Post your latest purchase!

I was on Craigslist a few weeks ago and managed to pick up a 1935 Buescher Artistocrat Alto Sax with Brilhardt #2 hard rubber mouthpiece (with a stamped serial number) for $75. I'm lead to believe the mouthpiece alone is worth around $200-300. After about $400 of work to it, the horn itself should be worth around $2500. I plan on keeping it and learning how to play it. Unless it sounds like ass, in which case I'll sell for a horn that sounds good.
 
Bill L said:
I was on Craigslist a few weeks ago and managed to pick up a 1935 Buescher Artistocrat Alto Sax with Brilhardt #2 hard rubber mouthpiece (with a stamped serial number) for $75. I'm lead to believe the mouthpiece alone is worth around $200-300. After about $400 of work to it, the horn itself should be worth around $2500. I plan on keeping it and learning how to play it. Unless it sounds like ass, in which case I'll sell for a horn that sounds good.
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Nice deal! My wife got me a student level Yamaha alto sax for Christmas. I've been working through a beginner level instruction book. Doing ok so far, but I'll never be a Charlie parker. But oddly enough, a bunch of horny geese have started to congregate in my yard!
 
Tadpui said:
Nice deal! My wife got me a student level Yamaha alto sax for Christmas. I've been working through a beginner level instruction book. Doing ok so far, but I'll never be a Charlie parker. But oddly enough, a bunch of horny geese have started to congregate in my yard!
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:laughings:

I'm not even planning on fixing it yet. I recently had 2 clarinets restored. One was my student model Prufer Silver Throat Deluxe that I got when I was in 4th grade and played until 9th grade. The other is a 1940's Otterol made in Paris all wood (this is a C clarinet rather than the standard Bb) that was my grand father's. I hadn't played since 8th grade but was amazed at how quickly it all came back. After I get some clarinet chops, I'll invest in the sax. And one of my dogs was barking along with my clarinet playing the other day which brought my son and I to tears of laughter.
 
Earlier in this thread, I posted up the yamaha alto sax I bought a few months ago. circa 1970's. The mouthpiece is a C-star which I understand is worth more than I paid for the sax. Cool.

Like Tadpui, I'm still learning to play it.
 
Chili said:
Earlier in this thread, I posted up the yamaha alto sax I bought a few months ago. circa 1970's. The mouthpiece is a C-star which I understand is worth more than I paid for the sax. Cool.

Like Tadpui, I'm still learning to play it.
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Awesome! I'm hoping to be able to play at an open jam one of these days. I've always wanted to play sax, so hopefully soon. Hang in there and I'm sure you guys will get the hang of it.

Happy New Year, boys
 
Hahaha, I practiced for half an hour yesterday with the studio door open. I came upstairs to find both dogs cowering together on the couch. They're not fans of my skwaking :)

I always wanted to play the sax as well. Played middle school clarinet, but nothing but guitar since then. It's actually cool to know that there are a couple other fellas around here in the same boat. Nothing like picking up a new instrument!
 
Where are ya'll getting these silly prices for those horns and mthpces?
I see Aristocrats going for as little as a couple hundred bucks and the very best restored ones might get 1500 ..... and that's only if you find an individual that wants one.
And the C* mthpces ..... which i consider a student mthpce so they're very good for a beginner .... they go for maybe 150 bucks new and I wouldn't pay 10 bucks for a used one.

There almost isn't a sax market anymore ..... it's not like when i was young and zillions of people played in school band.

Those prices seem very unrealistic, at least in the USA anyway.

Sax is considered the easiest wind instrument to learn so ya'll should be making musical sounds relatively quickly so have fun ..... I look forward to hearing your progress.
 
Posted this in the tone thread, but hell, I am stoked about it so I will throw it up here too :).

gibby_firechicken.jpg

Looks badass and sounds... badder... asser. What? I have always wanted one of these. The herd, she thickens!
 
Lt. Bob said:
And the C* mthpces ..... which i consider a student mthpce so they're very good for a beginner .... they go for maybe 150 bucks new and I wouldn't pay 10 bucks for a used one.
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Hard to filter out the garbage on the internet sometimes. I read all these reviews on different forums about that mouthpiece and I think I struck gold. lol When I took my sax in for repairs, the tech said it was a $280 mouthpiece. Yeah, I see it goes for about $150 - $180, but I paid $225 for the sax, so I'm happy. :)
 
Chili said:
Hard to filter out the garbage on the internet sometimes. I read all these reviews on different forums about that mouthpiece and I think I struck gold. lol When I took my sax in for repairs, the tech said it was a $280 mouthpiece. Yeah, I see it goes for about $150 - $180, but I paid $225 for the sax, so I'm happy. :)
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Same with me. I showed it to a couple of sax player friends and they all went nuts over the mouthpiece and then the sax. Around here, however, are a lot of horn players so I may be able to get that $ if I try.

As far as the price goes, I asked the seller why it was so inexpensive and he told me he bought it at a yard sale 20 years ago in Colorado with the intention of learning to play it. He never did play it and just wanted his money back. He knew what he had because he probably wouldn't have sold it to me if I was going to fix it up and sell it. He wanted someone to play it. I look at it as karma. I sold a 1946 Martin Committee trumpet (the same one Miles Davis used) that needed tons of work to the trumpet player in Roomful of Blues for $200 (I knew exactly what I had but I had no interest in refurbishing the instrument and then trying to learn it). He was thrilled and now that's his #1 trumpet. And Doug James (Jimmie Vaughan's Sax player) also checked it out and said I got a real nice deal and if I ever sell it to let him know.

Sax.jpg

**Apparently the brown on the sax keys makes this one more desirable, I'm told. At least around here.
 
well, ya'll got them to learn to play them so value is really a secondary thing anyways.
The important thing is playing them.

I'm a Selmer man myself ....... .... sax preference is pretty personal .... really moreso than guitar and I play guitar so I know what I'm talking 'bout here.
A lot of your tone on sax comes from the structure of your throat and tongue which is, of course, different for everyone.
My first sax was a Buescher 400 which I semi-wish I still had ...... then I went to Yamahas for decades before finally spending the big bucks to go Selmer 15 years or so ago.

To me the single biggest thing though is tuning.
Finding a horn you can play in tune is paramount.

Even very good players play out of tune ...... that's just an inherent thing with saxes.
You'd be amazed how many big name guys play out of tune live.
I hear tapes of me from a long time ago and wince.
But I'm a piano tuner so I play in tune now.

In fact ...... about 3 months ago a very good guitar player showed up at a biker event I was playing and when he got to the stage he said, "Louisiana Steve! I knew it was you the second I got out of my car!"
I was excited, thinking that I'd developed a recognizable tone of my own that people would know was me.
LOL
I asked how he had known, just SURE that it was my awesome tone and I wanted to revel in that compliment.
He said, "You were playing in tune!"

:D Not what I was hoping for.

:laughings:
 
Lt. Bob said:
well, ya'll got them to learn to play them so value is really a secondary thing anyways.
The important thing is playing them.

I'm a Selmer man myself ....... .... sax preference is pretty personal .... really moreso than guitar and I play guitar so I know what I'm talking 'bout here.
A lot of your tone on sax comes from the structure of your throat and tongue which is, of course, different for everyone.
My first sax was a Buescher 400 which I semi-wish I still had ...... then I went to Yamahas for decades before finally spending the big bucks to go Selmer 15 years or so ago.

To me the single biggest thing though is tuning.
Finding a horn you can play in tune is paramount.

Even very good players play out of tune ...... that's just an inherent thing with saxes.
You'd be amazed how many big name guys play out of tune live.
I hear tapes of me from a long time ago and wince.
But I'm a piano tuner so I play in tune now.

In fact ...... about 3 months ago a very good guitar player showed up at a biker event I was playing and when he got to the stage he said, "Louisiana Steve! I knew it was you the second I got out of my car!"
I was excited, thinking that I'd developed a recognizable tone of my own that people would know was me.
LOL
I asked how he had known, just SURE that it was my awesome tone and I wanted to revel in that compliment.
He said, "You were playing in tune!"

:D Not what I was hoping for.

:laughings:
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:laughings:

I did a gig this past summer with 2 horn players. One of them was out of tune for most of the night. The other one is very anal about being in tune. Guess who's my first call horn player. I'm thankfully surrounded by outstanding sax players who are very willing to help me out. In fact one of them is helping me learn what I need to know to start playing clarinet in a Greek band I'm trying to start. And my invitation still stands, Lt. Bob. If you ever make it up this way we'll get a couple of gigs together. Lots of New Orleans rock and roll. It'll be fun.
 
Bill L said:
:laughings:

I did a gig this past summer with 2 horn players. One of them was out of tune for most of the night. The other one is very anal about being in tune. Guess who's my first call horn player. I'm thankfully surrounded by outstanding sax players who are very willing to help me out. In fact one of them is helping me learn what I need to know to start playing clarinet in a Greek band I'm trying to start. And my invitation still stands, Lt. Bob. If you ever make it up this way we'll get a couple of gigs together. Lots of New Orleans rock and roll. It'll be fun.
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Amen brother! I had this f****** train-wreck gig with a bunch of jive ass scientologist horn players and it was an absolute f****** nightmare. They all kept looking at each other side eye with their fingers on the valves but no one would actually commit to playing a note.
 
On Christmas day, I got a great deal on a 2nd Distressor. It just arrived today and I had to mount it, even though I don't yet have the cables to hook it up (or hook them to each other). I'll be dealing crushing stereo damage by next week when my cables arrive! As a random dude in his basement, I have no business owning such excellent compressors. But I couldn't help myself.

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Jane, you ignorant gear slut. :)

But -5 points for any other rack gear that has to say 'Pro' in its name. per channel. :D
 
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