In this episode of the Sax School Online podcast, we’re talking about wind synths.
So what is a wind synth? And how can they help you as a sax player?
To help me, I’m talking with the guy that advises big brands like Roland when they’re designing their new wind synths and that’s Alistair Parnell. It’s going to be a fun conversation. Let’s get stuck in.
Hey, before we get started, if you love learning how to play the saxophone better and you enjoy this podcast, could I just ask you to share it with one other person? Honestly, it would mean the world to us and it would just help us to reach more friends like you.
Discovering Wind Synth – Michael Brecker
Nigel: So Alistair, wind synths. I guess it’s been 50 years or something since the first ones showed up in the seventies. But I’ve been a fan of them ever since the mid-eighties. I remember hearing Michael Brecker’s In A Sentimental Mood when that recording came out. It must be in 1986 or something like that. On Steps Ahead.
And I knew I had to get one of those. It was an Akai EWI that he was playing. And it was an early Akai EWI that I bought as my first wind synth. And I’ve had a string of them since then. There are lots of changes, with so many new ones on the market these days. And I’m by no means an expert, even though I’ve had one for such a long time.
You, on the other hand, are an expert, so I’m keen to dig into this conversation with you today. But I’d just love to know how you discovered wind synth. Because you’re a saxophone player as well, right? So what was what was the trigger for you?
Alistair: Well, pretty much the same time. It was sort of the mid-eighties. I was at music college in London doing classical saxophone and there was a huge explosion in keyboards coming out. And I used to go to the keyboard shop and play around with the keyboards. Then I heard about a WX7, a Yamaha instrument. Well, this was the perfect marriage for me because it was all those cool keyboard sounds and it was controlled by a saxophone type fingering. So that was great.
I was sold. So I remember that the first instrument cost me about 1,500 quid [British pounds], I think.
N: It’s funny. You and I are about the same age. I also did a classical degree while I was doing all my jazz gigs as well. And I remember going to the music shop and seeing this WX7 with the little plastic key keys and all that. Oh my goodness, it seemed amazing Also it seemed to me to be a lot easier in concept to play then an EWI. But I started my journey with the EWI.
But anyway, for somebody who’s listening to this and probably is a bit baffled about what on earth we’re talking about, perhaps we should start the conversation with “What is a wind synth?”
What is a wind synth?
A: So the simplest way of thinking of a wind synthesizer is, it’s usually an instrument which is fingered either like a woodwind instrument. Or a brass instrument, because you can get an EVI, electric valve instrument.
It would usually respond to breath pressure and most of them will respond to bite pressure as well. So it’s kind of like a keyboard that you can blow into. And you can get a lot of musical expression because it’s constantly measuring your breath output and your bite pressure as well. So, that’s essentially, what a wind synth is.
N: Right, so you’re getting a lot of the input that you can do with a saxophone – controlling your breath and expression and vibrato and all that sort of stuff, but you can use synthesizer sounds. It’s a great concept, particularly if you are comfortable playing the saxophone, but you’re less confident playing a keyboard.
We already talked about the Yamaha version back in the day, and the Akai version. And both of those companies still have models now. But there are lots of different brands and models as well, aren’t there?
Different types of wind synth
A: Yeah. And they’ve taken to concentrating on certain aspects of a wind synthesizer. So at the moment, there are instruments like the EMEO, which is brilliant. It feels like a saxophone instrument, metal-bodied, with proper keywork on it.
The same goes with the Yamaha YDS series. And they’re instruments that are primarily set up to firstly feel like a saxophone to play, in terms of the fingering.
So they’ve got proper fingering keys on the instrument – mechanical moving keys.
And then you’ve got the other side of things. So Akai is still producing instruments.
There’s a NuRAD. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen that. It’s a funky-looking thing. It looks like an EWI, but you play with your fingers equally distance from your mouth, so it’s kind of sideways.
N: Oh, okay. Well, I’ll have to look that up. That sounds fascinating.
The technology
N: And the technology has got so much better as well. The EMEO that you mentioned is interesting. So I can see somebody who wants to play the saxophone, but wants to shortcut the learning process being interested in that. Because it looks like a saxophone like you say, but it’s got all the technology inside it.
I remember when I had my first Akai EWI, I had the stick part of it, and then a big fat cable that went to a big rack unit. And you had to do all the jiggery-pokery on there to get the sounds that you wanted. It was quite complicated, but everything’s all built in these days, isn’t it?
A: Yeah. So things like the NuRAD are primarily a controller. It fingers like a saxophone, but it’s its primary use is a controller. And it connects to outboard gear, so you can plug it into a sampler, or a computer, a soft synth, an iPad – whatever you like.
So they are moving in slightly different directions.
What would you use a wind synthesiser for?
And if you’re looking into wind synthesizers, you’ve got to do your homework. You’ve got to think carefully about what your primary use is going to be.
If it’s as a practice instrument, which is very useful, you might want to look at something like EMEO or the Yamaha instruments because they’re going to feel more like a saxophone. The downside of that is that those instruments don’t have a bite sensor. So you’re not going to get any response from your bite. You are from the breath, but not from the bite.
So it takes a little bit of sorting out and seeing what you want to get from it. I like the idea of having a whole range of extra sounds. People very often ask me ‘what does the saxophone sound like on an Aerophone? I nearly always decline, because it sounds dreadful on an aerophone! But I use it to access a whole heap of other sounds, just like a Piano player might use a keyboard to get string sounds, wind sounds, brass sounds, synth sounds – all of that stuff. So you need to think carefully about what your primary use would be for a wind synthesizer.
N: Yeah, I think that’s a good point. And certainly, as a pro player, I see most people using them for what you’re talking about. So it’s about accessing those extra sounds in a performance environment, or a recording environment, in a studio. It’s being able to more fluently play a string line. It sounds a bit more realistic as well.
Learning saxophone on a wind synth
N: So, okay, that’s interesting. So we just backed up a little bit from there. So, We’ve got thousands of people learning with us at Sax School, and, you know, we teach people saxophone. We teach adults to play the saxophone. But we have quite a lot of our members who dabble with digi saxophones of various flavours – Akais and Yamahas and whatever else -Rolands.
We also have some students who come to us, and start their whole journey on saxophone with a wind synth. Which is an interesting thing that’s sort of evolved more in the last few years. And with things like the Roland Aerophone, I can start to see how that is a bit more feasible.
Because you’ve got a reed, and you’ve got some great sounds, and it looks a bit like a saxophone. And people can start the process of being familiar with reading music, and expressing themselves and making music that way. Is that something that you see your students do too?
A: Yeah, You know, I think we surely would agree that if you want to learn saxophone, you’ve got to get a saxophone, right?
A: But as a way to get the idea of how your fingering systems work, getting used to how you would blow and even articulate on an instrument, then I think something like an Aerophone can be a good starting point. I think you’ve got to be always mindful of the fact that the saxophone relies so much on what you’re doing internally. And you can’t get any of that from an Aerophone. So I think the sooner you can get onto a real saxophone, is going to be better.
N: Yeah, I do agree with you. Because that’s a big part of the puzzle, isn’t it? Getting your embouchure right, all that sort of stuff.
Travel option
However, you might be in a situation where you can’t make a lot of sound. Or we’ve got quite a few members who travel a lot with work, so they’ll take an Aerophone or an EMEO, or something like that with them. Even in fact, Fred, one of our tutors, is on the road with the Average White Band all the time touring around the world. And he takes a Travel Sax with him because he can work on his fingering, and lots of stuff, when he’s in a hotel room.
A: I don’t know about you, but I spend a lot of time here teaching saxophone. And I think I spend most of my time helping people with pulse and rhythm. I know we want to get a good sound, but very often we’re dealing with pulse and rhythm. Because a lot of people struggle with that early on and certainly that’s stuff that you can do on a wind synthesizer.
N: Yeah. That’s something you could be developing on your wind synth. So we’ve got a couple of ideas there. You could start your journey on a wind synth, but probably best to transfer over to a real sax if you get the chance.
And you could supplement your existing saxophone journey by having a wind synth and working on some of these skills in a more sound-controlled environment. So you can stick your headphones on, you’re not going to wake the kids, or get grief from the person in the next hotel room. Or if you’re a more advanced player, you could be using a Wind Synth to access all these different sounds and different colours and possibly open up some performing and recording opportunities, too.
So what about if we break it down and look at some of the big players then in the Wind Synth?
Major wind synth players
A: Well, we’ve already mentioned Michael Brecker, of course. You would have to say he is the Godfather because he’s the absolute top of the chain. Okay?
I would say, you know, closely followed by Bob Mintzer. So anything Yellow Jackets is going to have Bob Mintzer. I would say probably at least a good third of their material Bob Mincer plays on a wind synthesizer So he’s a good one to look at as well.
There’s a guy called Jeff Kashiwa – saxophone player. He does some great things on wind synth.
And there are a couple of other players who we have all heard, but might not realise we’ve heard. So one of those guys is Judd Miller. He’s an EVI player, but to get a sense of the sound, he’s a very good one.
And the great Tom Scott. Tom Scott started on Lyricon. Now Tom Scott is playing the Aerophone now, which is interesting. But we have all heard Tom Scott. We might not realize we’ve heard Tom Scott playing a wind synthesizer. but remember that guy Michael Jackson? And he did that track called Billie Jean. Tom Scott’s on Billie Jean playing Lyricon you know. So we hear this stuff quite often and we don’t realise we’ve heard it.
N: Yeah, it’s interesting. Tom did a thing for us at Sax School, actually, a really fun session. And yeah, it was interesting to talk to him a little bit about all that kind of thing.
I guess Tom’s big thing was he was busy in the studio, right? Playing with just about everybody. And particularly through that period of the eightiess. Synths were such an integral part of the flavour of all pop music. So it stands to reason that there’s going to be those synth things in there, that are played on Lyricon.
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Brands and devices
N: I guess the big players these days are in terms of brands and devices. So we’ve talked about some of the artists. But in terms of the brands, then there’s Roland with their range of Aerophones.
Roland models
And I know you consult with Roland, right? You’re their go-to guy and advisor for sounds and things like that. So the Roland aerophones are one to consider. Can maybe give us a quick rundown on the different options there?
A: So on the Roland side, you’ve got I think four that are still in production. Their first one was the AE 10. They’ve stopped producing that one now.
But you can go from the very smallest. It’s like a recorder-size instrument. That’s the AE-01. that doesn’t have palm keys and side keys. So it’s but it’s very nice and portable. I’ve taken it on holiday before and just had a tootle occasionally.
As and then there’s an Aerophone Go – it’s also known as the AE-05. Now that it has got all the saxophone keywork on it. The sounds are a little bit limited but it has good breath and bite control. And it’s it’s smaller than a sopranino sax. So that’s pretty compact to take around.
And then you go on to what we call the Zen-Core instruments. So there’s an AE-20 and an AE-30. They have Roland’s flagship sound chip in there. You’re getting the same internals as some of the synths that Roland make that cost £3,000 for a synth with that chip.
A: So we have access to a device with that cool chip inside it, that makes all these fantastic sounds and they’ve been properly programmed, some of them by myself. A lot of them have been programmed by a guy called Matt Traum, who’s over in America. A lot of people have come across him in the wind synth world. Then you’ve got a fantastic sound source and a decent feeling instrument with great bite and breath control. So, the top two – the AE-20 and the AE-30 – are really worth having a look at.
N: Yeah, they’re awesome as well. I’ve got a Roland AE-30 and yeah, it’s just fun. There are so many great sounds on there. And also it feels natural and easy to play under your fingers.
The playing experience – Roland
So maybe we can have a chat about the Akai EWI in a second. But with the Roland, you’ve got those buttons that you push down. And the first time I picked it up, I thought It felt a bit plasticky, like a bit clicky-clacky. But once you get past that, and as soon as you stick on headphones, that is irrelevant anyway. It just feels easy. It’s easy to play. And so, it’s been an interesting journey for me.
I’ve got a couple of teenage sons, and they love music, but neither of them decided to go down the saxophone route. They do other stuff. But interestingly enough, my older son, he’s always snatching my AE-30 out of here, and he plays it all the time, and he loves it. And, so I can understand why they’re so popular with our Sax School students as well. It’s because you can pick them up. It’s instant gratification. It sounds great. It’s expressive.
Hey, it might be fun to hear what it sounds like if you’ve got yours there, Alistair.
Alistair’s demo
A: So I’ll give you a little blast on a couple of synthesizer sounds. These are kind of my bread and butter sounds, if you like.
And you can hear the dynamic control, you can hear the vibrato that I’m introducing, which feels very natural to me, I’ve got all that kind of scoop and vibrato.
It feels very natural. But then you get onto this whole host of stuff where you, of course, can play more than one note at a time. So you can do some fancy things with chords.
And I can tune individual notes as well. So I can get into some kind of unusual sounds, like a kind of Arabic scale.
And by the way, that drone sound – I set that up by playing my first note, pressing my thumb down here, and it will keep going until I disengage the drone sound. So loads and loads of lovely harmony sound.
I mean, that’s going to rival any kind of keyboard player, right? But then there are some instrumental sounds.
Instrumental sounds
And I use quite a lot of instrumental sounds. So You know, we can do anything from a little recorder or something. I don’t know if you ever heard Jeff Kashiwa doing his little recorder duet thing. So you play a duet with yourself, because you’re just using a delay.
So there’s lots of opportunities to play instrumental sounds, like a nice harmonica. There are lovely bass clarinets on this thing. Some great brass sounds as well. There’s a whole heap of sounds in there. I mean, I’ve got like 600 sounds on this thing so it’s just endless.
But you need to spend time on each sound to get the best from it, because they articulate slightly differently. The dynamic range is a little bit different. So. You’re not just going to pick one of these up and get sounds like that straight away. There’s a little bit of thought that has to go into how you articulate, just like there is on a sax, right?
N: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I think, the interesting thing that you said today was about thinking about it like a keyboard, not like a saxophone. That’s where you’re getting the magic of a wind synth. But it’s exciting, right? It’s exciting because we can use our saxophone skills, and we can access all these other sounds as well. Because you don’t always want to sound like a saxophone, do you? Sometimes you do want to sound like a harmonica.
Recording possibilities
A: The other thing that is useful for saxophone players to think about is recording. Of course, some keyboard players will record into their computer using a keyboard. Well, now we can do it as well, right? So you can put a bass line in. I can put some drums in a track. I can do anything, with that harmony that’s, in a certain key or whatever.
And if you want to print music, if you want to play into something like Sibelius and write a score out, you can do that as well.You might not have the facility as a keyboard player to do that. But you can do it in real-time from something like an Aerophone.
Developing your skills
N: Yeah, interesting. So you make it look so easy, Alistair. When you do all of your stuff there, that makes it look simple. But I can remember when I first picked up one, I thought, This is it! I heard Michael Brecker. Now I’ve got an EWI in my hands. It’s going to be a piece of cake.
And it wasn’t. There’s a massive learning curve. I suppose that’s a good point for us to make just as we’re wrapping up. Because just like learning a saxophone, you’ve got to develop your skills. So just like on saxophone you need to develop your embouchure and your finger technique, and your expression, on a wind synth you need to develop your skills. You can pick it up, like I was saying about my son, and make quick music, and that’s brilliant. But if you want to dig into it I suppose you need to be prepared to put some time in, right?
A: Absolutely. You’ve got to put some time in. Just like we might hear about a sax player who uses such and such kind of mouthpiece and he’s got this sax. And we think ‘if I buy that same stuff, I’m going to sound just like him’. Maybe not. I get the same with the Aerophone.
I’ll play something on the Aerophone and people will say, ‘Oh, what sound are you using? I’ll sound like you, if I’m using that same sound’. Maybe not. Because there’s a whole lot of stuff going on. Just like in saxophone playing, it’s not only your setup with your reed and your mouthpiece, but It’s the way you use your breath, it’s your articulation, it’s your phrasing. All of that stuff happens the same way on a wind synthesizer as well, and it takes practice.
N: Yeah, so there are good things and bad things about that, right? I mean, it’s a slight negative because it means there’s a learning curve. But the good thing is, as a saxophone player, you could be still working on a lot of the musical expression-type skills that you use on saxophone, when you’re working on your Aerophone.
The iSax Academy
So one of the things I always struggle with the Aerophone or any of these digi saxes, is I’m reasonably tech, but I’m not a tech whizz. I just can’t be bothered with digging into all the stuff. So I’ve always found that it took a bit of patience. And I needed to do a fair bit of learning and digging and that sort of thing.
And that’s why I was excited when I came across what you’re doing. Because you’re teaching people how to use Aerophones and digi saxes with the iSax Academy. Tell us a bit about that, because I know some of our Sax School students are also getting help from you on that.
A: That’s right. So this was a new thing for me. Two years ago, I started doing it, and it’s been way more successful than I ever dreamt it would be. A friend of mine suggested I should do it and I kind of said, ‘well, no, I don’t think so’. But I’m so glad I did because it’s been great. You know what it’s like to draw a community of people together. People start to connect with me and with each other.
The Basics
So I do two courses. There’s a basics course, which is going from scratch. You know, there’s a G, here’s a little tune with a G in it. Here’s a G and an A, now let’s play some G and A tunes. And it’s got backing tracks, it’s got fingerings that you can see in real-time on the side of the screen. So it’s all very much step by step with extra stuff about more Aerophone-related things.
But the system I teach with that is going to dovetail with anybody doing saxophone. Because although we’ve got a lot of extra fingering possibilities on an Aerophone, I teach that basics course exactly like you’re playing the saxophone, with a few little extra additions that you can do on the Aerophone.
Advanced course
A: And then on the advanced course, that’s where I’m teaching about all those tricks. How do you make a drone sound? And how do you make this thing without even blowing it? How do you create a sound that’s got four sounds combined? And how do you harmonize? It’s all of that kind of cool stuff that people need some help with.
So rather than going through all this boring manual, which no one could ever get the gist of, I’ve got proper step-by-step instructions.This is how you make a sound. This is how you can save it yourself ,and manipulate your sounds, to get all the controls the way you want them to be, not just the way it’s set on here.
N: Yeah, that sounds brilliant. I mean, I think that’s a valuable resource for anybody who’s looking to add a wind synth to their arsenal of instruments, but also wants to get serious and dig into it and learn how to use it properly.
Choosing a wind synth
N: That’s brilliant. And just before we wrap up, Alistair, any advice for people about choosing a wind synth, maybe anything they should be avoiding or be cautious of?
A: You know, this is one of our problems. The wind synths are falling into an uneasy position, because people in woodwind shops generally don’t have a lot of knowledge of digital instruments. And people in the keyboard shops don’t have a lot of information on woodwind instruments.
So it’s a little bit tricky to go into a place and get good advice on a wind synth. So I would say your primary place here is to get onto YouTube and and just start going down those rabbit holes. Because there is plenty of stuff. I’ve got my own YouTube channel, but there’s loads of other stuff on wind synthesizers as well. I would say that’s the place you’re going to start with.
Do be a little bit mindful about which type of instrument you want to go for. Is it primarily for practice or do you want the extra sounds? The Aerophone for me hits a good sweet spot, because it’s pretty close to the saxophone feeling, but you’ve got all these extra sounds that you can do as well. So it fits a lot of people’s requirements.
N: Awesome. It’s great to talk to you, Alistair. I love what you’re doing with the iSax Academy. And that’s where people can go to find out more about your course.
A: Absolutely. iSax Academy. That’s the place to go. And just a little tip for you all. If you do want to look into it, make sure you sign up for the mailing list first. Then you’ll get an email from me and that will give you a discount code that you can get a better price on all the courses.
Next steps
Hey, thanks so much for listening today. Don’t forget you can get the full transcription from today’s show, which is episode number four over at saxschoolonline.com/podcast.
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