Trevor James?

[Michael]

Johnny is making some great points….man I would have LOVED to have a Selmer and there’s NO WAY I would put a T.J. over a Selmer; that’s ludicrous. But with the price tag, people having a families to support, etc, now days only a fortunate few are able to spend that kind of $ for one of them. I was about $1,000 out from being able to look at a Selmer (only ONE Selmer, with the $ I had to work with I was able to get 2 Trevor James, Alto and Tenor), but the question I asked myself is: Do I REALLY need it? I didn’t want to fall into that thinking that I HAVE to get one in order to sound good because as Johnny has said our MP/Reed combo. makes more of a difference than anything; so I was looking at the “fine-line” of having a Saxophone that will last me for some time to come and balance that out with a good MP/Reed. And like Johnny said above; how many people can really tell the difference anyway? Besides, I’m doing this for fun/enjoyment and that’s what it’s all about! 🙂
In an e-mail I got from Massullo Music when we were coordinating with the money wire transfer to pay them they talked about a Pro player from New York–they didn’t mention who his name was in the e-mail–that they had come by their shop who played a vintage Selmer SBA and tried the Signature Custom line of Saxophones that T.J. makes (the alto I have coming is a Signature Custom) Sandro, the owner, said that the player was quote “floored” by it and that player actually decided to get one; they shipped it to him the same day I got that e-mail dated Feb. 12th. He’s not saying for one minute that it was better than his Selmer SBA. But it was much “more” of a Saxophone than he expected; given the price of the Saxophone. Check out this interview from pro player Andy Snitzer who plays for T.J Saxophones who Massullo Music Interviewed:
http://massullomusic.com/interview-with-trevor-james-artist-andy-snitzer/ Given my circumstances with a family to support, $ on hand, etc., I feel I made the best decision possible to go with Trevor James; but different strokes for different folks as they say.

[Anonymous]

Lot of good points raised!

I’m just glad i haven’t got the itch for playing a soprano, Baritone or a Tenor Sax – all that extra costs!

I enjoy playing my intermediate Sax, which is better than a student sax but not quite as full bodied
as a Pro sax model.

I was originally only going to buy a student Yamaha Alto Sax, but i when i tried the Intermediate
model i did notice a slight difference in sound between the two models,
what put me off the student model – all 5 B flat positions sounded miles off on the one i played,
whereas the intermediate model they were all spot on – and that would have really bugged me knowing that.

At the moment i enjoy playing my sax, so i don’t see reason to change it yet!

What i have noticed is my sound now after 14 months is completely different to what it was 6 months ago,
in fact its so different i can’t believe its the same sax! Johnny’s “Daily Practice” routine which i use as a
30 min warm up has made a huge difference.

2 weeks before my abrsm Grade 2 Alto Sax exam last december, my instructor, spent a complete lesson
getting me to try out various mouthpieces, and he listened to the sound of each one as i played them!
Eventually he hit on one, which to me sounded really awful, and i would never have picked it!
So to humour him i went along with it as he said that’s the one you are going to play in the exam,
and he said after that you can go back to your original mouthpiece.

Looking back, if i had picked a mouthpiece that sounded wonderful – i don’t think there would have been
any conscious effort to improve on the sound, whereas the the mouthpiece he selected gave me more
of an incentive to improve on its sound. So basically he gave me a lump of clay which i could easily notice
the changes as i improved, whereas giving me a modelled lump of clay would have been a lot harder for me
to notice the changes – don’t know if that makes sense?

If i was going to upgrade – sorry, all the you tube videos i’ve listened to point to a selmer (my oppinon only),
So i would rather put the money to buying a selmer later than buying temporary stop gap models in between,
by the time i’ve paid for 3 or 4 saxophones, i could just have bought the selmer outright.
But like you say Michael – do i really need a Selmer .. not yet mate!

[Z]

Someone said that Massulo was really easy to work with. They seem to not be at all. I emailed them to see if they had the model I wanted in stock and they said that they could ship it in from Europe and get it here. No problem. Well it’s like two or three weeks later and they just now shipped it from Europe this morning. They said last week that they were sending it from Europe, too, so I have no idea. They also only respond to my emails like half the time when I ask them questions about the shipment or whatever. It just seems that I should have just ordered it from Sax.co.uk and it would have been easier since Massulo had to get it from Europe anyway..

[Anonymous]

i live in the Uk & years ago i ordered something from the Usa, it arrived 2 weeks later, and then i had to pay some sort of import tax when it arrived at my address. which to me doubled the whole price. So i don’t order goods from the Usa anymore.

So when i wanted 2 theowanne Usa mouthpieces, i did it through sax.co.uk. One item took several weeks as it wasn’t in stock and the other one took a few days as they had it in stock.
With sax.co.uk what they tend to do, when i rang them up is they then tend to put all their orders together and send off one big order to the supplier rather than do lots of separate tiny orders.
I think they do that over the phone/web site so it probably saves them a lot of time.

These small organisations/shops have less staff, i think they often get bogged down in paper work etc..
But saying that i’ve had no problems with sax.co.uk, when you ring them up they are really helpful, they won’t try and sell you something you don’t need, and they don’ t waste time with small talk, they respond to my e-mails within a day, The only problem i had was their tracking of orders on line was very slow – but thats down to the amount of staff again. So i used to ring them up & they would tell me straight away the status of the order.

[Michael]

If they didn’t have your model of Tenor in store, then they would have to order it from the U.K. to have it brought to the states for you and it would naturally take a little longer. Both of my Saxophones are “in transit” and tracking shows that one of them as cleared the Customs Inspection and is now in the U.S.. and they’ll get here so I’m not worried about it. There are things that are sometimes out of their control; Massullo Music is very good at what they do.

[john]

Sorry to hear about the slow service. I know Sandro Massulo personally and will chat with him about this and see what’s going on. Distributors are at the mercy of suppliers of course so it may have something to do with a recent shortage of product because Massulo is the only North American distributor for Trevor James. Normally he would have more of a complete line of stock and be able to ship it to you in a day or two.
Regarding the long response time I don’t know but I’ll let him know about it. Apart from all this, he’s very knowledgable, great repair guy who runs a small shop which is why I go there.
cheers
Johnny

[Lewis Pelham]

I too had a Yamaha tenor,,,a YTS 62, & like you, found it too “polite” sounding.
“The greats” did indeed tend to gravitate towards Selmer, & of course they make great horns; but the main reason they used them was, I believe, due to the revised key-work that they introduced in 1935 on their BA model….a system now universally adopted.
There were those who persisted with their Bueschers, Kings, Martins & Conns but their spatula tables were so awkward.
For reasons known only to themselves they did not adopt the Selmer system.
I have a really beautiful old Buescher Big B, but seldom play it….just because of the L/H spatula table….groping around for a tiny B1 key buried between the C# & Bb….

[Z]

I’m sure there’s reasons for it, I mean I know it takes time. I’m just really impatient.. Hah

[john]

Good point captain. I often wonder about those things, it’s like the designers weren’t players themselves or else why would they make the horns like that. Another thing I can say about Yamaha saxes… they feel very nice to play and are quality built but their tone is secondary to selmers. I remember start players like (Sanborn?) advertising these horns in magazines but when they did a studio session or a gig they always played their selmer.

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