Grafton Acrylic Alto

pete

pete

Brassica Oleracea
Staff member
Administrator
One of the many makes and models I didn't cover at saxpics.com while I owned it was the Grafton Acrylic Alto. I'm going to try to rectify that by posting some stuff about it, here.

Very nice review with pics: http://www.shwoodwind.co.uk/Reviews/Sax ... n_alto.htm
A few Grafton ads and promo pics from saxpics.com: http://www.saxpics.com/the_gallery/grafton/misc/ads/
Good Quality pics from saxpics.com: http://www.saxpics.com/the_gallery/grafton/pics/

A beautiful horn from Tenormadness: http://www.tenormadness.com/productDeta ... ductId=485
Another for sale: http://www.justflutes.com/pages/product-detailC2790.htm
The Christie's Auction catalog pic for Parker's horn: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bluejazzbuddha/2095092475/

Grafton article and pics from saxgourmet.com: http://www.saxgourmet.com/grafton.htm
Another article (with take-apart pic): http://www.xs4all.nl/~lexlub/chroma-tic ... rafton.htm (longer version).
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grafton_saxophone
A bit from The Sax and Brass Book, courtesy of Google Books.
An EXCELLENT article by Dave Gelly is at http://www.woodwindcourse.co.uk/user/im ... rafton.doc

Peter King Plays the Grafton on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjY1NPUUp9U (this is Charlie Parker's horn -- which sold for $144,500 at auction)
Ornette Coleman plays the Grafton on YouTube: http://youtube.com/watch?v=NgTr8Z2ioMk (there are probably others; it looks like he's playing a white S80 in newer clips, tho)

I'll try to link up the patent drawing pics in a bit.

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There were approximately 4000 of these horns made and the serial number started at 10,000. Parker's horn was 10,265 (source here and looking at the serial numbers of the horns posted on saxpics.com). In other words, discount the last serial number as being 13,085, as mentioned in the above articles. I've got pics of higher s/n horns on saxpics.com.

There were, supposedly, a few tenor prototypes made, but the acrylic wasn't strong enough to support its own weight.
 
Quite a few made beyond the 13,085 figure indeed. Mine has a serial number of 13,360 for example.

Not a bad horn as far as sound and playability goes. Quite a sweet, dark sounding horn, if not a wee bit lacking in ring. If the keywork was redesigned (especially the springs, rod/key attachment method and octave mechanism) and improved, modern materials were used, it could be sold in today's market (Vibratosax? http://www.vibratosax.com/).

I re-padded and restored mine. Umm, not recommended to the weak of heart or labor weary. :emoji_imp:

Incidentally,
I've found the perfect industrial liquid cement that will perfectly, chemically weld a broken joint in the acrylic plastic these bodies are made of. It is comparable to the original used to assemble these horns. Anyone wishing the name and particulars, send me an Email.

A lovely piece of mid 20th century Art Deco inspired, Italian design any way you look at it.;)
 
Plastics have come a long way in the intervening period. It would be interesting to see how well a polycarbonate saxophone would hold up under conditions of use (something that the Graftons apparently did not suffer well).

Graftons may gain some cache from the rarity factor, but from all accounts that I have seen they were fragile and not worth the trouble. You will note that all that see the sales light of day have the same damage to the key guards on same. Those guards are one area where the original design should have used metal.

Old plastics where the plasticizer (the chemical that keeps the plastic "plastic") has departed for points unknown) are not fun to deal with, and modern formulations are better but still not perfect. While newer stuff may be up to the challenge, Graftons are right now as good as they are going to get.

Assuming that the material is not that critical to the sound (and there are many studies that indicate that is the case), there are tons of real world advantages to, say, a plastic baritone. Ask anyone who has ever played a Fibreglas Sousaphone after lugging around a metal one. But, making an instrumental body takes quite a bit of effort in the form of molding and injection equipment, and that's a lot for one company to take a flyer on, particularly when they are (in effect) breaking new ground.
 
That's why the Vibratosax project looks very interesting. "Good" is questionable: I don't believe there is an actual production model, yet -- and the sound clips on their website aren't really going that far in convincing me that it's a replacement for a traditionally-designed sax.

But the Vibratosax mock-ups and the Grafton are beautiful looking horns.

It's also surprising, to me, how many people I know that own Graftons, especially considering their low production numbers and how fragile they are.

Speaking of low production numbers, I *think* I read someplace that if you broke a Grafton under its warranty period, they'd just send you a new horn. So, someone could have read a statement saying, "This is the official production" and neglected the "These are the replacements for broken instruments" additional production. Just a theory.
 
The story goes that your broken sax could indeed be sent back to the suppliers, and the company would elect to repair or replace. Since 9 times out of 10 it was easier to just chuck the broken plastic and supply a new body, the assemblies were either transplanted on to a new body, or as you say, they might send you a completely new horn. I'm not sure how many fell under a warranty, and how many were replaced with a fee.

This, coupled with the production and design snafu's allows one to easily see why this company went belly up rather swiftly!

Ornette Coleman had to replace his just about every year due to breakage. Even taking into account the rigors a pro player puts his equipment through, this is a pretty hefty attrition rate.

I play mine VERY CAREFULLY. :emoji_smile:

BTW,
durability aside, the clear plastic Deco Flame key guard is one of the major contributors to the flair of design and aesthetic attractiveness of the horn. I'd hate to see it done up in metal.
 
Cheers for posting the links. The JK replacement guard does indeed lack a certain je ne sais qua in comparison, no? ;)
 
Yes.

My opinion is that the metal guard on the JK is actually a factory replacement. I say that because I've seen too many of them and they all look essentially identical. Considering I have experience with the plastic key guard on these horns breaking off above the low C#/B/Bb key rods, I could understand JK wanting to make a much more robust replacement.

And, on their next series of horns, JK shifted back to sheet-metal keyguards :).

But the plastic is pretty.

I've heard that you can still get a replacement keyguard for the JK. I have the link somewhere.
 
Ponte's, a great saxophone shop on w46th st in Manhattan, had Ornette's Grafton for sale for many years, back in the '70s. I'd see it hanging from a hook over and behind the cash register, with a tag attached to it reading Arnette Coleman. Yeah, Arnette. I guess they weren't too into his music, so they spelled his name wrong. Or maybe they were thinking Arnett Cobb. Both were from Fort Worth Texas. Go figure.
I never noticed any interest in the horn whenever I was in the shop back in those years, people were beating a path to the rare and beautiful Selmers that Ponte kept in stock back in those days. I'm sure you could've bought Ornette's horn very cheap in those days.

The stories that I heard about Bird's Grafton were also not the most complementary. My father and his friends, who used to check out Bird live when he was giging and saw Bird playing the Grafton in person, did not understand the concept of Bird playing a plastic saxophone. So the word that I heard when I was a kid was that Bird was reduced to giging on a "toy plastic" saxophone. Pop and his friends used it as a cautionary message to me not to develop bad habits and end up playing on a plastic horn. They didn't know that the man was playing a real horn. A horn fraught with innovation, but a real horn.
 
I love these pearls.

I'm still pulling from the well of wisdom in the Baritonology email from last year. Nearly every time I pick up my bari I think of what you wrote and I hear it.
 
Ed, glad to know that you could use that info. Let me know how you're making out!
 
sideC said:
Ed, glad to know that you could use that info. Let me know how you're making out!
Click to expand...

It's going well. I was asked to be the regular bari player with local big band after doing some subbing at rehearsals for a couple of months. Really nice people on top of it.
 
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