[gtrbarbarian]

I just acquired a 1925 Buescher True Tone alto, which is in pretty nice shape with 98% of the finish...all the pads are in great shape as well...

-however- although every other note on this sax sounds great, the c# sounds a c natural...my brain can't wrap around how this could be seeing as no holes are supposedly covered...
?

Any ideas are appreciated

-Jon

 

[griff136]

have you checked the springs on your top stack, are they strong enough? are they on their "latches" - in particular the spring for the bis key?,

this would be my first port of call

 

[thejoyofsax]

Aren't open C#s on Buescher's notoriously flat? Isn't that why most who own them play that C# "closed pipe," which is playing the overtone from the low C# fingering?

 

[Seasax]

i think it could be that the spring on the Left hand stack 'speaker key' (the small pad cup ontop of the lh stack, the front F pearl sits on top of two keys, the top one is that key) if you look at the mechanism, it is closed for everything where one of those keys is closed, but for C sharp it should stay open, but if the spring is weak, it wall flop closed.

 

[clarnibass]

Does it sound exactly like when you play C natural or a totally out of tune C# or Cnat? Every case where I've seen this it was the spring on the little C key coming out of its place. Did you check this? The most out of tune C# on any sax I've ever seen (heard) was still not as low as a Cnat.

 

[gtrbarbarian]

Thanks for all of the replies!

"i think it could be that the spring on the Left hand stack 'speaker key' (the small pad cup ontop of the lh stack, the front F pearl sits on top of two keys, the top one is that key) if you look at the mechanism, it is closed for everything where one of those keys is closed, but for C sharp it should stay open, but if the spring is weak, it wall flop closed."

Bingo. :-D Spring was off of the pad directly above lh C key...probably didn't help that Mr. Fedex dropped the box on the way to my door. Now this sax plays beautifully from top to bottom, and is almost spot on tune on every note

I keep reading all the ebay horror stories...I think I may have lucked out with a "closet classic" ---> http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140176628513 ... can anyone tell if this is the stock mouthpiece?