I hate playing bari. bleh, its just too mando for me. Ooh theres this trick where you stick your foot in the barrel and it will go a half step lower than A. works for any sax.

It is perfectly possible to get a low G. There are two tricks for doing this: one is a really soft reed and lips with open throat (very hard to get in tune, and lousy tone) and my preferred method (only if the bassoon player next to you is lost or resting) and that is to take a music folder or work book and cover the bell leaving just a little crack for the air to excape. and between lippin it down and the folder, you can get a decent F# if you work hard. As for the top range, there are really good methods for doing that, a really good one is "high tones" by rousseau. i think the only really practical not in the altissimo range is maybe the high G, because anything about that is easily played by an alto.

yes, i think the bari is able to go to a low g. all you have to do is raise the bell all the way up to thetop loop.

I`ve been able to hit a low a and as high as up to a trumpets high Bb (just barely!! )

I thought it was about 10 yards. But perhaps if you`re at a cliff, it could go even longer

I play the bari and my bari has a ket range from low A all the way to high F# and you can bend the note to a pretty sharp g and g#.

Yeeeah, i`ve read this thread and seen all sorts of bad information. Wolfgang hit it right on the money... but some others (i.e. "the bari only goes from a low c to a high c") are quite off. Anything below an A should NEVER be played on a bari, the only saxes you would ever lip down to reach the next half step are soprano and alto, since their sizes are small enough that a small change in the embechoure changes the notes drastically. I swear if I hear anyone but Mulligan trying to play a low G, i`m going to go up there and slap them across the face. =) As far as altissimo goes, you need a decent mouthpiece and a hard reed to make the notes sound pleasing to the ear. The tone up there on bari is generally very thin and shaky while altissimo on alto is generally always solid and full. Anyone who says they`re lipping up from a high f# to a g or g#, i assume, is being very exaggerative. Once again it`s incredibly easy to lip up on a sax the size of a soprano (in fact, hitting a high f# on soprano will basically always give you a G until you learn to always lip down quite far), but the size of the bari and the mass amount of air space between the high f# key and your mouth prevent you from raising it up more than anything like 20 cents.
Today I was actually giving a lesson to an amazing 11th grader who has played alto his whole life, and was asked to play bari in an honor ensemble at Oklahoma University. You have to have a completely different mindset to play bari. Like I was telling him, when you play alto you try to blend in with the rest of your alto section, always being aware of the sounds around you. Playing bari, of course you listen to people around you and the balance, but you`re also the only bari sax player in the entire band (sometimes that can mean 200+ people.. and you`re on your own part). You have to belt it out sometimes and not worry that much about blending in if you have any chance of being heard. In a Jazz Band setting, my favorite sound from any instrument is that of a bari. In all the sax licks I always listen towards the bottom, because what`s cooler than a bari sax playing a harmony to a wicked fast alto 1 lick? Thankfully the fingerings are all the same throughout the saxophones, so the problem of being "slower" than the rest of the section is next to nil, all you have to worry about is how much air you use.
Oh.. I don`t know if anyone has pointed this out, but the bari is exactly one octave lower than an alto. So playing a low C on an alto is like playing a middle C on bari, etc.
Have fun on bari, it`s a blast once you feel confident!
-Eric

ive been playing alto and now the band conductor wants me to play baritone sax. Is reading the music the same as alto ie. same note, same finger position? therefore if i read a eg. middle c, will the fingering still be on the first hand, middle finger?

EVERYONE IN HERE NEEDS TO RESEARCH. The newer bari models are keyed from either A or Bb to either F or F#. Altissimo increases the range an extra octave and a fourth. You don`t need a hard reed, you need the correct reed. It`s different for every person. You have to learn altissimo properly. It takes years. Don`t make it sound easy. It`s all tongue placement. The bari can sound just as good as any other saxophone if you put as much time into it as you would your alto/tenor for private lessons. It is only in jazz that the bari should ever attempt to go below A (or Bb if no low A key). At that point, you CANNOT lip it down a half step, nor can you adjust the tongue to bend it beyond 10 cents. The only way to lower the pitch is to cover the bell. This method is not conventional. I`ve been playing bari for years, and have studied with a top student of Fred Hemke, and a top student of Lawrence Gwozdz. I know the possibilities of the instrument. The low A restricts the sound in the lower register more than a low Bb. Stop trying to sound like you know what you`re talking about.

Actually, I have been able to go down to low G on a bari. You have to use a combination of covering the bell, and bending the pitch down with your embouchure. It is easier to bend the pitch on the bari, I think.

The "standard" range of a baritone can be Low A (Concert C below the bass clef) or Low Bb (Concert Db below the bass clef) to high F (Concert Ab above the bass clef) or high F# (concert A above the bass clef). You can increase your range through altissimo playing where it will get higher, but for the baritone sax to play lower than Concert C (or Concert Db) below bass clef one must add onto the sax`s bell.