I second that yeah its great to be able to play in the altissimo and some find it easy that others just like any thing else i am fortunate enough to able to play now on alto and tenor in this active after 3 years it still needs a lot of work though , but i would say to all you guys or girls still trying to nail this one stick with it don’t forget that the just because your not there yet makes you any less of a player, its a bit like some one learning to do doughnuts in cars or hand brake turn it don’t mean they know how to drive the car though.The altissimo is the doughnuts and hand brake turns but with out been able to drive your sax its not going to make you a player! But just like all aspect of the sax sight reading, scales,learning tunes, ear training etc its a good idea to to make a little time in your practice to.

MMM….I am frustratingly working to try and get the G sxpoet but for love nor money it will not sound! I will keep at it but for now its a mirage. Did you need to step up in reed strength or find you had to change your lip position much? I will keep working through Johnny’s exercises and I am sure it will come, one day.

Dazza can you play altissimo A? altissimo A is one of the easiest altissimo notes to master (go for that one first) – if you can master the altissimo A, then you are on the right track to getting the rest of the altissimo grinchs, leave the G till later, but keep trying.

The common factor in playing altissimo is mastering overtones. You must have noticed in the past sometimes when you play certain notes, you accidently play and jump an octave higher? thats a bit like playing altissimo. If you try and do it you cant do it , yet sometimes you can unintentionalty do it. If you memorise the positions of the mouth – it still wont work.

To understand the altissimo G is not to try and work out how to do it, but to understand what it is and why you cant do it. Then you can move forward.

the best way i can describe why you cant do it –
If you sing a scale going down, at some point you will come to the last bottom note that you can sing clearly. Now if you try and sing the note below that bottom note – you struggle and you can’t do it – Well thats what altissimo G is exactly like. Something hasn’t developed inside you mentally/physically to bring it out and sing it.

Unlike singing the note below your bottom note – which you will never be able to sing, Altissimo G is possible, and you can do it, the problem is solved by getting a firm lips (embouchure), the Jaw in the correct position, the tongue in the correct position, the neck & shoulders relaxed – any tensing up strangles the throat, there is absolutely no need for excessive biting. Release and let the altissimo G come out, you cant force it out.

the main 3 variables you can play around with are altering the shape of your mouth chamber(put the jaw in different positions), the position of your tongue, and changing breath control (speed and shape). These are all developed when you learn to play overtones.

Some people will do this by singing different vowels as they play – that can work to find new positions.

A trick i learnt from clarinet players, is position the mouthpiece like a clarinet player (they use a more vertical than horizontal mouthpiece) – this gives more of the reed freedom to vibrate on really high altissimo notes. Putting the reed near the bottom of your mouth can restrict reed vibration for higher notes.

Then once you can hit altissimo G, start playing scales in the altissimo range trying to go higher each day.

In the forums i posted a bunch of chromatic exercises which i started and this enabled me to go up to D# in a couple of weeks. using flutter tongue, growling, double/triple tonguing in chromatic scales – builds up the strength to attack altissimo G from different angles.

Once you’ve mastered altissimo – pass on your tips, don’t get smug & big headed – as this will only put everyone else off. All the grade 8 student sax players i’ve met under the age of 18 can play altissimo – so its not for the chosen few probably like decades ago.

some people say for a dark mouth piece use a harder reed, and for a brighter mouthpiece use a softer reed?

i personally would stick with the setup that you are comfortable with that allows you to play chromatically from low Bb to high f#.

A great help us to play bottom to top on one breath and back down in one breath. This builds up the strength to sustain those higher notes – you really need to push up there continuosly otherwise your higher notes will soon fade out with lack of support.

The overtones are the only way to get the altissimo – which to start off will be very short lived, so you need to build up the breath support to sustain them.

Nice to hear all your comments guys. I hear and feel each of you! keep in mind that the prep lessons leading up to the fingering part are much more important that the fingering section. it’s the experimentation with air, embouchure and harmonics (overtones) that the real magic happens. when this starts to fall in place is when the G’s and A’s start to come.
I’d like to say a couple things about the G…
It’s arguably the hardest to hit at first BUT, if you work on that F# fingering I suggest when it slides right onto the G with only a couple fingers lifting off the keys you should be able to nail it with persistence. This means more than a day here and there…commit to some good sessions every day…this is the key.
For me it sucked not getting it day after day after day…. but then one day I got it and WOW. when it happens stop and realize what you did differently from the last time you did it and it didn’t work then and repeat it.
notice I said “what you did differently” cause if you don’t change anything with your mouth, air, throat nothing different will happen. always make minor changes until you are getting it.