Last night I went down to Mezzrow to check out Marc Mommaas play with Kenny Wessel and Jay Anderson. It was a lovely set. I think what stood out most to me was the warmth of Marc’s tone.
For those of you not familiar with the saxophone - or any wind instrument for that matter - the tone of the instrument varies greatly from person to person. This is down to a variety of factors, but in essence even though you don’t speak into the instrument, the organization and resonance of your entire structure and airway shape the sound before it hits the horn. The sound can be bright or dark or smooth or harsh and the best players choose what qualities they want to have as a part of their sound.
Marc’s tone is warm butter. And it stays warm butter from the bottom note to the top. And Marc knows that he doesn’t want a shred of tension in his neck while he plays.
These things are related.
Last weekend I was visiting Georgia. My friends took me to a show that had a very different type of saxophone player with a very different type of sound. The player in question was a prime example of standing with a bad case of saxophonitis.
I thought I could use his picture to illustrate a point, but I want to do this with a certain degree of sensitivity. I’ve blacked out the gentleman’s face for privacy purposes and I do not want to go and shame this person in any way. I do not know his injury history or anything about him and there could be all sorts of reasons why he stands the way that he does with the instrument.
Sometimes sh*t happens and there ain’t nuthin’ we can do about it. Other times we have fixable problems and we just don’t know what to do. And other times we just feel happy with our lives how they are. It’s all good!
BUT part of this work is about learning to recognize that how you stand, sit, and walk will have an effect on the quality of your work. So please have a look at this with an agnostic eye so that you can begin to see how habits pull us down.
I want to make another point before I tell you what I see. The player above is in motion. You can tell because his left heel is off of the ground. Moving while playing is totally fine, but just know that this guy did not permanently stand with the heel lifted like this.
All of those caveats aside, if you think about this man’s airway, it is not a vertical and open tube. To start, the head has drifted over the right foot and the hip has pushed over the left foot. If I had to guess, I would imagine that there is a lot of collapse/ compression along the right side of the torso/hip. This collapse on the right must have a consequence for the left side.
When we have this kind of structure present, I would say that the head, neck, and upper back are not functioning at their best. In FM Alexander’s language, this part of the structure is called the Primary Control of the organism. It is important to see these kinds of shapes, but it is far more important to learn to STOP, not control ourselves, and allow things to change at their own pace.
Releasing the Head, Neck, and Back
If you’re like me, you have your good days and bad days. Sometimes things feel freer than others and other times we can feel pretty jammed up. Why, just the other day I slept all crooked because I was dog sitting and wrestling with the dog for bed real estate. I lost because the dog was cute.
It left me with a cranky shoulder in the morning, so I got to work and did a lie down, some walking, and a little bit of work with the mirrors. Things felt a bit better afterwards. But I think what would surprise most people is that I didn’t really do a movement to open up my shoulder; I thought about allowing things to thaw and release into sprung weight.
That’s basically it.
WTF Exercise
I’m going to write today’s little exercise from the perspective of a lie down. You could just as easily do this while sitting or standing. In fact, I often feel the dynamics more vividly while sitting or standing BUT if your structure is very locked the dynamics of release may not happen while you’re vertical.
If you try this sitting or standing and nothing happens after 5 minutes, it’s better (or at least less frustrating) to transition to lying down.
To start, ask for things to STOP. Don’t hold your breath. Allow your thoughts to slooow down and simplify. If you are anxious or buzzing about internally just remind yourself that there’s nothing to do and that no joint should ever be fixed. This can all be summed up as, allow every fiber of yourself to be mobile and mushy.
From there, you may find it helpful to think about the image below:
Think about zone 1 thawing. This thought should be quietly added to the ones from the start. If you feel any amount of glacial thaw in the muscles around zone 1, you’ve got the idea! Feel free to allow this thaw to expand to your whole head.
While zone 1 is thawing you may or may not have noticed some shifts around zone 2. This region of the back is extremely mobile (think of all the twists and bends we can do in the back for things like golfing) and loooves to lock up on us. Typically, it is easier to experience an unlocking around zone 2 if zone 1 is thawing and releasing1.
The dynamics between zone 1 and zone 2 are best experienced in a hands on lesson. It’s all a subtle shift and can happen within a matter of moments. When these 2 zones get that subtle thawing sensation, the muscles along the back of the spine leave their state of holding and it begins to feel like you have a bit of wobbly muscle inflating all around the spine.
This sensation of wobbliness is what we want all over. We lose it quite quickly when the head tips forward and down, the back slumps into collapse, or zone 2 braces. Some of you may recall these photos from my post on Drawing Attention to a Part…
When things begin to unlock, we get this oddly balanced sensation of Middle. Nothing is pressed forward. Nothing is shoved back. Nothing is falling down.
If you can begin to sense more of the balance action in the Primary Control, you are well on your way to looking and feeling like our cool dude in the image above.
Get In Touch
If you have any questions about walking, please reach out and I’ll do my best to answer! Ask in the comments below or hit the like button. You know, all those good social interaction things for the algos!
If you’re in NYC, you may learn more about my private teaching practice at johndalto.com.
If you’d like to book any lesson time with me, you can find my booking link here.
This relationship is not something that I’ve cooked up, it’s something that I was taught by Beret Arcaya. It’s something that was also explicitly shared with me by Ted McNamara. He learned that bit from Margaret Goldie. It’s something that’s described by FM Alexander in writing but without any visual aid.
The thawing exercise feels both simple and effective. A thoughtful reminder that release, not force, shapes both movement... and music, of course.