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Can Anyone Identify This Alto?

2K views 11 replies 9 participants last post by  saxophender 
#1 ·
It's listed in an auction as "Unmarked Antique Saxophone". It does appear to be an older design and I find the square bar stock key guards unusual. With all the elaborate engraving I thought it may have been an expensive horn in it's day. Any ideas what kind it is?

Wood Artifact Art Drinkware Wind instrument

Reed instrument Musical instrument Wood Clarinet family Saxophone

Musical instrument Brass instrument Wind instrument Reed instrument String instrument

Musical instrument Wind instrument Reed instrument Art Brass instrument
 
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#4 ·
It isn't a Conn, the pinky table and palmkeys don't resemble an American maker. I would also say it is a European horn...maybe Italian or French stencil. Malerne stencils sometimes used the square keyguard wires like this one. Matter of fact, I just pulled up an old pic of a Malerne stencil I once fixed up...looks to be a dead ringer.
Will sound quite sweet, very big with a lotta cojones...and the stack and palm/side keys are pretty responsive - the pinky table is a bit clunky, however.
In project shape, worth maybe $100.
 

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#7 ·
After a lot of searching I think I agree with JayeLID. It’s a dead ringer for an Acme Artist which is a Malerne horn excepting the Acme doesn’t have the elaborate engraving. I already have a couple of $100 horns I don’t use.
 
#8 ·
Whatever it is, it is the duplicate of my first alto which was given to me by an organ player in 1970. I began to use it as the alto 'mule' for playing dual saxes. I didn't get a 'real' alto until 1983 when I bought a Selmer USA 'Omega'. A PO'd sound man stole the old alto along with my Brilhart Level Air mouthpiece a year or so before that. I guess they were claiming that it never got put on the truck or something. Anyway, I never knew what the thing was and didn't really care. All I cared about was that the upper half of it played.
 
#12 ·
It looks very similar to a York tenor saxophone I had long time ago. It was an American made saxophone (Grand Rapids). I still have a few pictures, not the best resolution but they could be useful:
View attachment 245106 View attachment 245108 View attachment 245110

There's a thread about York saxophones:
https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?57866-York-tenor-sax

I hope this helps.
That York is probably a Malerne stencil as well (the pictures are not sufficient for me to say for sure). If I remember rightly, in the late 1930s York was bought by Carl Fischer, who was the sole U.S. importer of Buffet instruments. Buffet and Malerne had a business relationship with Malerne making Buffet's less expensive Evette line of saxes, at least for a while. After Fischer bought York, York ceased production of saxes, and sold (mostly) Malerne saxes stenciled as Yorks, although I have seen one York in an old thread in the York subforum that was a Buffet (Dynaction I think) stencil.
I have one of the altos and I was surprised at how well it plays. It reminded me a bit in sound and feel of a Dynaction. A "poor man's" Buffet, if you will.
 
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