I love my vintage saxes. There is just something about their tone, that I find is not present in even the best of the modern saxes that I’ve played. (Although Gandalfe’s Reference 36 tenor is the closest I’ve personally ever encountered.)
Yesterday while I was at World Wide Sax, I had the chance to play an amazing vintage horn, that is weighing heavily on my mind today. As I try to work my way through the pros and cons of buying yet another vintage tenor at this time, I remembered a thread from the Saxgourmet Saxophone Forum, in which Steve Goodson talks about Why Vintage Horns Sound Different.
Lee:
yes, they do sound different, and yes, you CAN duplicate that sound if you wish.IMHO, there are a couple of reasons for the sound: first, the tuning was different. Saxophone design has advanced over the years, and modern horns are much more in tune. The alloys used today are different, becuase modern tastes demand brighter tone. Makers now use more zinc in the brass. Most importantly, I don”t believe a horn sounds its best until it”s been played for at least ten year. I believe the metal “breaks in” and resonates better after being played a while. You can “artificially age” a horn through cryogenics. I”ve had several of my brand new horns treated this way (it”s different from normal cryo) and the results are impressive.
You”ll never get the sound of an old horn by duplicating the bore, tone hole placement etc. alone. It has to be played, and played a lot!
He goes on to say in another response…
I think there is a lot of talk and not much truth to the claims that Selmer, Mauriat, and others make about recapturing the vintage sound. None of the retro-horns sound like the originals.
I think this is very interesting. My personal experience with vintage saxes, is that the ones that have been played a lot, do sound different, and “better” to my ears, than the ones that haven’t. (And my sample size is nowhere near as large as Steve’s would be.)
Reading Steve’s opinion on why vintage saxophones sound different, was very informative: it’s an interesting theory. Equally interesting was that he was able to artificially age metal through cryogenics. This does open the door for some interesting options…
An interesting experiment would be to take a Reference 36 and cryo treat it. If Steve’s theory holds true, then that would be a very interesting, and most likely very authentically, vintage-sounding, retro-horn.
