Breaking

for alto saxophone

Breaking is inspired by the same idea behind my piece Everything is Broken. The act of sharing our time, our knowledge, our love, symbolized by the idea of breaking ourselves into smaller pieces that we leave behind. This act of breaking is not a violent one but instead one of caring and compassion. This breaking can actually be regenerative.  And, in the end, a part of us can live on in the lives of those we’ve touched. 

Breaking is dedicated to one of the kindest, most knowledgeable, and most caring people I know. My friend Matt Taylor. Many years ago, Matt brought a small bowl of guacamole to a party at my house. It was a beautiful bowl with a textured black exterior and a magically shimmering green interior. Matt left the bowl behind as a gift. It became my favorite bowl and, for over a decade, I ate cereal from it most mornings. One day, my dog Mackey got a little too excited, knocked the bowl to the floor, and suddenly it was no longer a bowl. It broke into four large pieces (and a few very small ones).

As strange as it may seem, the bowl had become such a part of my life that I couldn’t bring myself to sweep it up and throw it away. Being a percussionist, one of the first things I thought was, “what would these sound like if I hit them.” Although the bowl had been beautiful to look at, it didn’t produce a very resonant sound (again, as a percussionist, I know what every bowl in my house sounds like). I took the four pieces to the back porch and began to tap on them with some small mallets. Now, broken, they all sounded beautiful. The pieces became part of my instrument collection, and the four notes they produce are the four notes that form the seeds of Breaking. Thanks to Matt’s gift of a small bowl and Mackey being a little too eager to find out what was in the bowl, Breaking was created. Sometimes, something breaking is far from the worst thing in the world. 

Breaking was premiered by Matt Taylor on March 7, 2019 in the Rotunda of the Arkansas State Capitol in Little Rock, Arkansas as part of the Music in Our Schools Month Celebration.

Breaking is available as a PDF download. Click here to to visit the blaketyson.com store.

In the original version of Breaking, I wrote many notes in the altissimo register of the saxophone. These notes can be very challenging at times. An alternate version was created to make the piece playable by saxophonists who do not feel completely comfortable playing in the altissimo register. The high notes can be beautiful, but they are not what Breaking is about. It is about love and kindness. Both versions are included in this download. Play the version of Breaking that allows you to best communicate with those who are listening.