Saxophones Selmer no longer supreme!

[PiccoloPirate]

Go to a reputable shop, where the horns are play tested by accomplished musicians, take your current mouthpiece and reeds.
Budgets, like rules/laws, are often happily disregarded.

 

[turf3]

Very far from it. It's a top quality professional saxophone which is out of regulation. And maybe needs a couple of pads.

Well, when I took a closer look last night:

Neck is seriously tweaked, looks like the horn was dropped on it (can't fix that in a couple minutes in the band hall with a screwdriver).

Something wrong with low C# that I couldn't diagnose - seems like the springs are in the right place, but almost zero closing force on the pad. Needed more time to figure it out.

All the adjusting screws on the lower stack had been run in too far so they were holding the related pads off the toneholes (this one I could do something about).

A cork had fallen off in the octave train, so one of the little pins kept popping out of its fork, totally disabling the octave mech. I used a big stack of duct tape to temporarily replace this.

I wasn't able to make the horn a whole bunch better; but this is what you can be facing with even a fairly new, high quality horn. No way that horn could be shown to its advantage in this condition. Next rehearsal, I'll bring my $100 Mexi-Conn for her to use, and it'll be a huge improvement over the Yamaha 62, just because it seals top to bottom and all the keys work properly.

 

[Pete Effamy]

Something wrong with low C# that I couldn't diagnose - seems like the springs are in the right place, but almost zero closing force on the pad. Needed more time to figure it out.

Bell twisted?

 

[turf3]

Bell twisted?

Dunno. I had about 15 minutes in the band hall before rehearsal. What that horn needs, first of all, is to get onto the bench of someone qualified, get the neck fixed, and then careful inspection of the whole thing.

 

[Tonehole]

In the junior college big band I'm playing in, one of the tenor players has been struggling with a horn and she calls it "crap" and the director calls it "Crap". I took a look at it last week - leaks all over the place. I think it may be mostly adjustment screws, not actually bad pads. If she brings it tonight I'm going to see if she'll let me run a leak light down it.

It's a nearly new silver plated Yamaha 62 tenor.

NOT "crap".

turf3 did you play the horn?​

I was going to post my thoughts earlier but did not want to be confrontational or challenge your ability. But since Squealer has posted and he appears to have confirmed my thoughts. Please take my comments as you will and no offence is intended.​

A 62 is not "crap" agreed and if silver plated it is the best, hand selected from many to have that expensive plating done.

I would be interested to know your Directors background as a player. Being in a music program why would the owner not have the horn maintained and why would the "Director" not suggest she have it inspected by a tech.
Is possible it is a knock off?

Really surprising she has been playing it like this from new. I am very good at playing "crap" horns after years of getting by but I am aware the horn has problems as I have to play through them. Maybe not something to be proud of?

I would suggest she take the 62 to a local pro tech after you determine and show her the problems. Once it is set up to optimum performance she will notice it degrading over time as she improves as a player she will be able to adjust her play until she eventually decides enough is enough and takes it in for service.

I am confident you can make the horn play better but can you make it perform to it's optimum?
There is setup and then there is masterful setup, no slight to your ability. Pig Squealer took me through what he did on my C Melody overhaul and it was mind blowing the detail and knowledge of the instrument he has. Have a tech like Barnard, Howard or their ilk overhaul or set up your tenor and see what comes back. This level of tech have decades of experience and incredible skill at their craft.

Turf you know more about horn set up than I but I am aware of my mechanical aptitude limits so I put my trust in those who know far more.

 

[turf3]

turf3 did you play the horn?​

I was going to post my thoughts earlier but did not want to be confrontational or challenge your ability. But since Squealer has posted and he appears to have confirmed my thoughts. Please take my comments as you will and no offence is intended.​

A 62 is not "crap" agreed and if silver plated it is the best, hand selected from many to have that expensive plating done.

I would be interested to know your Directors background as a player. Being in a music program why would the owner not have the horn maintained and why would the "Director" not suggest she have it inspected by a tech.
Is possible it is a knock off?

Really surprising she has been playing it like this from new. I am very good at playing "crap" horns after years of getting by but I am aware the horn has problems as I have to play through them. Maybe not something to be proud of?

I would suggest she take the 62 to a local pro tech after you determine and show her the problems. Once it is set up to optimum performance she will notice it degrading over time as she improves as a player she will be able to adjust her play until she eventually decides enough is enough and takes it in for service.

I am confident you can make the horn play better but can you make it perform to it's optimum?
There is setup and then there is masterful setup, no slight to your ability. Pig Squealer took me through what he did on my C Melody overhaul and it was mind blowing the detail and knowledge of the instrument he has. Have a tech like Barnard, Howard or their ilk overhaul or set up your tenor and see what comes back. This level of tech have decades of experience and incredible skill at their craft.

Turf you know more about horn set up than I but I am aware of my mechanical aptitude limits so I put my trust in those who know far more.

Too many assumptions.

The player doesn't own the horn, it's a school owned horn. This is a local junior college, the school doesn't have a lot of money and neither do the majority of the students. She has NOT "been playing it like this from new", last semester she was using a different school owned horn. I have no visibility into how the various students get assigned the different instruments.

I don't know how it came to pass that this junior college where most of the school owned horns are Yamaha 20 series, owns a silver plate Yamaha 62.

There is no way that "the best" horns are silver plated. That would require the thing to be fully assembled and regulated, then extensively play tested, then completely stripped back down (including the removal of all pads, corks, pearls, and felts), re-polished, degreased, plated, then completely reassembled. For the few hundred extra dollars in retail price, that's not happening.

I do not have any experience at fixing a pulled-down tweaked neck, and I"m not going to experiment on a horn that doesn't belong to me.

The director is working on getting her a better-condition instrument. That's their business on how they arrange that. What I could do was to show up with a leak light and screwdriver and do some minor adjustments. What I'm going to do next rehearsal is to show up with my own known good condition student tenor so the student can at least play a rehearsal on a horn that works. I am not an assigned tech or anything like that, for the band. I am just the one 60+ year old mechanical engineer i a big band of 18-22 year old junior college students, so I can lend some experience and expertise where I have it.

 

[Tonehole]

I stand corrected on silver plating they purpose build them!
From Yamaha Canada's site "Rather than choosing individual saxophones to plate out of the regular batch, Yamaha manufactures the silver-plated version from scratch as a distinct catalog item." They are selling it for a premium so they insure it is.

More information more insight.
So you never mentioned it was school horn. This explains why she is not wanting to pay to have it set up.and why the director just shrugged it off as a "crap playing horn". It is not a "crap horn" it just requires some TLC.

Since it is a school horn explains why it is in such rough condition.
Multiple players who have no investment in the horn. I worked at Long & McQuade's warehouse for 3 years during my summer breaks from University in the saxophone rental / school department helping a qualified tech go through hundreds of horns each season and play testing each one before set up and cleaning and then again on completion. I am well aware the condition and the abuse these saxophones receive when they are turned in and how fast they are turned around for the next season.

The fact it is a school horn explains a lot, sorry if I missed that in your earlier posts.
I am impressed with your empathy and your willingness to help her. Now I know something about your background and you mine.

Cheers

 

[turf3]

One additional point: the majority of students at this junior college show evidence of not having two dimes to rub together. Many of them work full-time or near full-time, some have kids, they're not running out and buying saxophones at the drop of a hat. They're doing the best they can with what they have available.

 

[Tonehole]

So they likely are playing on basic mouthpieces as well.

I donate a lot of mouthpiece to our local School of the Arts that I attended.
I get a lot of Meyers, Links and Selmer C* that have little resale value so I pass them on to student programs. I often have players "mostly older" give me mouthpieces to donate as well and I have buddies who are band directors.

I was censored on "another site" for sending a C* to a mother searching for a better piece for her daughter. I asked her to send me $6.00 USD saying I would get it to her in the mail from Canada. The mother had limited resources and the recommendations on the thread were crazy and costly.

I have a very large hoard of pieces and I make a practice of selling pieces to young players who come and audition pieces selling them at my cost regardless of the piece and what I can retail it for if it works for them.

I may list a piece local and when the student comes I will often direct them to a better piece. Some times the parent who brings them thinks I am just "up selling". But if the piece sings for the player I will show them the cost of it new and what they actually sell for on eBay, Facebook and what I bought it for.

When I was young I was gifted many pieces by techs and instructors to help me on my journey.
We all need to give back to the musical community to keep it flourishing.

 

[Pete Effamy]

Nice to hear. Most if not all of us on here will have had a leg up along the way from non - professionals in the job. I went through “the system “ and was lucky enough to only have had terrific teachers, but before all of that (age 11 onwards) I was in the local Boys Brigade (50 - strong brass band); with volunteers essentially. The band master was a big help, as was many other older band members and also my dad who came along with me having played in the railway band in the ‘50’s.

Probably the reason I stuck with playing as there was no music happening in my school before going to secondary school, and I first blew a clarinet at age 7. Playing solely at home for 4 years was probably not going to happen.

 

[Stephen Howard]

I stand corrected on silver plating they purpose build them!
From Yamaha Canada's site "Rather than choosing individual saxophones to plate out of the regular batch, Yamaha manufactures the silver-plated version from scratch as a distinct catalog item." They are selling it for a premium so they insure it is.

I suspect that's a bit of marketing blurb.
Yes, they probably do 'build them from scratch' as a distinct catalog item - but only in as far as someone says "Right, shunt this lot down to the plating department."
And yeah, it makes no sense at all to fully assemble a horn and say "Oooh, this one's nice" - then rip it apart and plate it.
Commercial suicide, in fact, given that there's barely £200 between one and the price of a lacquered model.

 

[turf3]

I suspect that's a bit of marketing blurb.
Yes, they probably do 'build them from scratch' as a distinct catalog item - but only in as far as someone says "Right, shunt this lot down to the plating department."
And yeah, it makes no sense at all to fully assemble a horn and say "Oooh, this one's nice" - then rip it apart and plate it.
Commercial suicide, in fact, given that there's barely £200 between one and the price of a lacquered model.

The way I interpreted that language, basically the same as the way you interpreted it:

The clear lacquer one is the YTS-62
The silver plate one is the YTS-62S
there are other ones

So the factory gets an order from the MRP system ("materials resource planning") that says this week you're going to make 35X 62 tenors, 7X 62S tenors, 480X 52 tenors, 800X 25 tenors. The 62 and 62S tenors have identical processes up to the point of finishing; but at that point after leaving the polishing process, the 62S parts go to the plating room and the 62 parts go to the spray booth.

Of course at this point they aren't saxophones yet; they are bodies, necks, maybe the back side key guards are also separate, and a whole bunch of keys. For that matter, since Yamaha 62s have detachable bells, the bells may be separate parts at this point.

The bells and bodies come together, then the keys get assembled, then the last few other parts, and only then are they going to start putting necks on bodies and actually having something you could call a saxophone.

So, yes, the 7X silver plate 62 tenors scheduled to be built this week, are identified on their build tickets, or travelers, as "S" from the beginning; but that doesn't mean there's any difference in the parts used to build them until the plating tanks.

 

[Stephen Howard]

So, yes, the 7X silver plate 62 tenors scheduled to be built this week, are identified on their build tickets, or travelers, as "S" from the beginning; but that doesn't mean there's any difference in the parts used to build them until the plating tanks.

Exactly that - and someone up in marketing has decided to make a 'feature' of an otherwise mundane standard manufacturing process.
But in all fairness, at the difference in price between the variants they're not putting a particular premium on it...but I suspect that's because silver-plated models aren't that popular, comparitively-speaking.

 

[turf3]

Exactly that - and someone up in marketing has decided to make a 'feature' of an otherwise mundane standard manufacturing process.
But in all fairness, at the difference in price between the variants they're not putting a particular premium on it...but I suspect that's because silver-plated models aren't that popular, comparitively-speaking.

If the difference is L200, that could easily be mostly due to the cost of maintaining the low volume part number. And a bit of marketeering.

I have no direct experience with them, other than seeing a couple owned by other people, but if the silver plating on Yamahas is as good as the rest of the horn, it probably holds up well. I always prefer a silver plate horn to lacquer; it'll tarnish, but the playing generally stays on the metal much much longer than lacquer does. (Although there is that bomb-proof Conn stuff.)

 

[Pete Effamy]

If the difference is L200, that could easily be mostly due to the cost of maintaining the low volume part number. And a bit of marketeering.

I have no direct experience with them, other than seeing a couple owned by other people, but if the silver plating on Yamahas is as good as the rest of the horn, it probably holds up well. I always prefer a silver plate horn to lacquer; it'll tarnish, but the playing generally stays on the metal much much longer than lacquer does. (Although there is that bomb-proof Conn stuff.)

Yes I often see silver plated vintage saxes in such good nick that I had thought it a modern horn.

 

[lig]

Over the years I've had 3 silver Yamahas. All held up beautifully.
The only real wear is on the neck strap ring. I should get that replaced soon.

This one has been my primary alto since late '99 or 2000.

I do take really good care of my instruments and very helpful that my main tech is also a personal friend.

Wrights Silver Polish, 3M anti-tarnish strips and always swabbed after play and now it gets pads dried post play via little battery operated blower.

Recently overhauled with black 'roo pads. Love it.

 

[Tonehole]

Yep seems to be marketing. Yamaha techs work on certain levels of horns so all the 62's would be assembled by the same techs do the lacquer or silver finish. The build up is the same and then they separate the horns for the finish and then bring them back to the same line for final assembly.

So I stand double corrected. 😔

Gotta learn something new everyday!

 

[rockplayer]

This has been an interesting read, and it pretty much reflects the positions of the sax playing world since I first started playing some 44 years ago. There's always the first line of "professional horns", which are fronted by the Mark VI. Even back in '82 when I bought my first sax the cost of a Mark VI was out of reach for most players. I didn't feel I could never afford one, my first horn was a Yamaha 61 tenor, played great and it probably still does. Since then I've had a number of different horns from Yamaha, Keilwerth, Guardala (B&S), Viking, Eastman and yes I did buy a "players horn" Mark VI in 2019 which I wanted so badly to be a good horn but it wasn't, had a ton of issues from just being used over 50 years, cost me a grand in set up, pads, adjustments and it still had issues. I let it and the idea of spending over $5K for a sax go, won't do it again. For the last few years I've played a Retro Revival Tru-Six tenor, works great for me, I'm sure there will be comments about it but I could care less. I've been playing if now for a few years and it plays fantastic, the best tenor I've every owned and I've had a few, that's pretty much all I care about. I've also got a couple, get ready for it, Eastern Music horns (OMG>>> save us all), one alto that I picked up on eBay for my granddaughter who was going to play sax in school but she chose the flute instead, I've had this horn for two years now. The EM plays really well, definitely work the $$ I spent. I sold my Eastman 652 RL alto (made in Taiwan) and play the EM horn, I'm very happy with it. Last year I picked up an EM tenor, sent Arnold an email, told him want I want and how I wanted the horn set up, he sent me a price, I paid the invoice, three weeks later I got the horn. I went through it, I found zero issues, I have it as my backup horn but I use it at each gig I play, I've had no issues with the horn since I unpacked it. Do I recommend Eastern Music (EM) horns, well, if you're searching for your dream horn I would say no, don't get one, go try out as many different horns as you can, get the one that feels and plays best for you. Unfortunately, in today's world there really aren't many music stores carrying much inventory. Hell, I live in southern California and there are really only a couple stores within a few hours drive that have stock of more than just a few brands (Yamaha, Cannonball, Eastman and maybe a Jupiter or Chateau). However, if you're a hobby player (probably fits most of us) then they are a viable instrument.

 

[teen37]

@rockplayer I trekked all over Birmingham on Thursday to find a rather large music store. When I eventually found it (it had moved from its more central location 😳🙄) they had only 3 alto's on show, no tenors at all and they were cheap student models at best anyway. Then I was informed that I couldn't play test anything anyway even if I wanted to as they stopped that since covid as I was told by the guy there "yesterday's spit, today's germs" and all that! 😳
I couldn't quite get my head around that but apparently, I could order whatever I wanted and they would get it in for purchase of course.
I declined that offer.
I mean, there's just no hope is there. This shop was huge, full of digital pianos, so my son enjoyed tinkling on them all (he's pretty decent tbh grade 8) it was nice to hear him as he doesn't play much at home lately 🙄
Full of guitars too. But there's more to music than just two instruments. Birmingham is a big city and that's the best they have to offer!!
Very disappointed 😞🤷
And as a hobbyist these days, it's not really wise or practical to go around all the private ads to try out someone's horn in my opinion anyway 🤷
Otherwise your advise is sound, I agree, try as many horns as possible...... If you can actually find any in the first place!

 

[Stephen Howard]

Then I was informed that I couldn't play test anything anyway even if I wanted to as they stopped that since covid as I was told by the guy there "yesterday's spit, today's germs" and all that! 😳

I mean, there's just no hope is there. This shop was huge, full of digital pianos, so my son enjoyed tinkling on them all (he's pretty decent tbh grade 8) it was nice to hear him as he doesn't play much at home lately 🙄
Full of guitars too.

What a numpty.
Sure, I get that folks can be squeamish about blowing into a horn that someone else has blown - but if someone feels it's an issue then a quick squirt of a suitable disinfectant will clean a crook out in no time at all.
And in any event you're far more likely to pick up something nasty from playing a keyboard/guitar that someone else's grubby fingers have been all over.