My First Few Months Of Being A First-Time Bass Saxophone Owner

By Bassic Sax Guest Columnist, Glenn G

I’ve owned my bass for about four months now. As I indicated in my article on bass cases, it is a 10-year-old Keilwerth. The horn was in great shape when I purchased it.

My first challenge was to find a suitable mouthpiece. The previous owner included an old Selmer piece that I think is a modified bari piece and the Keilwerth piece that came with the horn. He told me “No one uses the Keilwerth piece”.

The Selmer piece really didn’t do it for me. The Keilwerth didn’t fit the neck—the opening was too large. Luckily, I had been reading Helen’s Bassic Sax Blog and website and knew that Paul Coats offered a modified bari piece. I ordered one and had great results with it.  

     Photo by H. Kahlke © 2010

     Photo by H. Kahlke © 2010

     Photo by H. Kahlke © 2010

At first, I did have some issues with middle D, E and Eb. I understand that these can be problematic on the bass. I am not a professional musician. I practice regularly with the bass and Paul’s piece. At this point it is all coming together, although I am still working on budgeting my breathing.

I did put some paper on the neck to try the Keilwerth with some Vandoren bass reeds and found that it didn’t work well. I also ordered a Vandoren bass piece, used it with my Vandoren reeds, but returned it. 

The Vandoren bass reeds are $5.00 each, so I’m glad Paul Coats’ bari piece works. I use a Fibracell 1.5 on it; also the Coats modified Runyon 88 bari mouthpiece is less than $100.

I was at a Jazz camp at the end of July. Everyone was congregating in the bar on the final night after the concert. I mentioned to one of the participants that I had a bass. He went on about it having no parts written for it. It was just a novelty for everyone to go ga ga and to say, “Wow a Bass Sax”.  I told him that I didn’t disagree with what he said. He then said: Oh, you own a Bass Sax!  

I don’t care; I’m having fun with it. I see people who buy motorcycles, boats, ski-mobiles, etc, which cost more—sometimes much more—than a bass sax, and are very expensive to maintain and house. A bass sax costs little to feed and house. If I did decide to part with it, I may lose a bit of money or maybe make a small profit. I’m not concerned; I’m having fun with it. It’s money well spent.