Even though, I personally attempt to contrast my own playing to his, there was nothing like Michael Brecker’s playing that just elevated everything in the room. Live, or a recording, it moves everything.

So my newest saxophone student just messaged me about some frustrations that they are having with their horn. This student, whom, by the way, I am floored with their delightful creativity and natural talent, gave me this incredible description of their frustrations, that is everything that I ever wished I could have said to my teachers when I was working to develop a good sound on my horn. Thank you (you know who you are) for filling a hole in my educational and teaching rhetoric 15 years in the making

“…man, so i can’t just turn a little knob or something and all the awful squeaking notes i play will be perfect and rotund? (that’s the way i imagine sax notes: rotund. They’re all smooshed up into my tiny little alto horn gasping for air and there’s such a huge buildup of pressure that every time i play they come shooting out and it only takes about a minute of playing before the whole rooms full of the chubby, boisterous notes bouncing off the walls with glee…kinda little cherubs…except they don’t have wings)…