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The Saxophone's Music / Jacob Shapiro ------------------------------------The saxophone, invented by Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax (1814-1894) in 1846, was intended to combine the clarinet's agility and the brass' power. Originally there were two "sets" of instruments: orchestral ones in C and F and military-band ones in E-flat and B-flat. Today only the military band versions survive, even in classical music usage, although the orchestral versions are said to be much softer and blend in better with other symphonic instruments. The influential German military band instrument maker / composer / arranger Wilhelm Friedrich Wieprecht (1802-1872) had a bitter rivalry with Adolphe Sax {1}, which may have contributed to the saxophone's initial adoption mainly only in France and Belgium as well as its rather total failure to find a permanent position in a symphony orchestra. From the military bands, to French opera, to jazz, the saxophone quickly gained popularity, but never very much in serious classical music {2}. Some noteworthy composers such as Ravel or Berlioz recognized its unique qualities {3}, but as a whole, most of the pieces we have today for saxophone from serious composers came mainly due to the efforts of two saxophone players who worked very hard to commission pieces for it {2}. One is the German-born, later to be American, saxophonist-virtuoso Sigurd Raschèr (1907-2001), who, in the 20th century, commissioned many important pieces for the instrument (Glazunov, Ibert, Martin, Hindemith, Larsson, Dahl and so on). The second, Elise Hall, of Boston, was an amateur saxophone player who took up the instrument to improve her deteriorating hearing and had a lot of money to commission works from some great composers (Debussy, d'Indy, Schmitt, Caplet, etc). There is no doubt that though we are lucky to have as many pieces as we do, there was a certain unluckiness as well. Famous saxophone player Jean-Marie Londeix (1932 *) was just on his way to meet Francis Poulenc in order to discuss the possibility of a saxophone sonata as the composer suddenly passed away. Prokofiev asked for 10,000 Francs in order to write a saxophone sonata {4}. Johannes Brahms composed his two clarinet sonatas and quintet around the end of the 19th century (around six (!) decades after the saxophone was breathing air) because he had met an especially inspiring clarinet player--Richard Mühlfeld in 1891--but one could only imagine what he would have done had he met an especially inspiring saxophone player, such as Adolphe Sax himself, who was a professor for saxophone in the Paris conservatory and had lived until 1894. At any rate, while the beginning was "humble", it was also short-lived, and not because of the actual instrument itself, but rather, music in general was changing its direction. The tonal type of music had reached its full blossom by the beginning of the 20th century. Perhaps this shift was inevitable, because, the two The was number of possibilities to combine seven scale degrees, with scales, or 48 scales, or even 12 tones, is ultimately finite. emphasis went, thus, to different directions. One of which jazz, in which the saxophone played a major role. Hence, for a saxophonist, there is the possibility to play jazz, transcriptions, original classical literature, or contemporary classical music. Of course in the real world most musicians do a little of everything. Jean-Marie Londeix, mentioned earlier, claims that playing transcriptions bears no value for the listener, because it necessarily will not add anything—-he compares this to trying to build the palace of versailles from concrete blocks {5}. The implicit statement is that the composer's original intention will always provide a more pleasant experience for the listener than a transcription. Be that as it may, he goes further to claim that all classical literature of the saxophone is basically worthless(!), because it does not have its own, saxophonistic, idiomatic language, but rather, it borrows from the idioms of other instruments. He starts this argument by establishing the concept of an idiomatic language for an instrument: Chopin's piano music, Paganini's violin music, and so on. He then goes on to show how the very small original classical literature for saxophone does not establish an idiom for the saxophone itself, but rather, uses idioms of other instruments: Glazunouv's concerto is actually string language (in fact there are claims that it was sketched out first as a viola concerto), Ibert's Concertino da Camera is flute music, Singelee quartet is really a string quartet, and so on. In fact, according to him, the saxophone was not “given” its true idiomatic language until the composition of Edison Denisov's (1929-1996) sonata in the 1970s (which, coincidentally or not to his claims, was dedicated to Londeix). Ever since, many new music pieces have been written specifically for the saxophone, and, although in general the saxophone is not very prominent in classical music, within the “niche” of new contemporary music, it has gained a primary position of honor. There is the so-called Bordeaux composers' school, in which due to Londeix' influence as a professor (in Bordeaux itself), many new music pieces have been written, including ones by Christian Lauba, Francoise Rosse, and so on. It is my aim in this present text to offer alternatives to Londeix's claims. This shall be done on three fronts: One would be to show that the new music that is supposedly so special and idiomatic for the saxophone is in fact not quite so unique and that it is part of the general new direction that music took after its "tonal epoch". The second, to show that the original non-new-music literature of the saxophone does bear its own merit, and offers new (and perhaps better, or fresher) ways of expression of the same musical language or idiomaticism (for instance, is it valid to play the Hammerklavier sonata on a modern piano?) The third direction would be the discussion about transcriptions in general, in which it shall be attempted to show that the long tradition of transcriptions in music history is worthy and valuable. But just how unique is this new idiom for the saxophone that Londeix is talking about, and how much of it could be explained by the death of tonal music in general? True, the saxophone is particularly adept at new music techniques {6}. It can execute glissandi, quartet tones, non-standard temperament, multi-phonics, extended playing range (up to 4.5 octaves with some players), a wide plethora of types of attacks (including slaps), the clicks of its keys make a distinct sound of itself, and that is just the beginning. However, most of these techniques are also executable on any other wind instrument. True, if one plays a prepared piano or plays the bow below the bridge, one produces sounds that are specific to the instrument and cannot be reproduced on any other instrument. However, as has been mentioned, that is the general direction of music in general, into painting with sound {7}, rather than music composition that is analogues to verbal composition. But if one considers the musical material itself, one discovers that really there is not such a big difference besides the actual color. Denisov's clarinet sonata, composed in 1993, bears a striking similarity to the saxophone sonata. Either Denisov was using saxophone idioms to write that sonata, or he was just using the Denisov-idioms. If it is valid to use that musical material in that way for both instruments, then it cannot be considered saxophone-idiomatic or clarinet-idiomatic. Luciano Berio's Sequenca for clarinet has been published by the composer itself for alto saxophone, while the one for oboe he also published as a soprano saxophone piece (Sequenca's VIIIb and IXb respectively). Did Berio have a very specific saxophone idiom in mind? Another example is Philippe Hurel's piece Opcit, which was composed in 1983 for saxophone whereas in 1993 a clarinet version was composed. There are many other examples that show either that the material of a "typically" saxophone piece is also used in another instrument's piece, or that a transcription has been done all together, many times by the composers themselves if not by an authorized third-party. The second point is about the merit of the saxophone's original literature, specifically that which is not new-music. Specifically, the question arises if it has any added new value compared to having the same piece played by another instrument. As in the example of the Ibert concertino da Camera which was presented before to bear a strong similarity to the flute concerto, it is also obvious that Ibert didn't just copy exactly the same phrases, but also took advantage of the saxophone's special qualities in the right moments: the usage of the low register which is usually too loud and almost aggressive in a climatic place in the piece, the usage of the smooth lyrical tone in the slow section, imitating Charlie Parker bebop section to accompany the orchestra, and so on. All of these special things are not to be found in the flute concerto (of course, other flute-special features exist). Another example is Alfred Desenclos' "Prelude, Cadence et Finale" for alto saxophone and piano, composed in 1943. The Cadence in this pieces shows the the virtuosity and the screaming heights that can be reached. This quality, that is usually aggressive and thus not appreciated, is utilized with great mastery in this piece. It is in fact a new combination of abilities, that Sax had originally envisioned--the virtuosity of the clarinet with the power of the brass--that offers a new vista in music, indeed also tonal music. Lastly, if one was not convinced thus far, there is the discussion about transcriptions. As a thought experiment, one could imagine what one of the items from Bach's Art of the Fugue would sound like as synthesized on a MIDI controller. Sure, this would be horrible, but it would also show that there is a some quality in the music that is not lost even if a robot plays it--and thus--let alone a saxophone. Bach himself was an avid transcriber, who sometimes went from very opposite places. The g-minor gamba sonata BWV 1029 was a two flute trio sonata {10}. The famous d-minor toccata BWV 565 was a transcription from a 5-string cello and the Chaconne from BWV 1004 was perhaps a lute piece before {11}, which at any rates incorporates many of his chorales into one. He transcribed Vivaldi's four-violin concerto into a four-keyboard concerto. It is obvious, however, that Bach took care of the instrumentation as composed (he was using the help of a gamba player friend when composing the cello suites, and it is known he was a pretty good violin player, with the sonatas and partitas {12}). The tradition of transcriptions can find another example in Mozart's oboe concerto K 314 (1777) and flute concerto (1778). The flute concerto was supposed to be a new composition, commissioned by a Dutch flutist. However, Mozart was too lazy to write a new piece, and so he took the oboe concerto from C-major to D-major and called it a flute concerto. Consequently, he did not receive any money for that commission. But Mozart was not so stupid--he did not merely transpose, but in fact changed the flute part quite a bit to take advantage of what Mozart believed to be the special qualities of the flute. Where the oboe leaps one octave, the flute leaps two, for example. Perhaps the most avid transcribed in music history was Franz Liszt, and while many would argue that he mainly transcribed for practical reasons (in order to play orchestral music when an orchestra was not available), there are numerous examples that his transcriptions are so successful that indeed if one didn't know previously one could imagine his transcriptions were original. Indeed with the invention of the recording devices, Liszt's transcriptions were recorded in studio, which would be absolutely unnecessary if they were done merely for lack of possibility to play orchestral music (since one could just record an orchestra and then play _that_). So I would suggest that while it is true the music has a certain theoretical quality that transcends instrumentation, all from the early music and until the 20th century with impressionism, there are certainly very different considerations that have to be taken with every transcription and instrumentation. Certainly some transcriptions would be successful for the saxophones whereas others are just criminal. But it is obvious to me that transcriptions offer an exciting new way to experience our music. References 1: Berliner musikalische Zeitung, issue 42-43 1846 2: Jean-Marie Londeix, 125 Years of Music for Saxophone 3: Berlioz's orchestration treatise 1855 4: Jean-Marie Londeix Master of the Modern Saxophone by James Umble 5: Jean-Marie Londeix, Lecture: "Music OF the saxophone or music FOR saxophone?" 6: Marcus Weiss and Giorgio Netti - "The Techniques of Saxophone Playing" 2010, Jean-Marie Londeix - "Hello Mr. Sax!" 7: The Sound of Painting: Music in Modern Art, Karin von Maur, 1999 8: Jacques Ibert - Concertino da Camera for alto saxophone and 11 Instruments 9: Alfred Desenclos - Prelude, Cadence et Finale for alto saxophone and piano 10: Henle Edition of Bach's BWV 1029, Preface section. 11: The Musical Times Vol 146 No 1893 Winter 2005, Eric Lewin Altschuler - Were Bach's BWV 565 and the Chaconne from BWV 1004 lute pieces? 12: Henle Edition of the Bach Cello Suites, Violin Soantas and Partitas, Prefaces 13: The Life of Elise Boyer Hall, William H. Street