beuscher elckhart true tone low pitch tenor saxophone keys

Parker’s influence was pervasive and his explorations helped to change the course of jazz, transforming it from dance music to art. The saxophone (the tenor and alto varieties) only began to play an important role in the big-band swing era, when Johnny Hodges and Coleman Hawkins emerged as one of the best jazz saxophonists of their era.īut it was altoist Charlie Parker who made the biggest impact with a technically challenging and harmonically progressive new form of jazz called bebop, in the mid-40s. Though marching band music was part of jazz’s foundation, it was the trumpet, rather than the saxophone, that first took the spotlight. Yet when he died in poverty, in 1894, Sax, who invented several other wind instruments besides the saxophone – all of which bore his name – would have seen that the saxophone had been adopted mostly by military marching bands, though his hope that it would feature prominently in classical music orchestras was not to be fully realized. It also reveals a number of one-off talents who have helped take the music in new directions. Its status as one of the genre’s most important instruments is undisputed even the most cursory glance at the list of musicians hailed as the best jazz saxophonists of all time is essentially a list of the most famous saxophone players ever. It's OK to be wrong, but it's not OK to stay willfully wrong in the face of such easily accessible information.There’s no doubt that, if he were alive today, 19th-century Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax would be extremely surprised – and pleased, too, no doubt – at how the saxophone, which he invented and then patented back in 1846, has become universally popular, and was crucial in defining the sound of a 20th-century-born musical style called jazz.

In 1917, the American Federation of Musicians formally adopted A=440 as the “official” pitch for the US, and it became known as “American Standard Pitch”. However, as it hadn’t completely replaced high pitch, brass horns were often offered with slides to allow the player to play in either pitch, depending on what was required and what pitch the other instruments were in. Around the turn of the century, the use of low pitch became more common in the US, France and England. In fact, in the US, “military high pitch” was even higher at A=457 Hz.

However, at the same time, bands and orchestras in France, England and the US were playing in “high pitch” (A=452.5 Hz).

This is the standard “low pitch” of today (which later became known as “American Standard Pitch” when it finally came to use in the US).

In Germany, the bands and orchestras in the mid- to late 1800’s played in a pitch where A=440 Hz. But the standard has varied from 415-480Hz. Depending on source, it's either 456 or 457.

Beuscher elckhart true tone low pitch tenor saxophone keys