[saxmusicguy]

Lots of folks report playing non-original sax/neck combos that produce a desired set of characteristics (e.g. 10M neck on a VI, Ref. 54 neck on an 82Z, G3 vs. G1, etc.). I'm interested in hearing peoples' personal favorite sax/neck combos (sop, alto, tenor, or bari) and what makes them special.

 

[koumou]

I play a YTS62ii and I've tried the following with it:
Yanagisawa 65 : Loud lots of harmonics, good if you like to "scream" through your horn.
Yanagisawa 92 Bronze : This produced a warm open slightly airy sound with great dynamic range. This neck made expressive playing much easier.
I regret selling this.

I now have the G1 that came with my sax and a G3 gold plated borrowed from a friend. The G3 compared to the G1 is slightly more focused, it makes the low notes respond much easier and has a greater dynamic range. You can play down to a whisper. It improves the sax responsiveness.


I've got a Selmer Ref.36 on it's way to me in hope that I'll get a neck that will make playing expressively much easier. Loud and screamy playing is not my thing.

 

[dshook]

When I had a Chu I tried a couple of 10m necks on it and they really added some punch and focus to the horn. A Yam g3 neck works great on a yts23 to fatten and darken things up. In general, cleaning out your neck can have a HUGE effect on your horn, there are plenty of threads on how to do this...

 

[nitrosax]

There's a cat in Tokyo that plays a YTS-82Z UL tenor with a UL Ref 54 neck --I tried his setup with the original G1 neck and then with the Ref 54 neck...handsdown...the Ref 54 neck won...huge difference...You get a mark VI for a 1/4 of the price...

Cheers....

 

[Isle of Jazz]

I've got a Barone neck that I use on my YTS62 when playing with high baffle pieces — it really helps the tuning.

 

[koumou]

There's a cat in Tokyo that plays a YTS-82Z UL tenor with a UL Ref 54 neck --I tried his setup with the original G1 neck and then with the Ref 54 neck...handsdown...the Ref 54 neck won...huge difference...You get a mark VI for a 1/4 of the price...

Cheers....

Is this the chap you are talking about? Simon Cosgrove.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xHmVylR42g&feature=related The neck is definitely a Selmer and judging by the tenon screw the horn looks like a Yamaha

 

[Grumps]

I don't go for the whole neck experimentation thing, and I would never buy a new horn knowing I'd have to go searching for another neck. But with that being said, I do use a later Aristocrat 01 neck on my Buescher True Tone alto. The development of the Aristocrat neck cleaned up the known intonational quirks of the alto TT and basically makes mine a New Aristocrat.

 

[Nefertiti]

I have a Selmer Reference alto that I love but it has a gurgly low C. I tried a Macsax a couple of months ago and the neck on it fir my Selmer perfect. More importanatly it totally got rid of the low C gurgle on it. I ended up ordering a dark gold neck to try on it. I hope it's close in color to the Reference dark gold. The neck also seems to focus the sound a bit more than the refernce neck although I have to admit that what I love about the Reference is that spread fatness to the sound. We'll see how I like the new neck after I have had it for a little while. The intonation on it was just as good as the reference neck although it was quite a bit shorter then the reference neck. I think that's why the low C gurgles......because the neck is a little too long?

 

[saxmusicguy]

There's a cat in Tokyo that plays a YTS-82Z UL tenor with a UL Ref 54 neck --I tried his setup with the original G1 neck and then with the Ref 54 neck...handsdown...the Ref 54 neck won...huge difference...You get a mark VI for a 1/4 of the price...

This guy sounds great, but apparently the horn/neck combo isn't close enough to a Mark VI for him...he's selling his 82Z with both the Ref. 54 neck and the original neck in the marketplace. He says that he recently purchased a Mark VI.

 

[bfoster64]

After trying many different neck/horn combos, my favorites are:
SDA tenor with Barone neck
Mk VII tenor with Barone neck
82Z tenor with Barone neck

Interestingly, I don't like the way the Barone necks work on my Mk VI tenors (or on the B&S tenor I formerly owned), but they work great on the horns listed.

I find the Ref 54 neck is really good on a Mk VI and pretty good on a Mk VII.

I haven't had nearly as much luck when swapping necks on alto, but right now I'm using a Ref 54 neck on my SBA alto, which seems to work real well.

 

[jasonj]

Anyone had success with an after market neck on an SML?

 

[eugeneherman]

I use my Buffet SDA neck on my Vito/Beaugnier tenor... I like my Vibeau neck on my SDA tenor... then sometimes I swap them back... I am building a neck from a Leblanc/Vito blank (NOS) with no bracing... underslung.... to really open up the SDA and make the Vibeau scream!

 

[koumou]

This guy sounds great, but apparently the horn/neck combo isn't close enough to a Mark VI for him...he's selling his 82Z with both the Ref. 54 neck and the original neck in the marketplace. He says that he recently purchased a Mark VI.

Who is this guy? Any youtube link?

 

[nitrosax]

Yeah--Good ol Simon--that's the dude...I didn't know he was selling his Z...i played that setup and it was REALLY good...he also liked the Z best out of A LOT of horns and he played that horn for a while but he told me he always longed for a VI...I'm glad he could get one...

Dude is smokin on sax AND even more smokin on PIANO...

 

[saxmusicguy]

Who is this guy? Any youtube link?

This guy is the person you identified earlier on this thread...

Simon Cosgrove.

Here's his website: http://www.simoncosgrove.net

He also posted youtube links in the the ad in which he's selling his 82Z:

http://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?145057-FS-Yamaha-Custom-Tenor-82Z-UL-no-F-with-two-necks!

 

[saxmusicguy]

Anyone had success with an after market neck on an SML?

Kritavi has had such success, apparently:

I use an Oleg silver-plated neck on my SML Coleman Hawkins with very good results. It gives a more modern and focused Mark VI-like sound to a horn that is otherwise more spread and 10M-like.

So has Axel:

I play an Peter Ponzol (made by Keilwerth) neck on my SML Tenor. The intonation is fine and the upper register, esp the flageolets, works much easyer than with the original neck.

 

[hgiles]

G3 neck on a Z tenor...pretty popular combo actually. I really only noticed a marginal difference in going from G1 to G3, but there was a difference.

 

[Call Me Rockstar]

Same here- 82Z with the G3. Although I am considering trying the Barone copper neck. Any other success stories?

 

[BPSAX]

I have two gloger necks for my serie III soprano.
Warmed up the sound like nothing else!!!!!!

 

[Enviroguy]

I have one of those PB Moore necks that I use on my old school Bundy tenor that I keep as a backup sax. It REALLY cleans up the Bundy's intonation and focuses the sound. It makes this 1975 Bundy sound much more like my 1940 Crat.