I noticed an unusual Dörfler & Jörka horn on eBay yesterday. It’s not unusual in features or appearance. Rather, it’s the name that caught my eye.
Gebr. Alexander Mainz is a name which has been connected to D&J, because they were a dealer that Dörfler & Jörka regularly supplied with saxophones. Until this tenor popped up on eBay, I had only seen 1 other Gebr. Alexander Mainz horn.
That previous Gebr. Alexander Mainz horn was an alto, was silver plated, and had a high F# key. (This horn was a copy of J. Keilwerth’s Toneking.)
The current horn up for auction on eBay is just your plan old boring, two-tone tenor. It has no extra keys or engraving, and has just your everyday octave key lever. (The alto had a much nicer one.)
Source: g.mu6
The seller is in Germany, and describes the horn like this:
Interesting old Tenor saxophone. The bell reads:”Gebr. Alexander Mainz” The back reads: “10924 Made in Western Germany”. The neck reads the same number. I dont know what model it is. The golden color is partly worn, the pads looks fine, I guess they work for some more time. There is a small dent at the bell. (see pic) There is no mouthpice. The instrument needs service and cleaning. It comes in a very worn case which has a bad smell. (but may give some extra protection for shipping) Of course it will be packed very well for the transit.
Wow, a D&J tenor in need of an overhaul, and coming in a stinky case. Sounds great, right? It’s clear the seller isn’t a sax player, and perhaps not even a musician. He is however, a dealer who seems to specialize in antique and vintage musical instruments. (Which may in part explain his pricing on the horn.)
The photos show a vintage D&J in decent shape. However, you gotta’ budget on an overhaul on this baby.
Source: g.mu6
The name stencilled on this tenor notwithstanding, this is just your regular, run-of-the-mill, D&J stencil tenor. These are very nice tenor saxophones. I should know, I own one. Mine is branded De Villers. To read more about mine, check out the De Villiers page on my site.
D&J copied the bodies of the JK The New Kings and Tonekings, and made stencils for other companies. D&J horns are not however, JK stencils. Dörfler & Jörka was its own company, completely separate from Julius Keilwerth. To read the full story about D&J, and their connection to Keilwerth, check out the D&J page of my site.
The Gebr. Alexander Mainz tenor currently up auction on eBay has a starting bid of $999.00. IMHO, that is too high given its condition. However, the seller is in Europe, and prices there are higher than here. It will be interesting to see how the auction progresses.
The auction is scheduled to end on January 22. At the time of writing there were no bids yet, on this vintage, German stencil horn by Dörfler & Jörka.
Hi Helen, that Tenor is being advertised again (ebay item 130650663811), this time for Buy it-now @ $1098.00. Better get in quick before the price goes up even further !
Yeah, I’ve never quite understood the logic of: “Gee, item Y didn’t sell for X dollars (euros in this case). I think I’ll jack the price up the next go round, and see if it will sell now.”
Hohner President saxophones in Germany sell for less than this, and they are better horns. I suspect unless we see a price drop of at least a few hundred euro from the original price, this baby will be around for some time to come. IMHO of course. 😕
Update: Well this horn is still for sale under Item number: 130650663811. It still costs $1,098.90 US BIN. You’d think that after 2 months the seller might get the idea that he’s over-reaching. :scratch:
Hi Helen,
These D&J saxes are nice. Looks like my Diamond (D&J stencil) but the tube&neck is covered with clearlaquer on my sax instead of goldlaquer.
The price is high! I bouhgt my Diamond for c $ 350.00. A good player with a quite big sound. I use a Rovner Deep-V or a Dukoff mpc on my tenor. I think the tube/bore is bigger on this saxes compared to the average sax?
Thomas
Hi Thomas.
Interesting what you say about the price of your Diamond. Now you’re in Sweden. I don’t think the prices in Sweden and Germany are that different! You’re right, I think the horn is too expensive. I’ve seen D&J horns sell in Germany for about 1/2 of what the seller is asking.
The bore on the D&J horns is pretty much the same as on the The New King and Toneking. (They are JK clones after all.) There is more of a taper on the D&J horns’ body tube I believe, since I can’t put my D&J neck in my JK Toneking. Because my JK is getting overhauled, I can’t check the necks right now, but you have a JK don’t you Thomas? Is the D&J neck too small for the JK socket?
I find there is virtually no tonal difference between the D&J and my JK. The keywork on the D&J is not nearly as comfortable as that on my Toneking however. The right thumb rest especially, is really hard on me, especially after a long practice session.