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Very sad day, but, as they say, “Times is ‘ard…” – and I’ve taken the decision to sell the Richards Martin Magna alto and use the money, rather than let the alto languish in the case (just like so many C-Mels did…).

So if anyone has a spare 1400 UK Pounds – that’s around, at today’s rates, US$1900 or 1500 Euros, plus shipping  – they’ll be getting a gorgeous old lady with loads of spirit !  Click on the picture ( or here ) for more pics/info and a sound clip.

I have a few lesser Martin and Martin stencil alto’s around the house, so I’ll select the best of those (best player, naturally, not looker) to leave me still with alto capability, for those very rare Eb occasions.

This will bring two benefits -

a) I’ll have to fix up all the other alto’s to find the best one, and I won’t feel so bad about neglecting a lesser horn, with fewer sentimental attachments – plus -

b) It’ll allow me to concentrate more on C and Bb tenor/soprano.  There just ain’t enough time and energy to keep up a good enough standard on everything, and I’ve still got to find enough time for C/Bb clarinet, flute and fife/whistle…  Sigh -    email me if you’ve interest or questions

Click here for more pictures of, and info on, the Richards Martin Magna alto sax.

Hopefully I’ll be soon putting up some decent sound samples (rather than quick sound-bytes) on the bare-brass Aquilasax C, seen here sharing a chair with my early 30′s Martin C, and my solitary Bb tenor, a Melody Master Martin stencil, probably from the mid-30′s -  a bit of a ‘diamond in the rough…’

The Bb tenor is also getting a bit of attention lately, I missed playing tenor !   I could almost see alto getting squeezed out of the current favourites list.  Makes good sense, as my C & Bb soprano’s share the same mouthpieces and reeds, and the Bb and C tenors do likewise.

Alto has always been a rewarding sax to play in the past, but (for me) always needs more work to keep up ‘to a good standard’ than any of the others, so, unless I really concentrate on playing alto  – usually to the detriment of the other saxes – it can also at times be a frustrating instrument.  At the moment the Aquilasax C, with the alto style neck, nicely compliments the Bb tenor, and (as I’ve said before) conveniently shares reeds and mouthpieces with it.

Seems that I’m moving away from regarding the C-Mel as a small tenor, conveniently in C, to actually using the Aquilasax as a gutsy C-alto.  Hmmmm, strange turn of events, I’ll just keep playing and see how it all turns out…

I’ve been introducing a few more pictures into the random slideshow at the top right of the screen, and I thought it might be interesting to comment on any that I have some information on.   Sadly I don’t have the original, and if either the eBay seller or buyer of this postcard would like to contact me, I’ll gladly acknowledge their ownership.

This is a vintage Photo Postcard – of the Allen Family from West Virginia.  It was quite fashionable in the early 1900′s, on both sides of the Atlantic, to have family pictures printed onto postcards – so that the recipient had both words and a picture.  Almost a fore-runner of multimedia

The 1920 Census of Graham, WV, lists a Leonidas Allen, with his wife Helen Allen and their children Clara Allen and twins Anna Allen and Ada Allen.

I can only assume that the twins Anna and Ada are shown here on piano and drums, with father Leonidas on cornet, and sister Clara Allen on tenor sax.  I’d like to think that it’s a C-Melody, but the proportions look more tenor’ish.  Click on the picture for a bigger version with more detail.

A great photographic record of early 1900′s instruments, including  a beautiful upright grand piano, xylophone, drums, saxophone, cornet, tambourine, triangle, parlor guitar, and violin/fiddle. From the quality of the picture, and the light, I assume it was taken outside ?

On the reverse of the postcard, addressed to Emma Watts in Mason City, WV, was written – “Hello Emma, I like my dresses just fine. Here are our pictures. How is little Grace? Well that’s all. From Anna and Ada Allen“  The seller quoted that “the AZO stamp box dates to 1904-1918″.  What a lovely little time capsule, thanks to the original eBay seller for those interesting details – as a genealogist I can appreciate them.  I have a couple of picture-postcards of my own ancestors, sadly there seems not a musician amongst them…  Maybe I get my talent from my tin-whistle playing paternal Grandpa, who sadly died just before I was born 

Never mind ‘Name that tune’ - I suspect it’ll be more like ‘Name that instrument…’

Click on the mini-player (or the link) below to hear it

  Click on the player, left, or this link !

And then click on this link -> Helen’s Bassic Sax Blog , and scroll down, to see if you were right…

Were you ? 

This video is pure self indulgence…  Live in Montreau in 1971 with Champion Jack Dupree.  Never ever really wanted to be a Coltrane or Ben Webster soundalike – just playing like King Curtis suited me fine, and I did try…  For mouthpiece afficionado’s  he’s almost certainly playing an ebonite Berg’0′ with a huge opening (150 ?) – I seem to remember he had a lip impediment which closed the gap in to a more sensible opening.

Classic moments – check around 4:05 when Jack plays with one hand, drinking beer with the other – and around 5:18 when (I think) King Curtis plays a low A against his leg ?  Lovely stuff…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpdGCKEbwew

Here’s the LP cover – remember those plastic things ?

The prime purpose of the neck plug is to protect the vulnerable and exposed octave pin.  It has always occurred to me that the plug is less than perfect for this role because the pin is still exposed with the plug in position.  In fact, because of the position of the pin, at the rear of the sax main tube, the pin is vulnerable even with the sax "safely" in it’s case.

With this in mind, I have devised the "Pelham Pin Protector" with a protective skirt attached to the plug.  Photographs are shown of the Mk 1 prototype….consisting of an appropriately sized socket (as the plug) onto which I have soldered a suitably sized screw cap.  Click on any of the photographs for a larger image

 As the photographs show, the pin now enjoys total protection.   Not the prettiest of items….but it is never seen when in use.

Having established that it works, and fits into the case, I will turn up a rather less ugly version, in aluminium.   Another advantage of the PPP is that, because of it’s size, it prevents groping around one’s sax case for the neck plug in dark clubs, apres-gig.

( published by Lewis Pelham )

To all my friends, and indeed to all visitors to the blog/forum/website, may I offer this very laid back version of Auld Lang Syne – very proficiently multi-tracked by CooolJazzz – together with my sincerest wishes to you all, for a gentle and rewarding 2009.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fT91tzTL_IE>

It is readily acknowledged as a transcription of the Dave Koz original track, of which, due to copyright, I am only able to offer a short extract…

  Having spent most of my active musical life playing alto and tenor sax with metal mouthpieces – initially stainless steel Bergs on both, but latterly a Lawton 8*BB tenor piece, and a bronze alto Berg – I now find myself reverting back to rubber in search of a more subtle sound…

I’ve also always had a few ebonite Links and Bergs in the arsenal, but often found them to be relatively inflexible in the overall range of sounds – anything that could provide a lush sound, couldn’t always come up with the power and edge when pushed, and vice-versa.  I know modern pieces like RPC do address this, but I’m coming at the problem from a slightly more economical angle.  It all started years back when I picked up a handful of vintage fat Couf Artist’s on eBay (the two in the centre of the pics are all that’s left of them, as I stupidly sold a couple), and ever since I’ve been picking up the odd streamline tenor and alto version until I’ve finally acquired the six here – all excellent players I might add..  It’s good to have a pair of each – as mouthpiece quality can vary, although not noticeable in any of these so far.

As a real bonus, the slimmer ‘Streamline’ tenor Couf’s seem to have quite good intonation and sound on C-Melody – a bonus indeed !  I suspect the chamber is just that little bit smaller than on the fat tenor Couf’s.  And they all (well, the four tenor ones) have big wedge baffles, so no lack of edge when needed.  One of the alto Couf’s has an ‘after’ baffle, less substantial than the tenor ones, and the other alto Couf will doubtless be the subject of some experimentation with epoxy putty.  I look forward to concentrating on just these six for the foreseeable future, I’ve already found great potential with a couple – it would be great to also find one of the relatively rare soprano Couf’s (not just the Couf badged Runyon), but my soprano Meyer – with the heavily wedge baffled Metalite M11 soprano in reserve -  suits me just fine.  Interesting times ahead.

For further info on Couf mouthpieces, click here, and also here – all the ones shown here are ‘Artist’ models.

Remember Benedikt Eppelsheim? He’s been a bit quiet recently: after he announced his Bb contrabass clarinet and the Eb contrabass sax, there haven’t been any additions to his website. I know that he’s produced Sarrusaphones and Ophicleides, but as of yet nothing has come up.

However, looking at Guntram Wolf’s website, the picture that with any luck should appear with this post features heavily. He and Eppelsheim have previously collaborated on the Contraforte, a redesigned Contrabassoon and evidently they have been busy working on this Lupophone. I know that it isn’t a saxophone, but it looks so extraordinary that I felt that I had to share it with you.

Well, here’s a turn up for the books…     A friend came around last night with his (Lewin) Martin stencil tenor – he’d just started playing again, and couldn’t work out whether a couple of problems he was having were down to him or the sax.

  I had a bit of a play, and thought “Hmmm, I don’t remember being this bad on tenor…”  – so I got the leak-light out.  Two little problems found which both affected the lower notes.  Easiest to find was the little ‘forked’  Eb trill pad was leaking a bit – easily eliminated by corking it down, time for a permanent repair later. That made everything fine way down into the bell notes, but still fuzziness as soon as the octave key was pressed (especially around D2, E2).  That was fixed by a little gentle bending of the octave mech on the neck – the pad on the neck was slightly lifting all the time the octave key was depressed, instead of staying closed whilst the lower (body) octave pad was open.

Great, now it played like a dream, and I was really enjoying testing it with both Lawton and ebonite Couf mouthpieces – to the extent that I got my own (very similar but quite dusty) Martin stencil tenor out of mothballs to compare horns.  Exit one happy tenor player, having also acquired a couple of reeds for his daughters clarinet, leaving me tootling away on my old and battered tenor ( I like to call it ‘character ‘…)

After a while, I naturally put down the tenor and picked up my Martin C-Mel (well, it was  after 9 p.m. by then ) – and what a culture shock !  All of a sudden, with the same mouthpiece/reed on the C-Mel, I was having to adopt a more measured (cautious even) approach to playing,  and getting much less back from the horn for my efforts.  My tenor hasn’t been out of its case for  at least a  year – probably very much more – but I suspect that things may well change from now on.

I still quite ‘like’ the C-Mel, but after exclusively playing it for some time, my C-Mel tone seems to have moved ever-so-slightly away from that of my original ‘small tenor’ sound, which was what I really wanted it for – it now seems to have developed into a bit of a gentler hybrid combination of alto/tenor sounds, when I make a direct comparison, something I hadn’t been doing for quite some while..  Oh dear, I was probably being just a touch naive…  :(   Maybe there is still a place in my life for Bb tenor after all ?  No doubt about it !