Saxophone Lessons California

Instruments: Saxophone, Clarinet

I love teaching students, I try and adapt my approach to each student, as each student has their own education needs. I am strict teacher, but care about my students and their development. I work fundamental, A LOT. This is the backbone of our abilities and we need to make sure it's working all the time! I work with the student to try and find what they want to work on in addition to our fundamental practice. Read More

Instruments: Saxophone, Flute, Music

For young beginning students, I commonly use Hal Leonard's Essential Elements. Once a student grasps the fundamentals, I will begin to introduce outside repertoire for study which is often musically arranged by myself for the specific student. I also supplement lessons with any other musical material they might receive in school focusing on ensemble playing or performance help. For adult students, I try to find out what the student is interested in, and guide my instruction accordingly to keep the lessons engaging and fun, no matter their ability level. Read More

Instruments: Saxophone

For beginning and intermediate students, I usually start with Essential Elements Interactive, Sound Innovations for Concert Band, Standard of Excellence, Tradition of Excellence, and/or Accent on Achievement. For students who are interested in jazz as well, I use those mentioned books along with beginning to intermediate standards from The Real Book. I start them off with the blues because it is the foundation for jazz music, and I think it's imperative that the rudimentary tools become solidified. Read More

Instruments: Piano, Saxophone, Clarinet

For all my saxophone students, I always start my lessons talking about sound and working on techniques of how to develop it and how to breath properly.The basics are always the foundation of everything else so even if you are an advanced student, you might be having some bad habbits in your instrument, so I always work on sound. I also work in articulation and how to sound as rhythmically perfect as possible. Read More

Instruments: Piano, Saxophone, Clarinet

Especially for young people, maintaining interest and ensuring that they continue to see the value of their musical education is essential. I remember a very frank conversation with my mother when at 13 I wanted to give up music to play football, and I blame that on the style of teaching I was receiving. Whilst there is stuff not to like about instrumental learning - for some it's scales, for me it was sight reading - the satisfaction comes from masterng these challenges, and if we can keep these short and long term goals relevant to the student, getting the practice hours done may be a litte easier on everyone! Read More