Alto Couesnon Monopole Conservatoire # 11043 hight F# & G#

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Jazzbrass

Discussion Starter · Oct 10, 2007

Alto Couesnon Monopole Conservatoire # 11043
The last model manufactured by Couesnon, but was it indeed manufactured by Couesnon? Original keys, the model is almost identical as the one of Stephen Howard

What do you think about it?

For those which would be interested it will be soon to sell
[email protected]

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Chris J

· #2 · Oct 10, 2007 (Edited)

That must be about 1960

Odd to see the socket cut away to accomodate the tone hole. I had no idea they made a sax keyed to high G

Why do you question who made it?

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Chris J

· #10 · Oct 11, 2007

saintsday said:
I'm curious how you figured the 1960 date, Chris. I have yet to find a serial list of any kind for these. The '69 fire seems to have put the kibosh on compiling one. I do have a couple with dated original warranty cards, but I'd have to root through a bunch of cases to find them.

saintsday - Awesome collection!

Sorry, I didn't mean to sound authoritative on 1960 as a specific date. My comment was more a thought aloud in that I thought keying to high G was quite a recent thing and had never heard of a vintage (if 40 + years can be called vintage) instrument with that. But if a modification, it looks like a factory modification from the pictures (though "squeezed in" puts it mildly!)

When did high G keys get used by other makers?

In terms of dating by serial number, I only what I have been told to me by the people I bought my instruments from and Saxpics.com. So Monopole Series II started in 1950 according to Saxpics.com - I was told my tenor (SN 13xxx from memory - it is at home and I am not) was 1963 and my alto (SN 9xxx) was late 1950's so early 1960s might be a reasonable guess (if tenor and alto SN were in the same order)

If you have some confirmed dates and serial numbers it would be great to have one or two reference points - but I am loathe to ask you to dig in all your boxes, as you might not emerge for a number of days.......

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Chris J

· #11 · Oct 11, 2007

Looking in the forum, there is a thread:
http://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?t=22630

there is a definite 1969 SN 146xx because he bought it himself new then
there is a very likely 1958 SN 9xxx because the person said it was close to his, and he saw a 9xxx on Ebay with a warranty date

If (a very big if) these are at all reliable, and if (an even bigger if) there was even production per year, then that suggests about 500 a year manufactured which puts the SN 11043 in this thread at, well, 1962ish

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Chris J

· #16 · Oct 16, 2007

Thats interesting.

Just last week I had an email conversation with a dealer in France he said:

"I had 2 years ago an extremely rare Couesnon alto saxophone which was going to high G and down to low A and also was playing great !! Couesnon was an extremely good Cie and was making some incredible and strange instruments !"

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