Hi all,
I posted before about my son. Just a small re cap, He only 9yrs. in 4th grade and only been playing the Tenor Sax for about 3 weeks now. I have been trying to be very supportive and i am always right there to help him practice. We have been working on all the advice i have gotten here on these Forums. And now i have a few more questions. >>> I noticed there are 2 teeth marks on the top of his mouth piece... Is that normal since its always in your mouth? And that is just part of wear and tear? OR does the teeth marks means hes biting down on the mouth piece and i should help him learn to loosen his grip? Will that effect his playing abilities?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.Thank you all again.

how deeep are the marks? if there`re deep then yes he is biting too hard. If you need any more help e-mail me

If they`re just scratches it shouldn`t matter but I`ve never had marks on any my mouthpieces, so maybe he is biting too hard. Why not try a mouthpiece protector? These are just a small pad that you stick on top of the mouthpiece where your teeth go. I would also recommend getting a teacher, even if it`s just for a few weeks so that your son can get to know the basics.

My tenor sax player in my band has the same problem...it`s from biting to hard to produce the sound. Buy your son a softer reed (one step down) and a mouth piece guard (rubber mats to go on to of the mouth piece). That will cut down the biting from a hard reed and vibrations.

With 40 years experience of tenor may I suggest that, admirable as it is, your 9 year old son is a bit young to be playing sax, because his adult teeth are not fully grown
or set. This sort of pressure may make him look like Ken Dodd very soon The mouthpiece might be made of soft plastic and will be showing the excessive teeth pressure, just in time to save the situation. Try these :- Softer reed and/or a mouthpiece with a closer tip opening ( lay )

Jackie mclean started his son with just a mouthpiece at age 3 and now he`s an amazing saxophonist.

I think it`s perfectly normal for him to have very shallow scratches, nothing deep or noticable if you ran your finger over the top. If they are really deep, get a mouthpiece protecter piece at the music store and stick on top. Also, you may want to put him on alto sax and once he gets good on that bring him down to tenor, and perhaps bari sax eventually.

Not to deep scratches are normal though. Start young!

If theyre not too deep then not a problem.
1)i dont see how a softer reed would help but then again,I am 13 years old and playing alto sax
2)ya a mouthpiece protector and maybe a more flexable mouthpiece(jazz maybe?)
3)DEFINATELY a teacher.That way he doesn`t get any bad habits(trust me,REALLY hard 2 get rid of them after a while)

well for starters i think its great you getting him intrested in music so early.the only thing i can think of really helping him is a mouth piece guard.a reed really wouldnt do much good.what kind of mouthpiece is he playing on, i recommend getting him a yamaha 4c because they are great for begginers, and fairly innexpensive compaired to others out there.the biting thing is fairly naturali figure he has a clay mouthpiece though(is this true) keep asking questions too i rhink its great your so involved

The teeth marks should be normal because that is where your teeth rest while your playing.
Although it wouldn`t be good for him to be biting so hard maybe let him play a 2 and 1/2 reed or something that doesn`t cause him to play so hard and maybe he`ll loosen up his grip.

I do not reccommend a teeth guard for your saxophone. The rubber pad on the top of your mouthpiece can severly damage his embrochure just go down a step on reed size he shoudn`t be playing anything over 3" since hes a beginner.

I have teeth marks on my mouthpiece. And they`re really deep. And I wouldn`t say that it is normal because my sax instructor told me that he`s never seen such a thing before in his whole career. O_O

I bite too hard. And I fear that on my new mouthpiece that I just recently got, that I`m going to have teeth marks on it too.

Do you know what brand of mouthpiece he is playing? The Yamaha student line of mouthpieces (4C and 5C), are notorious (well.. to me, anyway) for being extremely prone to deep tooth marks. Pretty much all of the 4C`s I`ve used have gotten toothmarks eventually, unless I used a mouthpiece patch.

Think a pad would be good to prevent the teethmarks. Furthermore, just as its common for children to chew pens, they tend to not bother about the unslightly teethmarks as well. I remember i used to always chew on my recorder when you shouldn`t even be biting it. And its left with all these teethmarks but i really didn`t ever bother about it at all!

So i guess its really normal for him to bite down hard on his mouthpiece and not really care about it. He will grow out of this habit and learn to do something about it when he gets older. Then probably then its better to get him a new mouthpiece and teach him about the correct pressure. I believe his objective now is to get the sound out and play the right notes with the right intonation.

I also agree with the others about getting a teacher to teach on correct techniques. its hard to change once wrong techniques hae been picked up.

the teeth marks are a good sign. because if u dont have a firm grip then u will always be out of tune. too deep may be bad but my band director always walks by and wiggles out saxes to make sure they're not moving so it is a good thing to have them as long as his teeth arent being hurt