This one is for folks that like old horns.
I've been playing sax for about 15 years now, started late in life, and it's my main instrument now. I love it. Being a recovering guitar player and even worse, a recovering consumer, I brought the same 'collection' mentality to my world of playing sax. Long story short, I've been through more tenors than any person should ever go through. At one point I always had 3 in rotation, sometimes up to 5. Talk about not getting much done! So when I ran out of credit and decided financial sobriety is a good idea I needed to answer what is the best horn for me? What is the best tool for all of my jobs?
My first influence on sax was really Lester Young. And my first teacher played the baddest Conn 10M in the universe, a 1939 model he bought in 1948. I heard him bury many guys at jam sessions on their shiny new horns. His by this point was covered in rubber bands to make it work. Anyone who really knew WC Cage in the Portland Oregon area wanted to buy his horn. I secretly broke the 10 commandments by coveting it myself. He had such a great sound on that thing. So for me I had to have a Conn 10M. Actually, I had to have a 30M which is what I got. The flagship.
Ugh....that was kinda a no fun horn. Stiff. I just played the fanciest one in the universe today, a gold plated model built in the 30's for Al Epstein who played with Benny Goodman and Andy Kirk. Gorgeous horn, totally unenjoyable to play. At least for me.
So I moved to a 10M. More fun, better horn all around. I owned a few, the 1942 model was by far the best. The '48 was kinda, meh.... And the '59, ew...not for me. That '41 had it going on though. Very dark and for a 10M it was pretty flexible. But I convinced myself I didn't deserve such a nice horn and sold it for $1942 to a guy in Germany. Mistake? Maybe. Oh well. It was red, lotta copper. I kinda gravitate towards red horns:
I won't bother with the whole list which includes a King, Buffet Dynaction, an old 30's Selmer that my band got mad at me for selling, I'll just stick with the horns from Elkhart Indiana.
Could you imagine Elkhart back in the day? It was a brass town I've been told. 3 major sax manufacturers there. So cool.
Anyway, I probably sold that 10M cause I didn't like it as much as my main horn which was a Conn Chu Berry from 1928. I had 3, 2 were about 20 serial numbers apart, one of which was a gold plate portrait model, the other bare brass. And a 1921 model that was silver. The '21 was pure Lester Young. Too Lester Young. Beautiful sounding horn. I miss that one. It looked like hell and heaven in the same bar. Sold that to buy a stupid Selmer. The gold plated one went away for the same reason as the horn pictured above: crap self esteem! I don't deserve this horn so I sold it to a guy in Staten Island. Made a few rubles on it. The bare brass one was my main squeeze for about 7 years. I did have a Transitional naked lady I bought in Baltimore at Bills Music that was mint. Traded that one for the stupid 30M. Now that was a mistake. The guy I traded it to thought I was crazy. I ran into that horn later on when I became a better player and well, there is a reason why some folks think they are the best tenors money can buy.
Here's me and my 1921 model:
So what did I like about the Chu horns better than the M series? They are flexible. More fun to play.
This is the horn. Notice the neck is from a Buescher 400. That was a deadly combo. But the neck went away to someone who 'deserved it more than I'.... See a pattern??? Anyway, yeah, this horn was good but difficult to center. Quite spread. My other '28 was too. The '21 and that tranny I had were more pure sounding. Solid fundamental, much like Prez. Oh I tried all kinds of silly tricks to get it to center. Had the original neck 5x nickel plated which made it heavier. Did it make a difference? I thought so but after a while couldn't remember what it was like in the first place. Besides, a good reed makes a huge difference. Plating does nothing compared to a good or bad reed and good or bad practice habits. Oh consumerism and marketing coupled with online forums is a bad mix for a guy with a credit card addiction!
With original neck:
I also used it with a Mexiconn 16M neck.
Those are great on these old horns. Better neck angle, better pitch, more power and focus. But....What was I after?
I simply became more dis-satisfied with my sound, especially on recordings. The old Chu, when played with a female vocalist, there is nothing like the subtone on one of these. It fills the room without ever getting in her way. Just a beautiful tone. But I am a recovering Luddite. Time to move into the 21st Century.
In 2008 I was in Baltimore at Teds music shop on Center and Charles Street. He had this old Bundy in the window for the past 3 years, a 30's model just like the one Wayne Shorter played. Built by Buescher. It needed work but just had such a lovely sound and the engraving was gorgeous. I used it on one gig with the band, lacked the power but listening back the sound just reached out and grabbed me. I sold it for a profit to a guy in Japan. Took him a week to send the money and I secretly hoped he would flake. I even told him not to worry about it if he couldn't follow through. But he did and i was kinda bummed. This paid for a lot of my gas money on our 2008 Econo Crash tour so I was glad but something told me that if I paid to have that horn fixed up nice, it would have really made some changes.
This is right before I discovered Portlands finest saxophone dealer, Mr Peter Deley.
There is no cooler cat than him. Saxes, flutes, clarinets, kitchen knives, espresso makers and bicycles. He knows his stuff. I got my best kitchen knife from him and my current tenor. I would go to his house and try out horns for hours over Cappucinos. We'd compare SML to Selmer to Buescher to Conn to whatever modern stuff there is. I bought this 30's art Deco Buecher Aristocrat:
Sorry, crap photo but my good ones won't load for some reason!
Anyway, it was one of those old models with the skinny little bell that looks like it shouldn't be so powerful but for some reason it just projects out into the room better than anything else. This horn looked awful: on it's 2nd relacquer, someone painted it whorehouse gold at one point, and it had a Conn 10M neck (eventually sold that for a pretty penny and bought a proper Buescher neck for way less and made it a better horn. If I learned anything by all this silly neck swapping its that the neck does make a huge difference. A Buescher neck on a Conn body, the horn sounds more Buescher. I recently tried a Selmer neck on a Buescher and it really became the best of both.)
So I bought this right before I moved to Los Angeles in 2010. I started playing this more and more. The tone was simply better than my Conn. Better for cutting tracks with. But the Conn feels like a bigger tone, I couldn't get into the Buescher as much as I wanted to cause I was hooked on that cavernous Conn tone, or, I really was hooked on the idea of the Conn.
Here it is on a session I did in LA:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWaJ35iKUO8
And a duo with my good friend Steven Denman:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4MDnAsiY7I&list=UUMhr-A-1fGhPjvHFF9fBP-A&index=20
And what it sounds like on a horrible recording!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fhe261bgMIQ
Still sounds great. What it offered was a much wider pallet of colors. A Woody sound, the upper register I could mimic a flute. Really, the Buescher is just a better all around choice. Even my Uncle Cliff, who is a fine saxophonist, when he played it he described it as 'more organic' than his Selmer 6. He simply said "I could fall in love with this horn".
Actually, where ever I played I got high praise for the sound I was getting.
I just wasn't convinced though. Conns are 'cooler'. They mean business. I'm moving to NYC and want to be taken seriously. Bueschers have a bad rap. They don't cost much. And really I don't think most repair men aren't willing to do a great job on them so you seldom find one in great shape. Plus like my uncle said, he would have never considered one back in the 60's cause most players regarded them as "student" horns. You needed a Selmer if you wanted to work and you had to work if you wanted to eat.
So before I moved to New York I sold it to my friend Tiffany. She loves that horn.
About 2 days into my New York life I did a recording session for Fergus and Geronimo. I used my Conn, this was my only tenor now. I liked the sound I got for this amazingly diverse band, it worked but I felt it should be better.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bpgbG8-fBg
I did another session for a straight rock band and became bummed that I sold that Buescher. I sounded terrible on this session. I learned a lot in this session. Stop shopping and commit to one bloody horn. And choose the right tool for the job. The worlds most popular horn is Selmer. I don't have $5k for one and really don't want one. I do need a more modern sound though.
So I gave up on all that silly useless resistance and bought from Peter the horn I've been on for the last year and a half, my 1946 Model 155 Aristocrat. A big B model.
My man Lathan bought my Chu and he loves it. He's got the right horn for his music and I've got the right horn for me now.
What do I love about it? There is nothing it can't do. It's completely flexible and takes whatever air I can give it. I haven't come close to exhausting its volume! Oh I go out and try different horns now and again and this one just knocks them out of the game right away. It's gutsy like a good Chu, got a lot of body but far more complex than the Conns I've played. And best of all, it's fun to play. It blends well with other instruments and doesn't have a personality of it's own. It's entirely up to me to create my sound.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX7JY7aEE8Y
I can say I've never been happier and I love to spend hours practicing with this horn. Will I get another Conn some day? Maybe. They are lovely though, this horn does it all. Difference in how they behave while pushed is significant. A Buescher can get really nasty and I like that. It's great for rock n roll. The Conn seems to stay together, pretty. It's odd that some folks call the Buescher Aristocrat the "classical pro horn". That kept me away. What a stupid thing to say.
So consider one of these. It's keeping me sane and healthy and my wandering attention towards other horns has greatly diminished. I practice way more and am inspired to create way more. I know the next sessions I'm on I'll sound great. A nice boost to my confidence.
Hmmm. Maybe I'll name this one?
J
I've been playing sax for about 15 years now, started late in life, and it's my main instrument now. I love it. Being a recovering guitar player and even worse, a recovering consumer, I brought the same 'collection' mentality to my world of playing sax. Long story short, I've been through more tenors than any person should ever go through. At one point I always had 3 in rotation, sometimes up to 5. Talk about not getting much done! So when I ran out of credit and decided financial sobriety is a good idea I needed to answer what is the best horn for me? What is the best tool for all of my jobs?
My first influence on sax was really Lester Young. And my first teacher played the baddest Conn 10M in the universe, a 1939 model he bought in 1948. I heard him bury many guys at jam sessions on their shiny new horns. His by this point was covered in rubber bands to make it work. Anyone who really knew WC Cage in the Portland Oregon area wanted to buy his horn. I secretly broke the 10 commandments by coveting it myself. He had such a great sound on that thing. So for me I had to have a Conn 10M. Actually, I had to have a 30M which is what I got. The flagship.
Ugh....that was kinda a no fun horn. Stiff. I just played the fanciest one in the universe today, a gold plated model built in the 30's for Al Epstein who played with Benny Goodman and Andy Kirk. Gorgeous horn, totally unenjoyable to play. At least for me.
So I moved to a 10M. More fun, better horn all around. I owned a few, the 1942 model was by far the best. The '48 was kinda, meh.... And the '59, ew...not for me. That '41 had it going on though. Very dark and for a 10M it was pretty flexible. But I convinced myself I didn't deserve such a nice horn and sold it for $1942 to a guy in Germany. Mistake? Maybe. Oh well. It was red, lotta copper. I kinda gravitate towards red horns:
Could you imagine Elkhart back in the day? It was a brass town I've been told. 3 major sax manufacturers there. So cool.
Anyway, I probably sold that 10M cause I didn't like it as much as my main horn which was a Conn Chu Berry from 1928. I had 3, 2 were about 20 serial numbers apart, one of which was a gold plate portrait model, the other bare brass. And a 1921 model that was silver. The '21 was pure Lester Young. Too Lester Young. Beautiful sounding horn. I miss that one. It looked like hell and heaven in the same bar. Sold that to buy a stupid Selmer. The gold plated one went away for the same reason as the horn pictured above: crap self esteem! I don't deserve this horn so I sold it to a guy in Staten Island. Made a few rubles on it. The bare brass one was my main squeeze for about 7 years. I did have a Transitional naked lady I bought in Baltimore at Bills Music that was mint. Traded that one for the stupid 30M. Now that was a mistake. The guy I traded it to thought I was crazy. I ran into that horn later on when I became a better player and well, there is a reason why some folks think they are the best tenors money can buy.
Here's me and my 1921 model:
So what did I like about the Chu horns better than the M series? They are flexible. More fun to play.
With original neck:
I also used it with a Mexiconn 16M neck.
Those are great on these old horns. Better neck angle, better pitch, more power and focus. But....What was I after?
I simply became more dis-satisfied with my sound, especially on recordings. The old Chu, when played with a female vocalist, there is nothing like the subtone on one of these. It fills the room without ever getting in her way. Just a beautiful tone. But I am a recovering Luddite. Time to move into the 21st Century.
In 2008 I was in Baltimore at Teds music shop on Center and Charles Street. He had this old Bundy in the window for the past 3 years, a 30's model just like the one Wayne Shorter played. Built by Buescher. It needed work but just had such a lovely sound and the engraving was gorgeous. I used it on one gig with the band, lacked the power but listening back the sound just reached out and grabbed me. I sold it for a profit to a guy in Japan. Took him a week to send the money and I secretly hoped he would flake. I even told him not to worry about it if he couldn't follow through. But he did and i was kinda bummed. This paid for a lot of my gas money on our 2008 Econo Crash tour so I was glad but something told me that if I paid to have that horn fixed up nice, it would have really made some changes.
This is right before I discovered Portlands finest saxophone dealer, Mr Peter Deley.
There is no cooler cat than him. Saxes, flutes, clarinets, kitchen knives, espresso makers and bicycles. He knows his stuff. I got my best kitchen knife from him and my current tenor. I would go to his house and try out horns for hours over Cappucinos. We'd compare SML to Selmer to Buescher to Conn to whatever modern stuff there is. I bought this 30's art Deco Buecher Aristocrat:
Sorry, crap photo but my good ones won't load for some reason!
Anyway, it was one of those old models with the skinny little bell that looks like it shouldn't be so powerful but for some reason it just projects out into the room better than anything else. This horn looked awful: on it's 2nd relacquer, someone painted it whorehouse gold at one point, and it had a Conn 10M neck (eventually sold that for a pretty penny and bought a proper Buescher neck for way less and made it a better horn. If I learned anything by all this silly neck swapping its that the neck does make a huge difference. A Buescher neck on a Conn body, the horn sounds more Buescher. I recently tried a Selmer neck on a Buescher and it really became the best of both.)
So I bought this right before I moved to Los Angeles in 2010. I started playing this more and more. The tone was simply better than my Conn. Better for cutting tracks with. But the Conn feels like a bigger tone, I couldn't get into the Buescher as much as I wanted to cause I was hooked on that cavernous Conn tone, or, I really was hooked on the idea of the Conn.
Here it is on a session I did in LA:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWaJ35iKUO8
And a duo with my good friend Steven Denman:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4MDnAsiY7I&list=UUMhr-A-1fGhPjvHFF9fBP-A&index=20
And what it sounds like on a horrible recording!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fhe261bgMIQ
Still sounds great. What it offered was a much wider pallet of colors. A Woody sound, the upper register I could mimic a flute. Really, the Buescher is just a better all around choice. Even my Uncle Cliff, who is a fine saxophonist, when he played it he described it as 'more organic' than his Selmer 6. He simply said "I could fall in love with this horn".
Actually, where ever I played I got high praise for the sound I was getting.
I just wasn't convinced though. Conns are 'cooler'. They mean business. I'm moving to NYC and want to be taken seriously. Bueschers have a bad rap. They don't cost much. And really I don't think most repair men aren't willing to do a great job on them so you seldom find one in great shape. Plus like my uncle said, he would have never considered one back in the 60's cause most players regarded them as "student" horns. You needed a Selmer if you wanted to work and you had to work if you wanted to eat.
So before I moved to New York I sold it to my friend Tiffany. She loves that horn.
About 2 days into my New York life I did a recording session for Fergus and Geronimo. I used my Conn, this was my only tenor now. I liked the sound I got for this amazingly diverse band, it worked but I felt it should be better.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bpgbG8-fBg
I did another session for a straight rock band and became bummed that I sold that Buescher. I sounded terrible on this session. I learned a lot in this session. Stop shopping and commit to one bloody horn. And choose the right tool for the job. The worlds most popular horn is Selmer. I don't have $5k for one and really don't want one. I do need a more modern sound though.
So I gave up on all that silly useless resistance and bought from Peter the horn I've been on for the last year and a half, my 1946 Model 155 Aristocrat. A big B model.
My man Lathan bought my Chu and he loves it. He's got the right horn for his music and I've got the right horn for me now.
What do I love about it? There is nothing it can't do. It's completely flexible and takes whatever air I can give it. I haven't come close to exhausting its volume! Oh I go out and try different horns now and again and this one just knocks them out of the game right away. It's gutsy like a good Chu, got a lot of body but far more complex than the Conns I've played. And best of all, it's fun to play. It blends well with other instruments and doesn't have a personality of it's own. It's entirely up to me to create my sound.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX7JY7aEE8Y
I can say I've never been happier and I love to spend hours practicing with this horn. Will I get another Conn some day? Maybe. They are lovely though, this horn does it all. Difference in how they behave while pushed is significant. A Buescher can get really nasty and I like that. It's great for rock n roll. The Conn seems to stay together, pretty. It's odd that some folks call the Buescher Aristocrat the "classical pro horn". That kept me away. What a stupid thing to say.
So consider one of these. It's keeping me sane and healthy and my wandering attention towards other horns has greatly diminished. I practice way more and am inspired to create way more. I know the next sessions I'm on I'll sound great. A nice boost to my confidence.
Hmmm. Maybe I'll name this one?
J
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