An Interesting Way To Display A Saxophone

While perusing eBay last night, I happened upon an auction that will nearly be over before I publish this. (Sorry, I’m a bit slow.) That said, I wasn’t necessarily writing about this auction anyway, but rather, what this auction shows us about how we might display an old saxophone.

This eBay dealer has an old tenor, combined with a John Coltrane LP, framed in a Plexiglas® box.

     Source: Sam’s Vintage House

Here is how this unique piece of saxophone art is described:

We have for your consideration a Fantastic Vintage Wall Art Hanging.

There is a John Coltrane “A Love Supreme” album open with the album showing under an original 1934 King Voll True Saxophone in a plexiglass case all beautifully matted and framed.

John Coltrane 9/3/26-7/17/67 was an American Jazz saxophonist and composer was into Be Bop and Hard Bop early in his career, helped pioneer the use of modes in Jazz and was later in the forefront of Free Jazz

A love supreme was a studio album recorded by John Coltrane’s quartet in 1964.

This awesome piece looks unbelievably cool and is a must have for jazz lovers.

The dimensions are approximately thirty eight inches high and twenty nine & one quarter across by seven inches deep.

     Source: Sam’s Vintage House

Now personally I wouldn’t have gone for framing a silver plated horn. I think you can guess why. The tarnishing is not all that attractive. This is what my Martin Handcraft C mel looked like after about 4 years of hanging on the wall.

Why not frame a lacquer horn? At least it won’t tarnish. And if you get something with some character, then you still have the vintage look—if that’s what you’re going for.

Regardless of what type of horn you use, or what kind of finish it has, the idea of framing a sax, together with an old album cover and an LP, is a really interesting idea. If you have the wall space for it, it might make a fine addition to your studio.

     Source: Sam’s Vintage House

Perhaps you have a favourite old album that you could think of, that might look really good together with a sax. For me, that would likely be Gato Barbieri’s 1976 album, Caliente!

Now there’s no way that I would take my Mark VI, or any other Mark VI (since that’s what he played and is pictured with), and frame it together with my old Caliente! album. However, a nice looking lacquered tenor—one that has some character to it—combined together with this and perhaps another album cover, as well as their corresponding LPs, would be an interesting piece of wall art.

Getting back to the original eBay auction, there are still a couple of hours left. At the time of writing there were no offers on it yet, and the Buy It Now price is $175.00. I suspect that you can’t even get the framing done at that price, let alone buy a vintage sax suitable for framing.