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Weissenberg - Taiwanese Sax with a German-Sounding Name

pete

Brassica Oleracea
Staff member
Administrator
The Weissenberg saxophone was manufactured at Huo-Li, the birthplace of Taiwan's saxophone, and is one of the manufacture stations of saxophone in the world. In the prosperous period, the annul output of the factories there reached more than thirty thousand, occupying approximately one third of the global market. Therefore the advantage of our Weissengerg [sic] saxophone is that we posses the essence of tradition technique passed down from Europe, America and Japan, together with the honor of designing saxophone, the unique characteristic of the our Weissenberg was then developed.
I've looked at a boatload of Chinese, Taiwanese and Vietnamese saxophones, recently. I've also seen and heard of saxophones where the body is made in one country, the keywork in another, the design in another, and assembled in another. It's somewhat nice to see a company say, "Made in Taiwan" up-front -- although I do subtract points because of the fake German name (however, the actual company name is, "Coming Musical Instruments," so maybe I should cut them some slack).

They offer a couple sterling silver horns ... at 31,900 Euros for an alto and 36,500 Euros for a tenor. I think either is more expensive than buying the entire family of Yanagisawa SATB sterling horns ....
 
They do look like an interesting option; Huo-Li is indeed where Taiwan's saxophone manufacture began in 1945.
There's another brand, Lian Cheng, which is the one that started it all; they're like the Selmer of Taiwan.

I'm seriously considering one of their sopranos as less expensive alternative to Yamahas.
Story has it that when Yamaha began making saxophones, they sent their artisans to Huo-Li for training...
 
They do look like an interesting option; Huo-Li is indeed where Taiwan's saxophone manufacture began in 1945.
There's another brand, Lian Cheng, which is the one that started it all; they're like the Selmer of Taiwan.

I'm seriously considering one of their sopranos as less expensive alternative to Yamahas.
Story has it that when Yamaha began making saxophones, they sent their artisans to Huo-Li for training...
I can't recall the history off the top of my head but I think Yamaha (and Miramatsu, etc) came out of Yanagisawa.

considering the quality of Taiwan horns just 15+ short years ago, I would think Yamaha would want some high quality training.

Do you have a reference to that information ?
 
They do look like an interesting option; Huo-Li is indeed where Taiwan's saxophone manufacture began in 1945.
There's another brand, Lian Cheng, which is the one that started it all; they're like the Selmer of Taiwan.

I'm seriously considering one of their sopranos as less expensive alternative to Yamahas.
Story has it that when Yamaha began making saxophones, they sent their artisans to Huo-Li for training...
I can't recall the history off the top of my head but I think Yamaha (and Miramatsu, etc) came out of Yanagisawa.

considering the quality of Taiwan horns just 15+ short years ago, I would think Yamaha would want some high quality training.

Do you have a reference to that information ?

Sure thing; it was first referenced in SOTW in 2010:
https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?147365-LC-Sax-Lien-Cheng-Saxophones

Then I found that information on Lien Cheng's website:
http://www.lcsax.com/aboutus/history.html

Surprising nonetheless.
 
I don't quite have the time to read 16 pages of posts on SOTW, ATM, but I did notice that the first post in the 10-page thread that the user Adolphe Sax et Cie says that Bill Clinton's sax was from LC Sax. That's a no. It was an LA Sax instrument. Again, I didn't read all those posts. It's possible that someone has some evidence that LA Sax = LC Sax or something like that.

Yanagisawa was founded in 1896. Yamaha was founded in 1887, but didn't produce bunches of instruments at the time. Yanagisawa sold Nikkan in 1955. Nikkan is the woodwind component of Yamaha corp. Here are some Nikkan horns. I think the older ones look a lot like the Yanagisawa 3 and 5 Series -- and Yamaha says they started wind instrument manufacture in 1965.

LC Sax said:
The Changs regret that “Jupiter” (which came from Yamaha) was the only independent Taiwanese brand that penetrated the global market.
I really don't think that Yamaha ever made Jupiter horns or that Jupiter/KHS is some offshoot of Yamaha. I don't see any evidence of that online, other than at the LC Sax website. Maybe it's a translation problem and they meant something along the lines of, "Copies of Yamaha models."

You could write to Yamaha and/or Yanagisawa and/or KHS and they might be able to easily confirm/deny for you any of the claims from LC Sax. I've gotta say that I've got enough stuff that's more interesting to work on, so I won't :D. However, please share the response if you do contact them.

Helen's got an article on LC Sax. It would be interesting to see a 1948-ish Taiwanese sax.
 
From WikiPedia it states that Jupiter started in 1980 from KHS.

Also interesting, I have a few reseller books of instruments from the early 1980s. I cannot recall one Taiwan/Chinese brand on those lists and yet the website states that they produced 1/3 of the worlds production in the 1970s of saxophones ?

more info is definitely needed.
 
Also interesting, I have a few reseller books of instruments from the early 1980s. I cannot recall one Taiwan/Chinese brand on those lists and yet the website states that they produced 1/3 of the worlds production in the 1970s of saxophones ?

more info is definitely needed.

Ah ha... It seems to me that there is some exaggeration going on here. European manufacturers were still very much in the picture at this time. It was later during this decade that some of the those companies finally couldn't compete with the cheap Asian horns, and ceased saxophone production. However, ATT those horns were coming from Japan, not China... At least according to the companies like Hammerschmidt, et al.
 
I don't quite have the time to read 16 pages of posts on SOTW, ATM, but I did notice that the first post in the 10-page thread that the user Adolphe Sax et Cie says that Bill Clinton's sax was from LC Sax. That's a no. It was an LA Sax instrument. Again, I didn't read all those posts. It's possible that someone has some evidence that LA Sax = LC Sax or something like that.
to quote SOTW
Everyone wondered what saxophones the former Taiwanese president handed to mister Bill Clinton: well...it was an LC Sax...
This is not the same episode as the LA Sax. But the Taiwanese President.
Of which you can clearly see via the lacquer that it was not the same horn.
I cannot authenticate when the picture was taken. The horn looks like a small bore by looking at the photo.
EDIT: this apparently occurred in March 2005 of Former President Bill Clinton trip to Taiwan (when he was no longer President).
f07ed52bf78c7e5e5e7fa870419e08ee_THUMBNAIL_4.jpg

So President Clinton had a sax 3 times in the White House.
A LA Sax, a LC Sax and a Lewinsky. lol
 
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Also interesting, I have a few reseller books of instruments from the early 1980s. I cannot recall one Taiwan/Chinese brand on those lists and yet the website states that they produced 1/3 of the worlds production in the 1970s of saxophones ?

more info is definitely needed.

Ah ha... It seems to me that there is some exaggeration going on here. European manufacturers were still very much in the picture at this time. It was later during this decade that some of the those companies finally couldn't compete with the cheap Asian horns, and ceased saxophone production. However, ATT those horns were coming from Japan, not China... At least according to the companies like Hammerschmidt, et al.
What I could agree with, with no research, is that LC made 1/3 of saxophones produced in Taiwan/China.
But certainly not 30% global manufacturing starting in the 70s.

It also mentioned a potential partnership with Yamaha. We also know that Yamaha wanted Taiwan/Chinese horns, thus they were looking for a partner in the late 1990s (?). This later created the Advantage line of instruments in order to compete with the China market for low cost instruments.
 
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Me said:
1. The Yamaha China plant is owned by Yamaha and has been producing horns since 2000 ...
2. There appears to be some Yamaha stuff being made in Malaysia, which is immediately north of Indonesia, but they're two separate countries.
3. There are still Yamahas being assembled in the US using parts from Yamaha China, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Of course, that doesn't matter for the 40% or so of our members that live outside the US -- or, possibly, for the 60% that live in the US.
...
5. It's not very clear if Yamaha Japan is still making student/intermediate horns. Stephen Howard mentions that he was starting to see "Made in Indonesia" in 2007, but there appears to have been some cross-over then, still.
6. It's overly confirmed that Yamaha pro models are still made in Japan.
Yamaha Indonesia was first with the 01Q models starting around 1998. The Chinese-made Advantage line looks like it came out around 2000. (The Allegro line was initially sold to the education market, only, and is now made in China. I don't have a good start date on these.)

+1 on that Clinton pic, Steve. Makes me wonder how many saxophones Clinton now has because everyone keeps giving them to him :D.

===============

Take a look at this:

http://www.bloomberg.com said:
Yamaha Music & Electronics Taiwan Co., Ltd. engages in the import and sales of musical instruments, PA equipment, and AV products. Yamaha Music & Electronics Taiwan Co., Ltd. was formerly known as Yamaha KHS Music Co., Ltd. and changed its name to Yamaha Music & Electronics Taiwan Co., Ltd. in March, 2013 as a result of the acquisition of Yamaha KHS Music Co., Ltd. by Yamaha Corporation. The company was founded in 1996 and is based in Taipei, Taiwan. Yamaha Music & Electronics Taiwan Co., Ltd. operates as a subsidiary of Yamaha Corporation.
Full link.

I also dug up this link. It talks about a couple of Yamaha and KHS partnerships. The first was in 1969 to make pianos. The second was in 1996. From the link in the above paragraph, Yamaha bought out Yamaha KHS in 2013. I did some Internet magic and I went to the Yamaha Taiwan page from 2012. Looks like they're selling the standard Yamaha saxophone line. I'm relatively sure that the only instruments that Yamaha KHS made were pianos and electronic instruments. Also, going back to that link on the KHS website, KHS started making wind instruments in 1957 and started using the name "Jupiter" in 1985 (contradicting Steve's Wikipedia source). In other words, the LC Sax website is still playing a bit fast & loose with facts -- or, again, they have bad translators.

Personally, I don't mind the idea of Yamaha sending their techs wherever to get training. I think that LC Sax is trying to make you think that their horns are as high quality as Yamaha's. I think that's the bottom line and I really can't answer that for you. Taiwanese horns have made significant strides in quality over the past few years -- Helen really liked that Sea Wind bari, for instance -- but I don't think I can start telling folks, "Look for horns from LC Sax! They're grrrreat!" I also still think that $34,000 is a ridiculous price for any saxophone.
 
I do know the quality from Yamaha in the early 80s was fantastic.
And the quality from Taiwan horns in the late 90s/early 2000s was when they started being noticed for higher quality. But before that they weren't. I recall my Cannonball Big Bell tenor sax which was pretty good quality.

The LC to Yamaha ... that can be correlated to ... LC techs changed jobs and went to work for Yamaha. Which is entirely plausible and would make that statement loosely correct. But details/ supportive facts would have to be found.

But, I'm not an asian horn expert by any means.
 
Helen really liked that Sea Wind bari, for instance

I don't however, know what factory it was built in. It was a case of don't ask, don't tell. ;)

Claudio did tell me that he and Phil Dwyer (the owners of Seawind) toured all the major, and some of the smaller manufacturers' facilities in both Taiwan and China. They were shocked at times at what they saw. The quality control seemed to be lacking in some places altogether, while in other places it was top notch. However, they were looking for something a little different.

Not only were they looking for a company that had the willingness to work together with them to implement their designs, and incorporate all the parts and pieces they wanted, but they also didn't want to have the saxophones assembled there. They just wanted the parts shipped to Canada in pieces, so Claudio could assemble them here.

Finding a factory that met all these standards was apparently not all that easy. Many companies are happy just to have all the horns roll off the assembly line looking identical with only the name being different on the bell, and with QC being a somewhat hit and miss thing.

I purposely didn't ask about factory names--in part b/c they wouldn't have meant a thing to me--and secondly, to protect the confidentiality of brands vis-à-vis their sources.
 
Yup. And also, in regard to Yamaha products made outside of Japan, there have been about 20 years to see if the quality on their non-pro horns has taken a nosedive. Nobody's been complaining.

The last Taiwanese horn I played was a CE Winds student model a few years ago. It wasn't terrible, but I felt that their intermediate horn would better compete with the Yamaha student horns. I also still think that buying a used Yamaha 23/Vito stencil alto at around $450 - $550 is better than buying new, provided you know what you're looking for. If you're a pro, I can't fault you for choosing any make/model.
 
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