i`m interested in joining my school`s marching band, but i`m curious to know which instrument is easy to pick up and learn, clarinet or saxophone?

I played both in marching band and found that they are the same in difficulty to learn. The only difference is how you hold the instrument when marching. Saxophone is a little more difficult to march with and do the moves with on the field...plus side is your neck takes most of the pressure so your thumb doesn`t die on you half way through the performance and you are always by the brass players so you can pick up where you are easier.

both have their high points. typically, clarinets have the most technically challenging parts, which after a while are not hard at all. saxes at a LOT of color to the over all band sound. if your going into this for the long run, if you like more classical sounding stuff, go for clarinet. if you like jazzy stuff, go for sax. but since i play clarient, i say GO FOR CLARINET!! (this was my first year in marching band as i am a freshman, but it was a blast. clarinet is not at all hard to march with, and no, my thumb never hurt. just dont march with a wooden clarinet because it will crack in the heat or cold, and if you get a plastic once a little wet in the rain, it won`t matter. OH, and if you drop a wooden clarinet...ohhh mannn.)

i am from ireland, aren`t i brilliant! i play the clarinet and just got the saxophone last week since i asked my tutor if i could try to play it as well as the clarinet. the saxophone has the same fingering as the recorder and the clarinet has a completely different fingering. but when you go down to low c in the saxophone, it is quite hard to stop it going to the upper register. i think the saxophone is really heavy and hurts your neck after a while, so i say go for the clarinet. also, at by band (it`s not a marching band) the clarinets play the main tune while the saxophones just do harmonys. i prefer the clarinet

If you start on clarinet it will be easier to switch to saxophone than if you start on saxophone and then switch to clarinet.

I started out on sax and then started to learn clarinet. and they have totally different fingerings, which was kind of hard at fist but after you get used to it then its ok. I would say play sax because even though they are kind of heavy and don`t get the melody in band, there`re much easier to learn than clarinet. I myself like clarinet though because it has a better sound, but like I said sax is easier to learn than clarinet.