Saxophones Dave Walker Saxes

[Pete Thomas]

The fact that your only 2 replies to the comments here have been these ^^^^...sorta intimates to me that I may not have been far off in my positing earlier on:

Although I do tend to believe anyone with a huge chicken growing out the back of their head, I wouldn't be so quick to judge please.

 

[JayeNM]

Its good to see another British made sax, at £7000 its out of my range but I don't think its over priced compared to other high end tenors, Inderbinen's are dearer at CHF11,200 and its in the same range as the high end R&C,s, even top end Yani's and Selmer Ref tenors are not too far from this price.

Again for the sake of fairness.....you may indeed have some valid points here. My problem at the moment is, the marketing pitches being utilized are just the usual specious claims, many of which have been discussed and debated ad infinitum (and at times disproven) over the years.

So if someone actually has produced an 'elevated' product.....then fer chrissake !!!...elevate how you are gonna present this horn !

Because that website pitch is sorta embarrassing at the moment (as are the OP's comments here thus far).

 

[JayeNM]

Although I do tend to believe anyone with a huge chicken growing out the back of their head, I wouldn't be so quick to judge please.

Hey, hey, hey !!!...it's not just a 'chicken'...it's a Rooster, OK ? 😡

(and...perhaps...it is I who am growing out of him, eh ? )

 

[Pete Thomas]

(as are the OP's comments here thus far).

Again, I'd like to give people the benefit of the doubt.

Having said that, I'm scratching my head over "Yorkshire built" it implies it's all made in Yorkshire - especially to citizens outside the UK where (as mentioned) "made in..." implies something else. This saxophone could be made in Eastern Europe, Vietnam, China, Taiwan or the Falkland Islands.

 

[Alice]

Hey, hey, hey !!!...it's not just a 'chicken'...it's a Rooster, OK ? 😡

(and...perhaps...it is I who am growing out of him, eh ? )

A bit like Kuato, the mutant twin in the movie Total Recall?

 

[Halfers]

Hey, hey, hey !!!...it's not just a 'chicken'...it's a Rooster, OK ? 😡

(and...perhaps...it is I who am growing out of him, eh ? )

A big chicken growing out of your head is probably preferable to using the British term for Rooster..

 

[Alice]

Having said that, I'm scratching my head over "Yorkshire built"

Implies decades worth of hard toil, slog, solid, pride and tradition as well as a good, no nonsense attitude and a decent cup of tea.

 

[Jeanette]

Again, I'd like to give people the benefit of the doubt.

I agree, it's fine to question posts but sometimes members can jump on the band wagon of trashing something unfairly. Better if we can stay open minded. We have lost members because of this in the past and I'd hate someone to be wary of posting something new they found because it might not be well received.

That said we do value all opinions we just need to be careful how they are worded and that they are not seen as attacking, gentle humour always resonates well with me 🙂

Jx

 

[griff136]

........
Even hand made saxophones like Inderbinden and Peter Jessen are said to use keywork bought in from other manufacturers

Inderbinden definitely use yamaha kework

 

[JayeNM]

I agree, it's fine to question posts but sometimes members can jump on the band wagon of trashing something unfairly. Better if we can stay open minded. We have lost members because of this in the past and I'd hate someone to be wary of posting something new they found because it might not be well received.

That said we do value all opinions we just need to be careful how they are worded and that they are not seen as attacking, gentle humour always resonates well with me 🙂

Jx

Absolutely, and I don't mean to be 'trashing' anything. As I said, it may be an interesting endeavor with some serious R&D behind it; but for the moment its website is representing the product somewhat awfully by virtue of the fact it is recycling dubious marketing statements we have all heard before....

 

[jazzdoh]

Again for the sake of fairness.....you may indeed have some valid points here. My problem at the moment is, the marketing pitches being utilized are just the usual specious claims, many of which have been discussed and debated ad infinitum (and at times disproven) over the years.

So if someone actually has produced an 'elevated' product.....then fer chrissake !!!...elevate how you are gonna present this horn !

Because that website pitch is sorta embarrassing at the moment (as are the OP's comments here thus far).

I agree with you about the the promotion of the the product, one can only think that maybe they specialise as saxophone technicians and not computer technicians, and maybe they didn't want to spend the cash drafting the latter in.

 

[altissimo]

it seems strange to me that they've spent a considerable amount of time and money getting the non standard parts for this sax made, but so little time and effort into promoting the thing - there aren't any prices given on their website or the All Brass and Woodwind website, so the only evidence we have for it being £7k is the first post on this thread.

Designing a web site isn't that difficult - far easier than designing a saxophone - and a few hundred quid to a whizz kid with a laptop and a decent camera would do wonders.
As far as I can tell, there are only a few of these saxes in existence, so maybe they're still in the preproduction stage - who knows?

 

[Pete Thomas]

so the only evidence we have for it being £7k is the first post on this thread.

Good point, @Saxodent can you say where the £7000 price comes from (also the made in Yorkshire?)

one can only think that maybe they specialise as saxophone technicians and not computer technicians, and maybe they didn't want to spend the cash drafting the latter in.

These days you don't need to be a computer technician to have a modern responsive website, available off the peg. Marketing is just down to writing the blurb using a text editor as simple as the one we have here

 

[JazzMatt]

Good point, @Saxodent can you say where the £7000 price comes from (also the made in Yorkshire?)



These days you don't need to be a computer technician to have a modern responsive website, available off the peg. Marketing is just down to writing the blurb using a text editor as simple as the one we have here

Surely the IP address can be traced..

 

[jazzdoh]

If its not that difficult to build a website then I'm surprised they haven't done it, maybe we will see this improved more in the future, I've never had to do it but it seems many websites get neglected, Rafael Navarro mouthpieces comes to mind, his site never got updated.

 

[JayeNM]

it seems strange to me that they've spent a considerable amount of time and money getting the non standard parts for this sax made, but so little time and effort into promoting the thing -

THIS is an interesting observation and actually....not the sole example of such a dynamic.
Now and again, in thread discussions on new products, there will be mfr's or sales rep claims of this or that which would be, quite honestly, quite significant as far as the development of sax design goes. Oftentimes an obvious question is posed: 'if you've managed to do ALL of that, WHY hasn't anyone heard about this and why are you not full-on promoting it on every obvious marketing venue available ?"

Yes, one answer can be "we are designers, not marketers" and THIS is actually a reasonable answer sometimes - although a generalization, IMHO most creative folks tend to be mediocre-at-best business people -

But something as simple as a nice, slick website with PROOFREAD text, clickable/zoomable detailed photos, official product announcements, and a big effort to make trade-show appearances is all pretty basic marketing stuff that one would expect to have been built into any prospectus....

 

[altissimo]

Unless you've got a big fat bank balance, if you're planning on going into business selling an new product you've got to come up with a business plan that satisfies the bank manager enough to lend you the cash. So aviable marketing strategy to make back the investment plus interest in a fixed time frame would seem like the kind of thing they'd be looking for before they hand you the cheque...
Maybe Mr Walker has managed to persuade Geneva Group/Amati to finance the project and make the instruments without him having to invest in the project, although given their lack of distribution in the UK and elsewhere, they could do with a bit of marketing oomph themselves.

It'd be a shame for these saxes not to succeed, although if they are 7 grand then sales will be slow - I think the reason people spend lots of money on a vintage Mark VI isn't because they want to spend 6 or 7 grand on a sax so much as they want a Mark VI and that's what they cost.
You'd have to be a real marketing genius to make a brand new sax have the same mystique and desirability as a vintage Selmer and there's a lot of stiff competition from other makers

 

[Andrew Sanders]

Implies decades worth of hard toil, slog, solid, pride and tradition as well as a good, no nonsense attitude and a decent cup of tea.

A saxophone with nowt buggered about with, like white bread? Aye......

 

[thomsax]

I don't see what's the problem? Some interesting details on the sax. It's free to watch and read. If you don't like it go to another page. I like it. And I also like Powell Eagle, King Super 21, Codera, Allesophone (R&C), Grafton ..... . Always interesting to read about saxes? Maybe it's just a "look at us and see what we can do".

Eb Alto Saxophone - Alessophone - Rampone & Cazzani Handmade Italian Saxophones

Rampone & Cazzani is an Italian manufacturer of wind instruments, specializing in the production of handmade saxophones by highly skilled craftsmen. The company is located in Quarna Sotto (Italy).

www.ramponecazzani.com

 

[griff136]

I also think that at a price point of 7K these horns are Niche market and perhaps Dave Walker doesn't necessarily want hundreds of folk wanting to buy them if he himself alone is assembling, padding and setting them up,
I'd sure like to try one - I've seen Shabaka Hutchings playing his.