Home » Music » Saxophones » Blow, Gabriel ...

Blow, Gabriel ...

© Chris Mindel

After learning a little about saxophone history and saxophone instruction, one question remains: just how does a saxophone work? Well, it is very simple and very complex. To get the complex (and more thorough) answer, you must study the science of acoustics. Acoustics is the science that "describes the physical basis of music." [Harvard Concise Dictionary of Music] Let me try to boil it down into something simple (all the while admitting that I don't know much of the in-depth reasons).

Sound travels through the air in wave form. Sound waves are generated by vibration. In the saxophone, the vibration begins in the mouthpiece. More specifically, vibration begins with the reed. When you blow into a sax, your air stream passes between the mouthpiece and the thin reed, causing the reed to vibrate. But anyone who has blown into just a mouthpiece knows that it requires more than a mouthpiece and reed to make a pleasing (or saxophone-like) sound. That is why the rest of the instrument was invented! Inside the saxophone is what is called an air column. It just sits there, waiting to for the vibrations to come from the mouthpiece. And they do. The vibrating reed causes the air column inside the rest of the instrument to vibrate, producing a very saxophone-like sound. The more keys you put down, the longer the air column becomes and the lower the sound you get. The smaller you make the air column, the higher the sound gets. Voila!

Now let's complicate things.

This is one part of a sound wave (based on an illustration from Music Theory). Pretend the left node is the mouthpiece and the right node is the end of the saxophone bell. Loop A is half of the entire sound wave being produced. The second half looks like loop B (picture B continuing on after loop A, forming a sideways "S"). This entire sound wave (which, remember, is double the length of the air column) is producing what is called the fundamental. That is, when you play the note C, the fundamental is C. What are also being produced are called overtones, or partials. For not only does the entire air column vibrate, but parts of the air column vibrate as well. The air column vibrates in halves, thirds, fourths, fifths, and into infinity. What does all this mean? Simply put, it means that when you think you are hearing a saxophone play one note, you are really hearing a complex combination of sound waves.

The copyright of the article Blow, Gabriel ... in Saxophones is owned by Chris Mindel. Permission to republish Blow, Gabriel ... in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.