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But wait, there’s always more

Is your brain numb yet? Have you overdosed on Hohner President information yet? No? Well strap in, because we’re about to explore how the Hohner President transitioned from one version to another, AKA, Yes Virginia, there were Transitional Horns too.

A few years ago I started seriously tracking the various permutations of the Hohner President alto and tenor saxophones and came up with the following chart, which has been updated a couple of times as I gleaned more info.

Features based on serial numbers

The Phases of the Hohner President

Based on what I have described above, Hohner President saxophones can be divided into three (3) phases—based on their features—with a transitional phase between Phase 2 and 3.

1. Phase 1: Pre 25XX
2. Phase 2: 25XX-12XXX
3. Transitional: 107XX-12XXX
4. Phase 3: 13XXX +

However, it needs to be stated that not all horns between 107XX and 12XXX are transitional horns. Some are straight-up Phase 2 horns, while others are from the Phase 3 category. In some instances we can’t say with 100% certainty which phase they fit in, since not all sides of the horn have been photographed.

Furthermore, in other instances it is quite likely that Hohner was using up bits and pieces from Phase 2 horns, while already using other parts from Phase 3 ones on the same sax. It is also possible that some of these saxes may represent an experiment of sorts, where different things were tried out. EG: A seller on eBay stated that a tenor he was selling with a similar serial number, too had a mix of tone holes. Sadly however, the pictures were not clear enough to capture that detail.

With regards to the transition from Phase 1 to Phase 2 horns, we don’t see nearly the same kind of wild variations in horns—in part because the most notable, visible difference was in the the horns’ tone holes.

As noted below, around the early 2XXX mark things were a little inconsistent with regards to tone hole types. Some horns with earlier serial #’s had rolled tone holes, while later ones had soldered ones. However, there were not nearly enough saxes, nor enough differences in the saxes themselves, for me to say if we have another transitional series of horns.

The Demise Of The President

In the early 1970s Hohner ended its saxophone production. Although it is not known why, German saxophone historian, Uwe Ladwig, speculated that its reasons were the same as Hammerschmidt’s: The overwhelming cheap competition from Japan was too great, and the demand for the more expensive German saxophones declined.

Once they ceased production of saxophones, Hohner destroyed all its documents related to the Hohner President saxophones. (Very un-German-like if I do say so.)

While SaxPics was still owned by Pete Hales, a man by the name of Jim Warner provided him with some information about Hohner saxophones. Jim had been conducting research into the President horns, and during his research had been in contact with a person at Hohner. The information Jim provided to Pete was the sum total of all he had been able to amass about the Hohner President.

According to Bridgitte Conrad of Hohner Musikinstrumente, the company had very little information about their saxophone production left. Ms. Conrad provided Jim Warner with a document in German, but he was not able to translate it adequately to be able to understand it, or to even be able to ID the source. Although I have not seen the document that Jim was sent, based on the information and photos I have seen on SaxPics, the document was Uwe’s research paper.

Serial Number Chart

Through his efforts, Jim was able to establish a table of serial numbers which combined a number of sources. Sadly however, since Saxpics was bought by USA Horn, many images have vanished and links have broken. Therefore I chose to recreate the serial number chart; replace the missing images; and of course update it with all the new information I have gathered over the years of research.

A few notes about this chart:

1. As we saw in the chart of the Transitional Horns above, there are no hard and fast rules when it comes to tone holes around the transition periods. Just because a horn is above/below a certain serial #, that doesn’t mean that it will have a certain type of tone hole. Notes are added below to clarify.
2. The same applies for the logo located below the right thumb rest.​

	Year	Serial #	Tone Holes	Logo	Logo Image
Phase 1	1949	1	Soldered	Hohner Trade Mark
	1950	500	Soldered	Hohner Trade Mark
	1951	1000	Soldered	Hohner Trade Mark
	1952	1800	Soldered 2, 3	Hohner Trade Mark
Phase 2	1953	2600	Drawn & rolled	Hohner Trade Mark
	1954	3400	Drawn & rolled	Hohner Trade Mark
	1955	4200	Drawn & rolled	Hohner Trade Mark
	1956	5000	Drawn & rolled	Hohner Trade Mark
	1957	6000	Drawn & rolled	Hohner Trade Mark
	1958	7000	Drawn & rolled	Hohner Trade Mark
	1959	8000	Drawn & rolled	Hohner Trade Mark
	1960	9000	Drawn & rolled	Hohner Trade Mark
Transitional	1961	10000 5	Drawn & rolled	4 Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
Transitional	1962	11000 6	Drawn & rolled	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
Transitional	1963	12000	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
Phase 3	1964	13000	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
	1965	13500	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
	1966	14000	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
	1967	14500	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
	1968	14800	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
	1969	15200	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
	1970	15600	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
	1971	15800	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name
	1972	16000	Drawn & straight	Man playing accordion in shape of Hohner name

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² Alto 2425 straight tone holes, while 24XX had bevelled ones. Tenor 21XX had bevelled tone holes as well. Tone hole types seemed to vary around this time.

³Alto 2502 & 2543 have rolled tone holes, as do tenor 2215 & 2280.

⁴ Alto 10697 is the first Hohner I have seen with the new logo.

⁵ Alto 10742 is a transitional horn with a new bell to body brace and rolled tone holes, and C/D trill key.

⁶ Tenor 111XX is a transitional horn with a new bell to body brace and rolled tone holes.

The Hohner President Saxophone Gallery

Over the years I have developed what is likely the largest online gallery of Hohner President saxophone images. I do still look for the occasional unusual example, or version that will add to the body of knowledge about the brand. 

If you have an information you would like to add, please let me know. Thank you!

Hohner giveaway in 1968

As a Fine to this historical look at Hohner President saxophones by Matthias Hohner AG, I offer this bit of historical trivia. In the December 1968 edition of Boy’s Life, Hohner was offering a Win Your Own Band contest. Notice one of the top prizes was an alto President saxophone, which they list selling for $380.