Historically, did he perform cleverly on sax? (5)
I believe the answer is:
saxon
'historically did he perform' is the definition.
The answer is a person as well as being a singular noun. This is suggested by the definition.
'cleverly on sax?' is the wordplay.
'cleverly' indicates anagramming the letters.
'on'+'sax'='onsax'
'onsax' anagrammed gives 'SAXON'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for saxon that I've seen before include "Ancient German" , "Germanic tribesman" , "Settler from Germany in the home counties" , "Race of England's rulers before the Conquest" , "Pre-Norman" .)