Suggested Prerequisites for Saxophone
The quarter tone technique is arguably the most difficult technique to learn, practice, and master. It requires precise embouchure control, precise airflow control, strong performance endurance, and a strong ear, one that can discern common intervals and chords with ease and can be trained to discern quarter tone intervals and chords in a performance setting. Before beginning this technique, I recommend you master all of the aspects of saxophone performance indicated below.
Technical Fluency
The quarter tone technique introduces twenty-six new notes across the range of the saxophone. Unlike most conventional notes, each of these notes can be produced by five or more fingerings whose selection depends upon the construction of the horn and mouthpiece you’re playing, your own body, and your own style of performing. Many quarter tone fingerings require unfamiliar combinations of buttons that are initially counter-intuitive. Before studying the quarter tone technique, make sure that you’re highly competent and fluent in your saxophone technique and are able to work through complex and technically challenging repertoire.
25 Caprices and an Atonal Sonata for Unaccompanied Saxophone by Sigfrid Karg-Elert and Jeffrey Lerner is an excellent book for improving your overall technical fluency and performance capabilities. It includes caprices of varying tempi, keys, complexities, and overall difficulties.
This book is available on Amazon.
Reading and Sight Reading
Quarter tone nomenclature introduces a range of new accidentals that must be memorized during practice and instantly recognized during performance. You’ll need to be able to navigate through these accidentals while simultaneously balancing the immense performance difficulties of producing the quarter tones themselves. You will need to have excellent reading and strong sight reading skills in order to effectively navigate quarter tone sheet music, even for simpler quarter tone pieces.
Technique of the Saxophone – Volume 3: Rhythm Studies by Joseph Viola is an excellent resource for sight reading practice, exercises with complex rhythms, and exercises over a variety of meter. After these exercises, the book features 15 etudes that incorporates elements of all previous exercises.
This book is available on Amazon.
Overtone Series and Production
Many quarter tones are produced via overtone production in tandem with non-standard fingerings. Beyond this, the majority of quarter tone fingerings require the precision and control that only a saxophonist who’s mastered the overtone technique can achieve. Any saxophonist seeking to learn the quarter tone technique must master the overtone technique.
The book below, Top-Tones for Saxophone, is an excellent resource for overtone practice and mastery.
Altissimo
The altissimo register of the saxophone is the range of notes that can be produced above high F. All altissimo notes are produced via overtones, and many involve non-standard fingerings. Learning to produce altissimo notes also helps the saxophonist gain finer control of their embouchure, air control, and overall ability to control their instrument. This technique itself is not used in the quarter tone technique, but any saxophonist who is fluent in this technique will be better positioned to begin studying the quarter tone technique.
Top-Tones for the Saxophone by Siguard M. Rascher is an excellent resource for learning and practicing both overtones and altissimo with a wide range of exercises to challenge you on overtone and altissimo production over a range of notes, dynamics, and tempi.
This book is available on Amazon.