Pink, " Hard" of Christian Lauba, " Concertino" for soprano saxophone and octuor of violoncellos of Pascale Jakubowski, various works of Etienne Rolin, Thierry Went, Christophe Havel.

The saxophonist Daniel Kientzy, initially as a whole 2E2M, then as a soloist, ordered, created and recorded large a number of works written for him: " Drip of Gold Blues" for saxophone and band of Bernard Cavana in is an example.

Other type-setters also produced works of a great interest for saxophone solo: Paul Méfano, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Marie-Helene Baker, Gerard Grisey, Bruno Giner, Carson Cooman, Jean-Thierry Bushel, Alberto Posadas, Philippe Hurel, Giorgio Netti, Jacques Lejeune, Robert Lemay… use all the types of saxophones, without exclusive, to obtain a whole variety of sonorities, atmospheres and musical qualities of which the family of the sax is able.

The whole of saxophones

Fact perhaps of their rejection (relative) per certain medium traditional, the saxophonists had a strong tendency to gregarious instinct. Thus all kinds of units developed, while starting with the Quatuor of saxophones. The duets for saxophones are rather numerous today: Christian Lauba, Karlheinz Stockhausen, François Pink, Ryo Noda, Marie-Helene Fournier inter alia wrote beautiful pieces combining various family members. Except for Savari, Dyck and rare others, it is as in the modern music as one finds works for three saxophones: Reich, Dazzi, Baker, Rose, tested themselves with the kind.

The quartet of saxophones

See also: Quartet of saxophones

The first type-setter interested by a formula joining together a soprano, an viola, a tenor and a baritone on the model of the string quartet was the friendly Belgian violonist of Sax Jean-Baptiste Singelée. Its good named " First quartet for saxophones" go back to 1858, twelve years hardly after the patent deposited by Sax! But in spite of works of Savari, Mohr or Mayeur, the formula did not make considerable great strides then and fell into a relative lapse of memory (perhaps for lack of musicians of talent to defend it, since their formation had been removed).

A rebirth of this repertory is done under the impulse of Marcel Mule, soloist of the Republican guard and musician unanimously recognized in the traditional musical mediums, which gives the formula to the last style in 1928 while forming the Quartet of Saxophones of the Republican guard. This unit takes the name, in 1936, of Quartet of Saxophones of Paris, then of Quartet Marcel Mule and gives very many concerts in Europe, while recording a series of discs which belong to the history of the instrument. It is thanks to the radiation of this formation except par, that the combination of the quartet of saxophones knew a certain passion in type-setters like Jean Absil, Eugene Bozza, Jean Françaix, Gandolfo, Alexandre Glazounov, Guerrini, Mengold, Gabriel Pierné, Florent Schmitt or Pierre Vellones which dedicated to him of the parts which form the current base of the repertory of this formation. The success of the Quartet Mule will cause very many vocations and the majority of the traditional saxophonists formed a quartet which takes again these initial parts and develops its own repertory: let us quote inter alia the Quatuor Deffayet, the Whole of French saxophones of Jean-Marie Londeix, the Quartet Jean-Yves Fourmeau, the Trouvère quartet of Nobuya Sugawa, the quartet " Aurelia" of Arno Bornkamp, the quartet " Prism" of Taimur Sullivan, the flexible Whole of saxophones Xasax, the Diastema quartets, Habanera, Ars Gallica, Wiener sax four-bit byte,… On its side, the alter ego of Mule, Sigurd Raschèr will also form (with his/her Karina daughter) a quartet which is still a great success and contributes very seriously to the expansion of the repertory since it ordered showpieces with type-setters like Iannis Xenakis, Franco Donatoni, Hugues Dufourt, Ivan Fedele, Luciano Berio, Philip Glass and of many others…

It is indeed often for the formula of the quartet of saxophone that the major type-setters of our time dedicate their most relevant work. Among most outstanding, also let us quote: Henri Pusher, John Cage, Bernardo Kuczer, Giorgio Netti, Georges Aperghis, Salvatore Sciarrino, Alex Buess, Elliott Sharp, Denis Levaillant, Alvaro Carlevaro, Terry Riley… give the indication of an instrument to the multiple facets and able to nourish itself of all the influences, to be used with relevance all the styles as musics.

The whole of saxophones

The first entirely formed whole of saxophones was rested by professor Berlinois Gustav Bumcke in the years 1920. With its continuation, Sigurd Rascher will also form of them one in the USA in the years 1960, but it is especially Jean-Marie Londeix and the Whole of saxophone of Bordeaux which gave the impulse for the development of these orchestras of saxophones. It fixed of it the basic formula of 12 instruments under the model of triple wide quartet: 1 sopranino, 2 sopranos, 3 violas, 3 tenors, 2 baritones, 1 low.

Jean-Pierre Caens took as a starting point the training of its mentor Jean-Marie Londeix to create a similar unit based has Aix-en-Provence, the whole of saxophones of Provence .

It is for this formula that were made up of many parts of a great interest: François Pink, Francisco Guerrero, Christian Lauba, Christophe Havel, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Felix Ibarrondo, but also Ida Gotkovsky, Gerard Gastinel and Antoine Tisné, without counting the many transcriptions which flower here and there to supplement this a little recent repertory.

Since the years 2000 and the appearance of new saxophones such as the Tubax or the sopranissimo, of new formulas appear here and there to exploit these new possibilities of colors: inter alia the unit Amiens Sax Project or the National Saxophone Choir of Nigel Wood.

The first definition by Berlioz

Hector Berlioz in its large Treated instrumentation and of orchestration defines with a great exactitude nature of the stamps of the saxophones:

See too

• Tacts of the saxophone
• Saxophonist