Slide Saxophone

OK. The article names -- I've already mentioned the issues are:

* The Royal Slide Saxophone
* Voices of the Slide Saxophone, Part II
* Voices of the Slide Saxophone, III: Those that Might Have Been!

Gimmee a few and I'll try to write out a few summaries, at least to see if I can answer Helen's question to a better extent.
 
You asked for it:

===========

Article I:

R&H "... began as silversmith company in downtown Chicago, c. 1911." However, because of the WWI demand for instruments (aside: remember that the Conn 16V contrabass Sarrusophone was primarily made for a military order), R&H started to dabble in making brasswinds, including trombones.

"In 1922, Carl Reiffel contacted Lyon and Healy ... about distributing ... the slide saxophone." This actually encourages me. It means something that I've often said: L&H never made saxophones, they just bought stencils. Additionally, Paul Cohen quotes from an article on R&H by Lloyd P. Farrar (AMIS Newsletter, Feb. 1991) that L&H responded, "If you succeed in making the slide saxophone work to our satisfaction, we are willing to authorize your firm to manufacture these instruments for us, any new features you embody in same to be exclusively orur property; patent applications are to be assigned to us by you without charge." Dr. C goes on to say that Carl Reiffel turned them down and patented the horn under his own name.

My reading of the rest of the article is that the R&H horn is a fairly decent instrument, but it was essentially a novelty horn and "... crossing registers is ... difficult".

The only person that used it to any great extent was Snub Mosely.

One thing about the R&H that I forgot was that the horn does have the pitches engraved on the "piston" and they do "... come to eye level". Which is pretty kewl. I've seen that on an example that was in better shape than the one I posted on saxpics.com. However, they're a tad shallow. I don't know if you could easily see them in a playing environment.

Article II:

The Swannee-sax was available in at least three different variants and I posted them to saxpics.com awhile back. According to the article, the inaugral concert performance with one of these was on April 25, 1928 with Paul Specht and his orchestra.

Dr. C mentions that, "The manufacturer (probably Lyon and Healy) agreed to custom-make them (at great cost) [Pete's note: they're called "SaxoSlides"], if only to dissuade the purchaser from buying a foreign-made instrument [comment from me: the Swannee-sax was made in England]." He quotes, as his reference, an April 1928 article in Musical Merchandise.

Dr. C goes on to talk about the HN White King Saxoprano (it's the far left slide sax in this sample from my 2008 Calendar) and says that he has not found any advertisement from HN White for this instrument. (You might want to write the folks at hnwhite.com and ask if they have a catalog that lists it.)

Actually, that sample from my calendar essentially closes out the article: the MelloSax was made by Rene Lazare and William Clapham and it's patented. Like the Swannee-sax, there were at least two versions, with one looking a lot like the HN White King C Saxoprano (there's a picture in the article).

Article III:

Talks about the FC Bender slide tenor, which was based on the R&H "principle" (linky to the patent).

There's also a fully-keyed straight slide alto pictured and mentioned in the article, but it is not stamped with any name or patent number. The person that owns the horn thinks it's of European origin.

The article then talks about the circular slide alto, made by Martin Juhn. There is only one know instrument that survives.
 
Anyhow, answering the questions:

* Were they novelty or serious? Depends a bit on the model. The R&H and L&H models seem the most "serious" instruments. The HN White looks a bit flimsy (its slide is a leather strap, after all).

* There were at least two "big name" manufacturers that made slide saxophones: Lyon & Healy, HN White and possibly Holton

* According to this, R&H went bye-bye around 1930. I assume that all slide sax manufacture stopped around then.

* Interesting reading about Reiffel and Husted.

* From the pages of interesting trivia, I bring you this.

... Annnd, I'd be remiss if I didn't include a pic of hippy boy.

:D
 
Wow Pete! Did you leave a stone unturned?

This is really interesting. I am always astounded how you dig this stuff up.
 
Well, of course 90% of the above was gleaned through Dr. Cohen's writing. The hippy pic was found through Googling for "Reiffel and Husted" :D.

The patents are a bit more fun. The USPTO does not have a full search available for patents before 1976, just if you know the number. Fortunately, I stumbled across http://ep.espacenet.com a few years back and that's a full text search for all patents, worldwide and goes back into the 19th century for most countries (not France, unfortunately).

There are a LOT of pictures on the web of the R&H and Swannee-sax slide saxophones. The other ones that I've mentioned above really are rare. I think that pic from my calendar is probably the only one that features all of the fairly well known ones -- and I think maybe Rob Verdi and Paul Cohen are the only two that have a collection that diverse.
 
I work cheap!

I do like to do research, but only on things that capture my attention spa ... ooh, look. Something shiny!
 
pete said:
You asked for it:

===========

Article I:

R&H "... began as silversmith company in downtown Chicago, c. 1911." However, because of the WWI demand for instruments (aside: remember that the Conn 16V contrabass Sarrusophone was primarily made for a military order), R&H started to dabble in making brasswinds, including trombones.

"In 1922, Carl Reiffel contacted Lyon and Healy ... about distributing ... the slide saxophone." This actually encourages me. It means something that I've often said: L&H never made saxophones, they just bought stencils. Additionally, Paul Cohen quotes from an article on R&H by Lloyd P. Farrar (AMIS Newsletter, Feb. 1991) that L&H responded, "If you succeed in making the slide saxophone work to our satisfaction, we are willing to authorize your firm to manufacture these instruments for us, any new features you embody in same to be exclusively orur property; patent applications are to be assigned to us by you without charge." Dr. C goes on to say that Carl Reiffel turned them down and patented the horn under his own name.

My reading of the rest of the article is that the R&H horn is a fairly decent instrument, but it was essentially a novelty horn and "... crossing registers is ... difficult".

The only person that used it to any great extent was Snub Mosely.

One thing about the R&H that I forgot was that the horn does have the pitches engraved on the "piston" and they do "... come to eye level". Which is pretty kewl. I've seen that on an example that was in better shape than the one I posted on saxpics.com. However, they're a tad shallow. I don't know if you could easily see them in a playing environment.

Article II:

The Swannee-sax was available in at least three different variants and I posted them to saxpics.com awhile back. According to the article, the inaugral concert performance with one of these was on April 25, 1928 with Paul Specht and his orchestra.

Dr. C mentions that, "The manufacturer (probably Lyon and Healy) agreed to custom-make them (at great cost) [Pete's note: they're called "SaxoSlides"], if only to dissuade the purchaser from buying a foreign-made instrument [comment from me: the Swannee-sax was made in England]." He quotes, as his reference, an April 1928 article in Musical Merchandise.

Dr. C goes on to talk about the HN White King Saxoprano (it's the far left slide sax in this sample from my 2008 Calendar) and says that he has not found any advertisement from HN White for this instrument. (You might want to write the folks at hnwhite.com and ask if they have a catalog that lists it.)

Actually, that sample from my calendar essentially closes out the article: the MelloSax was made by Rene Lazare and William Clapham and it's patented. Like the Swannee-sax, there were at least two versions, with one looking a lot like the HN White King C Saxoprano (there's a picture in the article).

Article III:

Talks about the FC Bender slide tenor, which was based on the R&H "principle" (linky to the patent).

There's also a fully-keyed straight slide alto pictured and mentioned in the article, but it is not stamped with any name or patent number. The person that owns the horn thinks it's of European origin.

The article then talks about the circular slide alto, made by Martin Juhn. There is only one know instrument that survives.
Click to expand...

The circular slide saxophone is one of the most remarkable instruments I have played. I found out that three survived and were being kept by the family. I had the pleasure of videotaping my playing of the instrument at their home in Ohio, and if there is any interest I'll try to find a way to convert it to an internet format. It was brilliantly designed and well-made. In some ways it reminded me of the care and quality of construction of my Loomis Double Resonance alto saxophone. The circular slide saxophone is more unusual that playing Billy True's three simultaneous saxophone set up (also from Ohio) and makes the "traditional" slide saxophone feel like a flute-o-phone.

Paul Cohen
 
You know I'm gonna say it: I'd love to see a video. I remember your article about the circular slide from the Saxophone Journal. That must have been 10 - 15 years ago.
 
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