Musical Instruments- The Saxophone
The invention and use of the saxophone in modern music has a long and interesting history. This instrument has evolved since its invention in 1840 into an music instrument with amazing depth and versatility.
In the mid 1800's a radically new musical instrument was invented. It was a strange hybrid of metal and wood, yet it had a sound that was said to mimic the human voice.
There are very few among us, past or present, that can honestly claim to have invented something totally new. Fewer still have the honor of being able to have their invention named after them. In Paris in 1840 a young man in his twenties did just that. Adolphe Sax, a clarinetist by trade, set out to create a hybrid instrument unlike any that had been invented before. A woodwind instrument using a vibrating reed as the sound source was combined with a brass body to create a new family of woodwind instruments known thereafter as "saxophones."
The saxophone that most individuals are familiar with is the alto sax. About the size of a traveler's carry-on suitcase it has become an accepted instrument in concert band literature dating back to the 1870's when John Philip Sousa first began using the instrument in his ensembles. Other noted composers helped usher the instrument into the mainstream. Berlioz was one of the first to accept the instrument and wrote passages for it in the L'Arlesienne Suite No. 1 and L'Arlesienne Suite No. 2 (Farandole).
Adolphe Sax's original saxophone was little more than a brass cone with a cane reed. Throughout his lifetime, Adolphe Sax created and perfected over fourteen different variations on this original saxophone. Today, four main varieties of the saxophone are in production ranging in voice from the smallest, clarinet sized, soprano saxophone to the large, trombone sized, baritone saxophone. In the middle of the family lie the alto and tenor saxophones, each with the same basic layout of keys and mechanisms. A fifth, much larger cousin of the saxes, the bass sax, is also still produced although rarely used in western music. While each instrument is pitched differently all of the saxophones are written with the same fingerings, meaning that a performer can quickly and easily switch from alto to tenor to soprano to baritone without having to learn a completely new set of fingerings. This flexibility and the innate ability of the saxophone to be able to mimic the expressiveness and versatility of the human voice have made it an accepted and expected part of bands and orchestras all over the world.
