By Stuart Coghill

Year 10 Alto and Baritone Saxophonist talks about his experience playing in bands and how they are important for improving on your playing in general.

Over the last four years my experience in music has risen dramatically by being in an ensemble.  It challenges not only your playing ability, but encourages you to become a good talker, listener and thinker.  Playing in an Ensemble, like everything else in life, has it’s pros and cons, but lucky for us the pros far outweigh the cons. 

When you play with others, you learn to hear them, and then mix your own sound with theirs, and equalize to create a nice tone.  My director expects hard work and concentration, as I am the first alto saxophone in the Stage Band at my High School, and this is not unexpected.

I have been playing alto saxophone for four years now, and I never could have accomplished what I have without total dedication to the band.  I am in two bands at the moment, the Concert band and Junior Stage band.  I play the Baritone saxophone in Concert band, and this is very good experience to play two different instruments in different styles of bands, as this lets you discover more about different genres and styles of music. 

My favourite style is Jazz-Funk, which has a large variety of styles in itself. One of the greatest Funk saxophonists of our time is Maceo Parker. He is also the person I look up to and get inspiration from. Another all-time great is the well known Charlie Parker, who lived and died by his saxophone. He has written some incredible charts, including “Now’s the time”, and “Ornithology”. 

Possibly the most important tool for having a successful band is never to turn up late! If you can, get there 15 minutes early to set up and tune. This is essential for a good band, as showing up late is poor form, especially if you have a performance. This goes for any type of instrument, including the rythym section.  The rythym section should maybe get there even earlier, as they will have more equipment to set up. I hope to improve over the next few years, and form a band of my own. If you want one last piece of advice, “practice makes perfect” is the ideal phrase. I never would have gotten anywhere without it.