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The Strange Life of Adolphe Sax (Advanced Program) · Spotlight English: Advanced

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Spotlight Advanced.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: I'm Colin Lowther and I'm Megan Nolette. Spotlight uses a
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: special English method of broadcasting. It is easier for people
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: to understand no matter where in the world they live.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: No one expected Adolph Sachs to live past childhood. The
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: little boy seemed to tempt bad luck. When he was
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: three years old, he fell down three flights of steps.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: He hit his head on the stone floor and did
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: not wake for a week. When he was ten, he
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: fell into a river and nearly drowned. Once a large
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: stone fell from the top of a house, again he
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: lost consciousness. He did not wake up for a day.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: He experienced so many deadly accidents that his neighbours called
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: him Little Sax, the ghost.
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  Speaker 2: But Adolf Sax did live, and in the time that
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  Speaker 2: he was not recovering from his accidents, he was learning.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: He worked in his father's instrument making shop. He was
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  Speaker 2: experimenting with new ways of making music, and soon he
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  Speaker 2: would create one of the most interesting instruments of the
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: modern age, the saxophone.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: Today's Spotlight is on the strange life of Adolph Sax.
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: Adolf Sachs was born in eighteen fourteen in Belgium. His
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: father and mother were instrument makers and they raised young
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: Sas in the trade. Sas may have been likely to
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: get into accidents, but he was very good at working
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: with instruments. His parents taught him how to make many instruments,
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: but Sacks loved working on wind instruments, which musicians play
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: by blowing air through them. Joe Santi was a researcher
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: at the Museum of Musical Instruments in Brussels, Belgium. He
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: spoke to the public Radio Exchange about Sach's early life.
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: Little Adolf had the time to learn all about making
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: instruments in this workshop, and he was really great at it.
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: He started out on his own instrument, the clarinet, when
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: he was fourteen or fifteen years old. He improved the instrument.
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: He changed the inside of the instrument and he changed
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: the exact placement of the holes. It made it sound better.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: By the time that he was twenty eight, Adolph Sachs
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: had already won many awards from his government. People all
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: over Europe recognized him as one of the most gifted
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: instrument makers of his time.
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: But Sax had a lot of energy. He was not
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: content with making instruments that others had invented before him.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: He wanted to change the way people made music, so
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: he began work on his own instrument, the saxophone.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: Sax invented the saxophone because of a problem he saw
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: in the way people made music. In those days, a
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: lot of musicians would play in orchestras. This large group
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: of musicians usually had three kinds of instruments. These were
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: stringed instruments, woodwind instruments, and brass instruments. Stringed instruments are
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: made of wood. People play them by pulling a bow
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: across strings. They sound very expressive, but they are not
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: very loud. Woodwind instruments like flutes are louder, but brass
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: instruments like horns are even louder. Because of this, orchestras
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: are not balanced one part of the orchestra can make
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: it difficult to hear the others.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: Sax hoped the saxophone would solve this problem. The new
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: instrument would play like a wind instrument, but like most
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: brass instruments, it would be made from metal. This would
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: give the instrument the sound of a woodwind, but it
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: could be as loud as a brass instrument. And it
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: could be as expressive as a string instrument. Sax believed
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  Speaker 2: this new instrument could solve the problems he found in orchestras.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: He even thought that one day saxophones would replace other
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  Speaker 2: wind instruments. He even invented different kinds of saxophones for
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: this reason.
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: In eighteen forty two, Sax moved to Paris. This was
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  Speaker 1: the center of Europe's instrument making world, and Paris had
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  Speaker 1: some of the continent's most important composers, people who write music.
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: Sax hoped that here his work would be influential. He
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: also hoped that his work would make him a good
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: deal of money.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: For a while Sax risk worked, most orchestras did not
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  Speaker 2: take on the saxophone, but he persuaded the French military
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: to use his instruments, including the saxophone. He made friends
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: with many important composers. These composers was named Hector BerliOS.
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: He was one of the first people to write music
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  Speaker 2: for the saxophone. He wrote about the instrument in one
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  Speaker 2: Paris newspaper.
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  Speaker 4: The sound quality of the saxophone has something strange and
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  Speaker 4: sad about it in its high notes. The low notes,
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  Speaker 4: on the other hand, are of a great nature. One
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  Speaker 4: might even say they are amazing. For works that are
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  Speaker 4: mysterious or serious, the saxophone is the most beautiful low
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  Speaker 4: voice known to this day.
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  Speaker 1: For several years, Sax was very successful. He created many special,
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: creative instruments. He improved older instruments, and he was for
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: a while the only person making saxophones. By the eighteen fifties,
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: he was one of Paris's most well known musical names.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: But Sax's success did not last. He had created something original,
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  Speaker 2: but people were slow to understand it. Some musicians found
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: his instrument too strange to work with. Composers did not
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  Speaker 2: know how to fit it into their music. Many did
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  Speaker 2: not take it seriously, and Sax's competitors also made sure
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  Speaker 2: it stayed that way. Other instrument makers formed organizations to
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: compete with him. They wrote negative things about him in newspapers.
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: They stole his ideas twice. They even tried to have
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: him killed.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: But Sax also hurt his own business. He had a
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: difficult personality. He could be extremely stubborn or wilful. He
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: would take people to court who made instruments that were
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: like saxophones, and he would do it often legal action
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: cost him a lot of money, and it made no
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: money in return. He often found himself in financial trouble.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: His business lost all of its money three times. He
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: died in eighteen ninety four with very little money.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: Still, Adolph Sax's name lives on. In the years since
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: he died, the saxophone has become one of the most
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: popular instruments in the world. It is important to the
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: history of blues music. It is even more important in jazz.
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: It never truly became popular in orchestras, but its unique
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  Speaker 2: sound helped create new, more popular kinds of music. Some
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  Speaker 2: hate it, some love it, but didd it is difficult
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: to deny the power of Adolph Sachs greatest creation.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: What kind of music do you like? Does it include
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: the saxophone? You can leave a comment on our website
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: or email us at Radio at Spotlight English dot com.
• 9:25
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• 9:30
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• 9:35
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• 9:41
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• 9:46
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• 9:52
  Speaker 2: The writer of this program was Dan Chrisman. The producer
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: was Migo Ozaki. The voices you heard were from the
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: United Kingdom and the United States. All quotes were adapted
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  Speaker 2: for this program and voiced by Spotlight. No AI or
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: artificial intelligence was used in this program. Spotlight programs are written, voiced,
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: and produced by real people for real people, no matter
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: where in the world you live. This program is called
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: The Strange Life of Adolph Sachs.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: We hope you can join us again for the next
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: Spotlight program. Goodbye,