I`m confussed by this bickering about high chops. It seems you all are forgetting that there are many things more important then how high you can play. For instance, your overall musicality. I`ll tell you what catches my attention as I`m walking down the hall looking for a practice room at a university - the guy playing a simple Concone study or someone playing the piano to enhance their musical knowledge, or even a person running over some easy orchestral excerpts. What does not catch my attention is the guy trying to slam high G`s (4th ledger up).

Some of the greatest players ever don`t have high G ranges for every day use, and the really great players that do have the high chops don`t have them because they devoted twenty hours per week to high register stuff. They have them because they play everything with a musically focused mind which simplifies things enough that your brain can figure it out. Playing high is possible for us all, we just have to get our heads out of the game and let music and feeling take over what we`re doing. If we let it, the brain will figure out what it needs to do to do what we`re wanting it to. The only way that`ll happen though is if you constantly remind it via listening and envisioning what you want to sound like.

Moral of the story - get your egos out of the way, and heads out playing - listen and play, that`s it.

Cheers!
Aaron

An excellent point Aaron and one that i feel needed to be clearly put across to some people.

Very true it isnt that important for some uses. I would like to see a lead jazz player that cant even hit a G though!

Dan -

I don`t know a single person alive who can`t "hit" a high G. I know many who can`t play one, but "hitting" a note is much different then "playing" a note.

However, your point is valid. Generally, lead players have at least a solid G range. That means they can open up a show with a lick up to a high G and close that same show on a high G, then do another one later that day. I have met a few lead players who have say, high A to CC ranges, but not dependably, meaning, they can`t depend on having that CC there at the end of a performance.

Listen through some of the major jazz/latin recordings and count the times the actual lead player has to go above a G. When I say actual lead player, I don`t mean, say, a recording of Gordon Goodwin`s Big Phat Band with Arturo Sandoval and Wayne Bergeron playing. Obviously, there is going to be some really high stuff in that piece BECAUSE they have the players there that can do it.

There aren`t too many pieces out there that demand more then a high G range. Yeah, they`re there, but for the average professional jazz ensemble, the chances of having above a high G required more then once or twice in a show is slim. That doesn`t mean you won`t hear a lead player go above it, just that the piece doesn`t require it. I don`t know what groups you`ve played with, but I`ve played with enough to know that lead players often go higher then whats written, A, because it /is/ fun, and the crowd loves it, and B, because they can .

Don`t get yourselves in rutts because you can`t play a high G all the time. I`m auditioning for Eastman, Juilliard, Manhattan, and Northwestern this spring (to name a few), and I only have a playable high E range. There again, meaning, I can play an E at the beginning and end of a show. Does that mean I can`t manage a high G in the middle of Kiss Me Kate or The Producers? No, it just means I wouldn`t want to perform a solo requiring it (yet.)

Practice, envision, listen and you`ll do well. Just don`t THINK to much!

Cheers!
Aaron

Spot on Aaron.