- Messages
- 8,160
- Location
- Bristol, UK
Once upon a time . . .
About 4 months ago I bought my first soprano saxophone. It was pure GAS - I had bari, tenor and alto, and I wanted the full set. I tried holding a straight and a curved soprano, and the curved felt more comfortable, so that’s what I decided to get. I had heard people say the sound is a bit more direct with a straight, but I didn’t think this would matter much for a beginner - comfort seemed more important.
I bought an Elkhart 300 (Taiwanese) curved soprano sax on eBay and I have had a love/hate relationship with it ever since. I find it hard work to blow, and I have difficulty with the bell notes (motor-boating). I have kept going, but it hasn’t been enough fun, and I would have given up on sop if it wasn’t for my teacher’s encouragement. Initially there were some leaks, which didn’t help, but these have been fixed. And I have a good mouthpiece, so that’s not the problem.
The soprano is probably always going to be an occasional instrument for me - my favourite sax is tenor, and the one I mostly play at the moment is baritone, so unless I can get to the stage where I can pick up the soprano and fairly soon make an OK noise by my standards, it’s not worth bothering. (I am fully aware that this expectation may be unreasonable, but I didn’t get where I am today be being reasonable!) And I think I can make an OK noise on a good day (my teacher tells me I can), but it feels like hard work blowing the thing.
Then a short while ago I was in Dawkes shop, trying out baritone mouthpieces, and I thought I would find out what it feels like to play a different soprano, so I asked to try some. (I thank the staff in Dawkes for their helpfulness and patience.) So first I played a straight and then a curved Yanagisawa 991. The straight Yani was wonderful - easy to blow and with a lovely clear tone - perfect. It was how I had hoped a soprano sax would feel and sound. I want one! But the curved Yani felt stuffy and harder to blow in comparison - in fact it felt just like my curved Elkhart.
The difference between straight and curved surprised me - I had assumed that there would be very little in it. Even the tone on the curved Yani seemed stuffy compared with the straight one. (I know that things might sound different to a listener 10 feet away, but frankly I don’t care - I care about what it sounds like to me.) Obviously it’s possible that I was comparing a very good straight Yani with a less well set up curved one, but it got me speculating about whether straight saxes are easier to play than curved. I think the difference I noticed is what people call “resistance” - the curved sax was more resistant than the straight one. And I realised that I really, really don’t like a resistant sax.
I can’t justify the cost of a Yani for very occasional use, so while I was in Dawkes, I also tried a curved Elkhart Deluxe, which I liked more than the curved Yani, and a straight Jupiter 500 series, which I didn’t like at all - it seemed thin and weedy compared to the Elkhart.
In my search for the perfect soprano that doesn’t cost much, I decided to get a second-hand Elkhart Deluxe straight soprano. I ended up buying a “tick logo” Sakkusu in the Cafe Yard Sale. (There is a long Cafe thread about these being more-or-less the same as the Elkharts.) It’s not a Yani, but it is definitely easier to play than my curved Elkhart 300, and I think it has a clearer tone. I can play bottom C and Bb without difficulty and it doesn’t feel as if I am blowing into a paper bag. Intonation is not as precise as the 300 - it’s wayward at the top if I’m not careful, but it’s controllable.
I find that a fully straight soprano feels a bit uncomfortable, but the curved neck makes it OK for me, and the keywork on a straight sop somehow feels a bit more spacious that a curvy one. (It’s not - I checked them side by side.)
Caveat: I’m a newish and not very good saxophone player, and I have only been playing soprano for 4 months. It is very probable that an accomplished player will have a different view of the merits of curved and straight sopranos. But for me, at the moment, it seems that straight is easier and more satisfying to play than curved.
So, based on a statistically-insignificant sample of 4 saxes, I have become a convert to the straight soprano and I feel it is my duty to preach to the unenlightened curvy-worshipping masses. If you are like me - just getting a soprano for a bit of fun, then my advice, for what it’s worth, is to get a straight one, possibly with a curved neck. You know it makes sense!
About 4 months ago I bought my first soprano saxophone. It was pure GAS - I had bari, tenor and alto, and I wanted the full set. I tried holding a straight and a curved soprano, and the curved felt more comfortable, so that’s what I decided to get. I had heard people say the sound is a bit more direct with a straight, but I didn’t think this would matter much for a beginner - comfort seemed more important.
I bought an Elkhart 300 (Taiwanese) curved soprano sax on eBay and I have had a love/hate relationship with it ever since. I find it hard work to blow, and I have difficulty with the bell notes (motor-boating). I have kept going, but it hasn’t been enough fun, and I would have given up on sop if it wasn’t for my teacher’s encouragement. Initially there were some leaks, which didn’t help, but these have been fixed. And I have a good mouthpiece, so that’s not the problem.
The soprano is probably always going to be an occasional instrument for me - my favourite sax is tenor, and the one I mostly play at the moment is baritone, so unless I can get to the stage where I can pick up the soprano and fairly soon make an OK noise by my standards, it’s not worth bothering. (I am fully aware that this expectation may be unreasonable, but I didn’t get where I am today be being reasonable!) And I think I can make an OK noise on a good day (my teacher tells me I can), but it feels like hard work blowing the thing.
Then a short while ago I was in Dawkes shop, trying out baritone mouthpieces, and I thought I would find out what it feels like to play a different soprano, so I asked to try some. (I thank the staff in Dawkes for their helpfulness and patience.) So first I played a straight and then a curved Yanagisawa 991. The straight Yani was wonderful - easy to blow and with a lovely clear tone - perfect. It was how I had hoped a soprano sax would feel and sound. I want one! But the curved Yani felt stuffy and harder to blow in comparison - in fact it felt just like my curved Elkhart.
The difference between straight and curved surprised me - I had assumed that there would be very little in it. Even the tone on the curved Yani seemed stuffy compared with the straight one. (I know that things might sound different to a listener 10 feet away, but frankly I don’t care - I care about what it sounds like to me.) Obviously it’s possible that I was comparing a very good straight Yani with a less well set up curved one, but it got me speculating about whether straight saxes are easier to play than curved. I think the difference I noticed is what people call “resistance” - the curved sax was more resistant than the straight one. And I realised that I really, really don’t like a resistant sax.
I can’t justify the cost of a Yani for very occasional use, so while I was in Dawkes, I also tried a curved Elkhart Deluxe, which I liked more than the curved Yani, and a straight Jupiter 500 series, which I didn’t like at all - it seemed thin and weedy compared to the Elkhart.
In my search for the perfect soprano that doesn’t cost much, I decided to get a second-hand Elkhart Deluxe straight soprano. I ended up buying a “tick logo” Sakkusu in the Cafe Yard Sale. (There is a long Cafe thread about these being more-or-less the same as the Elkharts.) It’s not a Yani, but it is definitely easier to play than my curved Elkhart 300, and I think it has a clearer tone. I can play bottom C and Bb without difficulty and it doesn’t feel as if I am blowing into a paper bag. Intonation is not as precise as the 300 - it’s wayward at the top if I’m not careful, but it’s controllable.
I find that a fully straight soprano feels a bit uncomfortable, but the curved neck makes it OK for me, and the keywork on a straight sop somehow feels a bit more spacious that a curvy one. (It’s not - I checked them side by side.)
Caveat: I’m a newish and not very good saxophone player, and I have only been playing soprano for 4 months. It is very probable that an accomplished player will have a different view of the merits of curved and straight sopranos. But for me, at the moment, it seems that straight is easier and more satisfying to play than curved.
So, based on a statistically-insignificant sample of 4 saxes, I have become a convert to the straight soprano and I feel it is my duty to preach to the unenlightened curvy-worshipping masses. If you are like me - just getting a soprano for a bit of fun, then my advice, for what it’s worth, is to get a straight one, possibly with a curved neck. You know it makes sense!
