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Linky Lee
Senior Member
- Messages
- 1,954
- Location
- Salisbury, UK
As some of you may know I'm in the hunt for a new tenor sax to upgrade from my Prelude by Selmer TS700.
Today I had the chance to give the two above saxophones a decent blow and a brief encounter with a Yani 902 which I won't write about as I only got 10 minutes on the thing.
Before reading this do remember it is all personal and very much opinion and will differ hugely for every other person.
The short review is that the cannonball was clunky, and buttery under the hands and the octave mechanism was awful, there was a centimeter of play before the key moved the nipple on the crook, which got reduced by half once I pointed it out to one of the representatives. The sound was boring and unlively and a bit brash and uncontrolled.
The Keilworth was better and managed to still suck quite efficiently. One huge problem was that the key pearls where huge! and hugely dished! so big that your fingers were slopping all over the place and you had to play it with straight fingers to feel secure, forcing bad technique onto you. The D key was a complete peal key width to far inwards and was either very uncomfortable or made you angle your hand so the thumb took lots of weight and the Eb key was impossible to get as it sat under your ring finger. It has adjustable palm keys that one of the technicians didn't even know about until I told him after asking how they worked and if they locked securely (Honestly some people don't use their eyes!). The sound was much nicer yet it didn't quite have the quality that the I noticed from the Yani in the 10 minutes I had with it. The keilworth played nicely in the low end but the top end was rubbish, thinned out much more than the cannonball and the Yani was far superior to them all but quite a way.
As I didn't get enough time on the Yani I found my Prelude to be tenfold times better than both of these saxes, both supposed to be top of the range and at premium prices.
The cannonball's finish was well done but personally it looked foul. The Shadow was equally as bad, though the engraving was much nicer Though the black key pearls was a negative. The stones in the cannonball were what I believe is known as 'tigers eye' an orange like colour that looks very very nice, though pearls have a nicer feel to them and would be much better on an instrument that wasn't black.
The keilworth really opened up a lot when played at louder volumes, but the cannonball was just pathetic, it was like a sloth. and was very uninspiring.
I'd like to have another go of the Yani, especially alongside a 901 for comparison and the TJ Sig custom and Yamaha 62. Hopefully I can work out a way to get a Hanson to try out along side them as well.
It just goes to show how good the Prelude is, especially at it's price point. Though I've found it isn't up to the job action wise, it get's left behind on some faster passages, especially on the bell keys and lots of G# and front F key use.
The tone is quite reed heavy, which is a nice sound but there is too much of the high pitch grating reed sound that I don't like.
Today I had the chance to give the two above saxophones a decent blow and a brief encounter with a Yani 902 which I won't write about as I only got 10 minutes on the thing.
Before reading this do remember it is all personal and very much opinion and will differ hugely for every other person.
The short review is that the cannonball was clunky, and buttery under the hands and the octave mechanism was awful, there was a centimeter of play before the key moved the nipple on the crook, which got reduced by half once I pointed it out to one of the representatives. The sound was boring and unlively and a bit brash and uncontrolled.
The Keilworth was better and managed to still suck quite efficiently. One huge problem was that the key pearls where huge! and hugely dished! so big that your fingers were slopping all over the place and you had to play it with straight fingers to feel secure, forcing bad technique onto you. The D key was a complete peal key width to far inwards and was either very uncomfortable or made you angle your hand so the thumb took lots of weight and the Eb key was impossible to get as it sat under your ring finger. It has adjustable palm keys that one of the technicians didn't even know about until I told him after asking how they worked and if they locked securely (Honestly some people don't use their eyes!). The sound was much nicer yet it didn't quite have the quality that the I noticed from the Yani in the 10 minutes I had with it. The keilworth played nicely in the low end but the top end was rubbish, thinned out much more than the cannonball and the Yani was far superior to them all but quite a way.
As I didn't get enough time on the Yani I found my Prelude to be tenfold times better than both of these saxes, both supposed to be top of the range and at premium prices.
The cannonball's finish was well done but personally it looked foul. The Shadow was equally as bad, though the engraving was much nicer Though the black key pearls was a negative. The stones in the cannonball were what I believe is known as 'tigers eye' an orange like colour that looks very very nice, though pearls have a nicer feel to them and would be much better on an instrument that wasn't black.
The keilworth really opened up a lot when played at louder volumes, but the cannonball was just pathetic, it was like a sloth. and was very uninspiring.
I'd like to have another go of the Yani, especially alongside a 901 for comparison and the TJ Sig custom and Yamaha 62. Hopefully I can work out a way to get a Hanson to try out along side them as well.
It just goes to show how good the Prelude is, especially at it's price point. Though I've found it isn't up to the job action wise, it get's left behind on some faster passages, especially on the bell keys and lots of G# and front F key use.
The tone is quite reed heavy, which is a nice sound but there is too much of the high pitch grating reed sound that I don't like.
