Should I buy a modern sax???

MartinMods said:
Interesting. I don't know anything about them, really. I just heard the only (and first ever of any C soprano) video demo of the "E-R" horn I could find, played by the "R" half of the team, and he did not play it in tune by any "stretch" of the imagination. I could hear the new scale and resultant modern tone.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1l22AliWDb8


Then I listened to the only Conn C soprano (1921) video I could find, and, the reverb and effects aside, I much prefer the sweet singing sound of the Conn, the played intonation of which, was much better than that of the new ER, for my taste.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Js6AsLXnGE
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Poor comparison, if'n you ask me. An intermediate player vs. a pro. Sound stage vs. impromptu performance. But sure, a pro can make almost any horn sound great. Those of us who are hobbyists should consider a horn that is easier to play vs. one that would have you fighting the intonation the whole time. There is a world of difference between the two players. And it is geometrically more complex if you play more than three kinds of saxes and even more so for a doubler playing other instruments too.
 
Helen said:
Pete...

"Pretty"... It has to look pretty? Care to clarify that one? You don't mean to say that you'd discriminate against a horn with a killer sound just because it didn't look "pretty" to you, do you? You're not that superficial. Are you? ;-) If so, then my poor Zeph will never make your calendar... :cry: I guess its chances of being a pinup are dashed... :emoji_smile:
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Some people want the shiny. I've had more than one person overlook horns I've owned or played because they weren't.

It's just one thing that some people look for. Seriously.
 
MartinMods said:
I didn't say that all vintage horns are good. I said, all good vintage horns are easy to play in tune, if you can play.
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You know, I didn't see that word "good" in your original post. I should have known it was there. Sorry about that Lance... I wouldn't have replied if I had seen that one word. :emoji_flushed:

... Maybe my subconscious really just wanted to use that pig & lipstick expression. ;-)
 
Wow... Shiny... Old horn smell... I'm starting to detect some vintage horn bias here. Interesting...

Personal opinion time here....

Shiny... Who cares? I'm buying a horn, not because of the way it looks, but because of the way it sounds. Not because I'm planning on reselling either. I'm a player, not a collector. Point in fact... The Zeph I bought from Sarge last year. It is the least attractive horn I own, and is a killer sax. It has a resonance that literally vibrates objects in the room. Sarge couldn't believe the sound of this sax. It's perfectly even in scale, and is a snap to play in tune. Is it pretty? No. Pretty is the one a few serial number away from it, that Sarge had, also made in 1950. It, rather than being 95% delacquered, is 99% lacquered with its original finish still. No comparison in sound however, when played side by side. Pretty does not trump sound. IMO anyway.

As far as smell goes... What smell?

I own 19 vintage horns. Not 1, and I mean 1, smells. Even the ones that haven't been rebuilt yet. However, if I did get a horn that had an oder, restoring it, would get rid of that oder, since the the pads, felts, and corks would be replaced. All the metal would be cleaned, and if it's silver, it would be polished.

Many times, the offending culprit is the case. Getting a vintage horn a new case, is the best way ensure that old smells aren't reintroduced back into the newly restored horn. Even if you haven't restored the horn, just getting it a new case, will often get rid of bad smells. (Also, just keeping the sax out in a stand for a while, and letting it air out is a good start as well.)

I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything. I'm just stating my personal experiences, and opinions FWIW.
 
I was thinking the same thing about the smelly vintage horns; none of mine smell.

Shiny, well just because we notice a bias toward the glare doesn't mean we agree. For me it comes down to the fact that I'd like all six models (sop - bass) that I play regularly to have great ergos and no major intonation challenges. Is that asking too much?
 
Gandalfe said:
Those of us who are hobbyists should consider a horn that is easier to play vs. one that would have you fighting the intonation the whole time.
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My point is, don't blame good vintage instruments for intonation problems, just because they offer true professional tonal response and flexibility. A real professional horn is more challenging to play than a good intermediate horn, a joy for the pro, and a nightmare for the hobbyist.

I've worked on stage with Laksar before. I wouldn't label him a pro player, but, that is his name on the horn (Eppelsheim-Reese), so it would surprise me really if he was completely unfamiliar with the instrument.
 
Most of mine did smell. Buffalo, NY = high humidity = mold.

Consider the shiny, again. If you're the parent of $beginner_student, are you going buy the horn that looks beat up or the one that's shiny? Especially if the shiny one costs significantly less.

For what it's worth, I'm not going out of my way to praise vintage horns. My opinion is the reason why there is a vintage horn market is because a lot of vintage horns are as good as any modern horn and generally cost less. I happen to like the way all saxophones look and I enjoy hunting for the ones that are truly uncommon or rare, but if I'm offered a choice between a Conn 30M and a Yamaha 62 -- and I can't sell it to get something else -- I'm taking the 62.
 
pete said:
....but if I'm offered a choice between a Conn 30M and a Yamaha 62 -- and I can't sell it to get something else -- I'm taking the 62.
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I'll take the 30M then, thanks. I remember when I owned a 62 alto and tenor. After playing them for a few months on various gigs, another sax player who knew my playing asked me, "What's wrong man? You lost your sound."
 
... and MartinMods demonstrates my point beautifully: two pro musicians with differing opinions.

Again, I will say that I was incredibly impressed with the warm, full tone of the 30M and I was appreciative of the way the horn felt, even though it wasn't "Selmer style keywork." However, it felt a bit hard to control and the intonation was something I had to focus a bit too much on. It was, definitely, miles better than the several pre-1930s Conns I've played.

(I also never really had much of a "need" for a tenor, but that's aside from the point.)
 
pete said:
Consider the shiny, again. If you're the parent of $beginner_student, are you going buy the horn that looks beat up or the one that's shiny? Especially if the shiny one costs significantly less.
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My 14 year old daughter, having played clarinet for a few years, wanted a bash at alto sax.

The choice in house already was a Yanagisawa (vito VSP - the A600 in the gallery on this site) - shiny

IMG_3025.jpg


or a 1950s Couesnon with the odd resoldered post, odd ergonomics, missing lacquer, scratches etc

monopolealto.jpg


Result - she chose the Couesnon. "Looks way cooler"
She also raided my mouthpiece draw, and having no knowledge of mouthpieces, she claimed my slant sig Link (with Wolfe Tayne facing) as her own...
 
MartinMods wrote: "I remember when I owned a 62 alto and tenor. After playing them for a few months on various gigs, another sax player who knew my playing asked me, "What's wrong man? You lost your sound."

pete said:
... and MartinMods demonstrates my point beautifully: two pro musicians with differing opinions.
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Not really, Pete. I was very unhappy with the 62's and agreed with the other musician completely. I sold them shortly thereafter and went back to Mk6's.
 
My old Conn, from the early 1920's, stank to high heaven when I first found it. At that point, it was truly a piece of junk, having been stored in the damp in the original green lining case for decades before someone decided to put it up for sale.

The horn was completely stripped, all the way down to disassembling the micro-tuner, cleaned, replated and rebuilt. From almost every bit of the horn, the stink has gone, but the lower joint between the tube and the bell occasionally (when the weather is warm) emits a whiff of "old horn stink".

In all other aspects, it's a wonderful horn. (Well, except for the thumb hook, and the LH little finger table keys.) If I knew how to post a photo, I'd put one up - the engraving is (as far as I can tell) a unique, custom job.

In any event, it's only a reflection on the owners prior to me. My "bought as new" horns smell pretty much like a piece of oily wood or clean brass ought to smell.
 
Slightly off topic, but can anyone explain the logo on the Couesnon at all? There must be some history or story behind it: An axe and rooster head. What's that about? I can just imagine the meetings in the ad agency offices as they're trying to come up with ideas for this one....

OK, so the farmer is going out to the chicken coop to pick out a bird for Sunday's dinner. The farmer is carrying an axe in his hand. In the background you hear the sound of saxophone being practiced. It's the farmer's kid. He's practicing on a Couesnon saxophone.
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I could go on, but since this is a G-rated forum, I won't turn it into a horror story, but you get the idea. :emoji_relaxed: It could get quite ghoulish... Which is rather how I see the logo on the Couesnon saxophones. Hence my original question, because I must be missing something.
 
I must admit I'm a bit confused about some of the intonation issues that have been raised here. I think the best quote that I have ever read about saxophone intonation, came from Stephen Howard. He said something like: (this is a paraphrase, because I don't have the exact quote in front of me at the moment)

No saxophone plays 100% in tune. It is the player's job to make it play in tune.
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Now while Howard would be the first to admit that tuning is among the first things to consider when buying a vintage sax, we do need to keep in mind that if a horn doesn't have inherent structural problems which are leading to its intonation issues, any (vintage & modern) saxophone's tuning issues can usually be corrected through proper tweaking by a tech, eg: key heights, and a good horn/mouthpiece/reed combo. Once those things have been taken care of, then the player just needs to become familiar with the horn enough to know how to make those minute facial adjustments to get the horn to play in tune.

All my vintage saxes require slightly different facial adjustments. No doubt about it. However, so too do modern horns. When I play a Yamaha, I have to play it differently in order to get it to even remotely play in tune. Same when I play my friend's Cannonball, which I do quite regularly. The thing is, the more you play the horn, the less you are aware of the changes you are making.

My Selmer VI and my King require slightly different adjustments to play in tune. These are my 2 main axes. I'm not even aware what I do to get them to play in tune. I was aware when I first got the Zeph 8 months ago, but now, I don't even think about. It took me only a couple of weeks before I was totally comfortable with the horn. (Probably less than that actually.) When I go to pick up on of my German horns--either my Dörfler & Jörka (Keilwerth clone) or my Hammerschmidt--I need to make different facial adjustments. They are also not as happy with my main mouthpieces. However, they play in tune for me as well.

My 10M & Martin Handcraft always play in tune for me. I can't seem to get them to play out of tune. I don't know, maybe I'm just lucky. Maybe I just have amazing examples of some classic, and obscure vintage tenors. But I don't think so.

I honestly believe that tuning is an "internal something" that a player can develop, and after a player has internalized it for his/her particular horn, then it no longer is an issue. Maybe I see things too simplistically. However, that has been my personal experience.
 
I've also heard this from one of my instructors, "If you tune a note on your sax, how many notes are in tune on the instrument." The answer of course is "none". And we've all seen players who play to a tuner on their stand which is just ugly. But that's not what I am talking about when I say that some horns are easier to play in tune than others. I suspect you know what I mean by that.

Stephen is a vintage horn aficionado just like Helen and Lance. And all three of you are pros, as far as I can tell having only heard Helen play in person. I think this argument is more about promoting vintage as an option vice anything else. I'm guessing over 95% or more of all sax players are young students, hobbyists, and the like. We need to consider them in the equation.
 
Helen said:
I must admit I'm a bit confused about some of the intonation issues that have been raised here. I think the best quote that I have ever read about saxophone intonation, came from Stephen Howard. He said something like: (this is a paraphrase, because I don't have the exact quote in front of me at the moment)



Now while Howard would be the first to admit that tuning is among the first things to consider when buying a vintage sax, we do need to keep in mind that if a horn doesn't have inherent structural problems which are leading to its intonation issues, any (vintage & modern) saxophone's tuning issues can usually be corrected through proper tweaking by a tech, eg: key heights, and a good horn/mouthpiece/reed combo. Once those things have been taken care of, then the player just needs to become familiar with the horn enough to know how to make those minute facial adjustments to get the horn to play in tune.

All my vintage saxes require slightly different facial adjustments. No doubt about it. However, so too do modern horns. When I play a Yamaha, I have to play it differently in order to get it to even remotely play in tune. Same when I play my friend's Cannonball, which I do quite regularly. The thing is, the more you play the horn, the less you are aware of the changes you are making.

My Selmer VI and my King require slightly different adjustments to play in tune. These are my 2 main axes. I'm not even aware what I do to get them to play in tune. I was aware when I first got the Zeph 8 months ago, but now, I don't even think about. It took me only a couple of weeks before I was totally comfortable with the horn. (Probably less than that actually.) When I go to pick up on of my German horns--either my Dörfler & Jörka (Keilwerth clone) or my Hammerschmidt--I need to make different facial adjustments. They are also not as happy with my main mouthpieces. However, they play in tune for me as well.

My 10M & Martin Handcraft always play in tune for me. I can't seem to get them to play out of tune. I don't know, maybe I'm just lucky. Maybe I just have amazing examples of some classic, and obscure vintage tenors. But I don't think so.

I honestly believe that tuning is an "internal something" that a player can develop, and after a player has internalized it for his/her particular horn, then it no longer is an issue. Maybe I see things too simplistically. However, that has been my personal experience.
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That sums it up pretty well, Helen. I'd like to add that, the fact that the saxophone has keys and defined fingerings, does not make it a piano, with a fixed pitch for every note - just push the buttons and blow. It's more like a violin or cello, where there are note positions, but the actual control of the pitch of the note, is up to the player and his/her inner ear. If you don't pre-hear the note, knowing exactly where you want it to go, it won't happen. Either you know what you want, which enables you to play the instrument, or you are unsure, and the instrument is playing you. A good vintage horn can be an obedient servant, or a ruthless master, depending on who is in command.

Also, in the real world of music, the correct place for any note changes with the tonality, and the needs of the music and the performance. Not even the most super modern sax with the greatest scale and intonation, will play in tune at all, if the player isn't listening and adjusting to the other players in the group. Intonation is 100% the player's responsibility.
 
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