Sylvain Carton
Sylvain Carton
“My primary goal with my setup is to get interesting (at least to me) and different sounds while playing acoustic instruments. I think the moment I became hooked on playing saxophone through pedals was when I played bari through an MXR Bass Octave Deluxe and into a fairly large sound system with 16 subs…pretty much the most massive sound I’ve ever heard a saxophone make! I’ve also never been interested in using effects pedals with saxophone unless I had a way to treat the saxophone like a guitar, where you can simply plug in and play through any pedal and amp combo you come across. With a Pasoana microphone inside the mouthpiece of my saxophones and inside the barrel of my clarinet I can do just that and not worry about feedback or mis-triggers on any of my pitch controlling pedals.”
Originally from France, Sylvain Carton is a multi-instrumentalist and composer/producer currently residing in Los Angeles. An accomplished saxophonist and guitarist, Sylvain tours and records regularly with a number of groups representing a variety of musical genres and traditions, such as Beats Antique,The Japonize Elephants, The Mitch Marcus Quintet, Aphrodesia, Space Blaster, John Vanderslice, Maureen and the Mercury Five, Carolyna Picknick, We Are The West, and The Sylvain Carton Quartet.
As a composer/producer Sylvain runs TZME Productions writing and recording original music for various bands, film, commercials, radio spots, jingles, chamber groups, and dance troupes.
Sylvain Carton holds a BM in Jazz Performance from the Indiana University School of Music at Bloomington, where he studied with David Baker, Eugene Rousseau, Tom Walsh, and Shirley Diamond, as well as an M.A. in music composition from UC Santa Cruz, where he co-directed the Latin American Music Ensemble.
In addition to performing and composing, Sylvain is a Vandoren Performing Artist and Artistic Advisor.
Pedals:
Dunlop - mini Bass Wah, mini volume
MXR - Bass Octave Deluxe, Sugar Drive, Carbon Copy, Carbon Copy Deluxe, Reverb, 10 band eq
Boss - Octave
Eventide - Pitch Factor
Electro Harmonix - POG, C9 organ pedal
Strymon - Flint
Digitech - Whammy Wah
TC Electronics - Ditto
Morley - A/B splitter
Radial - stereo D.I.
Microphone: Pasoana mic (drilled into mouthpieces and barrels)
Mouthpieces, reeds and ligatures: Vandoren
Amplification: For all Beats Antique shows I go direct out to two channels (clean and dirty). For my solo sets I split the signal and go into a bass cab and a guitar amp. On other gigs I plug directly into a guitar amp and double up with a stage mic.
Below are some examples of Sylvain using his pedals! Check them out for some inspiration!