Buescher 'True Tone' curved soprano
Origin:
USA
Guide price: £900+
Weight: Not much!
Date of manufacture: 1925
Date reviewed: August 2010
A professional quality vintage soprano in the
curved format
'When I were a lad' there was a popularity among the young bucks of my
age to drive around in what was known as a 'Q car'. This was a term derived
from 'Q ships', which were naval gunboats disguised to look like freight
or passenger ships. The enemy submariners would spot the ship, think they
had an easy target and pop up to have a shot - only to find themselves
looking down the barrel of a couple of 8 inch cannons.
A Q car was usually a sedate-looking old "granddad's car", such
as a Hillman, but under the bonnet there would be a dirty great V6 engine
- carefully (or not so carefully) shoehorned in. Would-be 'racers' with
their Ford Cortina 1600s would be left, as the modern phrase goes, eating
dust at the traffic lights.
How does this relate to saxes? Well, the horn under review turned up in
an aluminium camera case and was handed over with the words "You'll
never guess what's in here". I had a couple of goes...a pair of Eb
clarinets...a flute and a clarinet perhaps - but when I opened the case
I found this Buescher curved soprano, as wonderful a treat as lifting
a bonnet (hood) to find a meticulously polished V8 in your dad's old jalopy.
This sax dates from around 1925, and is only a few years older than the
straight version
I reviewed some years ago, so I was very keen to see how it would compare.
Just for fun I decided not to re-read that review until I'd completed
this one - to see just how many of the final impressions matched up (turns
out it's pretty close).
The saxophone in general is capable of being quite an elegant looking
instrument, but the small size of the curved soprano doesn't work in its
favour and I find they can very easily end up looking a bit, well, 'novelty'
like. Not so the Buescher.
There's something about its proportions that keeps it on the right side
of classy - perhaps it's the lack of bell key guards, or the modestly
flared bell. There's no doubt about it - it's a very pretty horn.
It's not just good looking, it's very well put together too with the sort
of build quality you'd expect from a premier maker of the period.
The body is very neatly constructed with drawn tone holes, soldered bottom
bow and securely attached pillars and fittings. The crook (neck) isn't
removable, being soldered to the body tube. As per the standard design
of the period the bell stay is a simple plain rod affair, which doesn't
really offer much protection to the body in the event of a bell-on bash...but
then that's far less likely to be an issue on a soprano than on any of
the larger saxes. In any case, Buescher make up for this 'flaw' by providing
a proportionately huge bottom bow brace.
A sling ring is fitted, as well as a non-adjustable but quite comfy thumb
hook - and there's a lyre holder fitted to the bell in case you fancy
a spot of marching.
The finish is silver plate, with a 'gold wash' to the interior of the
bell. In spite of the age of this horn and the obvious use it's had, it's
still in remarkably good condition - which probably means they didn't
skimp on the silver in the old days.
The keywork is similarly well built, and despite the small size
of the keys they're nonetheless quite sturdy. Compared with a modern
action the keywork is rather quirky in places. For example, there's
no front top F key (early models didn't even have a palm top F,
they only went up to top Eb) and there's an Eb trill key - which
isn't shown but which can be seen on other horns of similar vintage,
such as the Conn
10M. While some players find this mechanism useful it tends
to cause more problems than it solves due to wear and tear in the
action making it somewhat imprecise. This results in the trill key
pad leaking - so most players are happy to have the spring reversed.
This keeps the trill key cup closed, which has the added benefit
of making the E key action a little lighter and more responsive.
It's an easy tweak, and one that's completely reversible should
you ever wish to fork out for having the action tightened sufficiently
for the key to work properly.
The
design of the bell key spatulas is very basic, as you might expect,
but because of the relatively small size of the soprano they're
rather more sprightly than you might imagine. This is due in part
to there being no articulation with the G# key. I would normally
draw attention to the use of the long rod screws used in the bell
key levers but because of their relatively short length they won't
be much of an issue, unless very badly worn.
Typical of horns of this period, the G# touchpiece consists of a round
pearl. On a larger horn this might prove to be a clumsy arrangement, but
it seems to work well enough on this soprano. In fact it's rather good,
as we'll see shortly. On later models the round pearl was replaced with
a crescent plate, at which point a front top F key was also added.
There are also no guards on the bell keys, which is perhaps what makes
this soprano look quite elegant.
Strictly speaking this is a bit of a design flaw - those large key cups
are exposed and could easily be damaged or bent out of line - but because
the curved soprano isn't a clumsy instrument there's far less chance of
it taking a careless knock. That said, I wouldn't rule out damage while
the horn was in transit - so the design of the case must be taken into
account. As you saw at the start of the review, this horn didn't have
its original case - but I'd be very surprised if any provision had been
made for the lack of bell key guards.
One
of the biggest drawbacks of playing a vintage horn can be the design
of the octave key mechanism.
Until Selmer came along with the swivel (or seesaw) arm system,
these mechanisms tended to be rather complex and fussy. It can be
surprisingly hard to work out how they're supposed to work, and
on certain vintage baritones (which feature even more complex mechanisms)
working out which key does what is rather like doing a cryptic crossword
puzzle. Thankfully the Buescher's mechanism isn't quite that complicated,
but it's still a bit of a dog's breakfast.
The design is such that no matter what you do (fit low-friction
buffers, tweak springs, tighten free play etc.) there's no way the
final result can ever be called 'slick'. It's perhaps the one thing
that lets the whole action down - and the only saving grace is that
because the keys are so small it won't matter too much.
The pads are of the 'snap-in' variety. If you've not come across this
system before it's worth my while explaining it (if you have, feel free
to skip this paragraph!). Modern sax pads have reflectors (or resonators)
fitted to them. These are discs of metal or plastic which serve to cut
down on the surface area of pad leather presented to the tone hole when
the keys are closed - the idea being that this helps prevent the leather
absorbing too much sound and thus giving the instrument a woolly tone.
The snap-in (also sometimes knows as a snap-on) reflector is separate
from the pad and is fitted to a 'boss' that sits in the centre of the
key cup. The pad, with a suitably-sized hole in its centre, is fitted
to the key cup and the reflector is pushed on to the boss to hold the
pad in place. When the reflector clicks into place it does so with a small
'pop' or 'snap' - hence the term 'snap in'.
There are pros and cons to this system (which I might go into at
a later date), but suffice to say that many repairers remove the
bosses and convert the key cups to take standard pads. While there's
nothing wrong with this practice in technical terms, it does tend
to ruin the 'orginality' of such horns and this will affect the
resale value. It's not uncommon to find Bueschers with a mixture
of snap in and standard pads, where either the snap in has been
lost (they sometime become loose and can fall out) or removed during
a service.
Under
the fingers the keys felt quite comfortable - at least in terms
of the main stack keys. I ran into problems with the palm and side
keys, which is a well-known issue with this horn. They're positioned
such that it's quite a long drop before your palm hits the touchpieces,
which makes it tricky to keep the fingers hovering over the upper
stack. Fortunately it's not too difficult a job to modify these
keys yourself - check out the article on custom
key risers.
The clunky octave key mechanism proved to be less than inspiring too,
even after making allowances for the less than tip-top condition of the
action, but the relatively simple design of the bell key spatulas proved
to be no problem at all.
The action felt quite speedy, which ought to be a given considering the
relatively small size of the keys - though I've come across a number of
sopranos with positively spongy action. The G# mechanism deserves a particular
mention in that the feel and response it gives is superb, due to the generous
length of the lever arm (a similar design can be seen on the Conn 6M and
10M saxes).
One of the major problems associated with vintage soprano saxes is their
tuning, and this seems to be more of an issue with the curved variety.
I've long been of the opinion that no sax plays in tune, and that it's
the player that has to make the necessary adjustments with their embouchure
in order to bring the instrument into line. This holds true for all saxes,
save for the few with documented tuning problems due to design flaws.
The thing about sopranos is that their size tends to make all the necessary
compromises built into a sax rather more focussed - so straightaway there's
a tendency for players to struggle with the tuning. Add in the vintage
factor, when design and manufacture were less accurate than they are these
days, and I think it's fair to say that you can expect something of a
challenge when it comes to playing these little beauties in tune.
So I was rather pleased to find that the Buescher curvy was more
in tune than I expected.
My first few minutes of playing showed up a tendency for the low notes
to play flat and the upper octave to get progressively sharper up the
scale. After ten minutes or so the lower end stepped more or less into
line and the upper octave began to slip down. Half a hour later and I
was more or less getting the pitch bang on, as long as I continued to
rein in the embouchure as I went up the range. Given enough time and practice
I can see that the tuning could be mastered, and so I'd say that Buescher
has few or no issues with regard to its tuning.
I would say though that mouthpiece choice is likely to be critical. I
used a rubber Link 7 - I suspect that a more open piece with a larger
tone chamber would have made things a little easier, as much as a more
contemporary piece would have made things more difficult.
Tonewise? Oh well, let's face it, it's gorgeous. The big payoff for accuracy
in tuning on modern sopranos has been a tendency for a more hollow, bright
tone. Personally I quite like that - but there's no denying the Buescher
has a much more complex and rich tone. It's quite hard for sopranos to
develop much warmth, but this horn has plenty of it - and better yet it's
evenly spaced right across the range. The low notes are nicely rounded
and the top end is nothing short of creamy.
It has plenty of power too - a slightly resistant blow, which requires
more breath support from the player, but it doesn't break up when you
push it hard. In fact it develops quite a nice edge...though you wouldn't
want to play at that kind of volume all the time.
I would prefer rather more edge in general myself, which would mean using
a brighter mouthpiece, which would play havoc with the tuning...and which
would negate most of the benefits of playing a vintage soprano (in other
words, a waste of time).
I think a modern soprano has an ability to be 'haunting' in terms of tone,
but the Buescher feels much more friendly and warm.
Rather interestingly, I compared it side-by-side with a modern Bauhaus-Walstein
bronze curved soprano. These Chinese-built horns are based loosely on
a Yanagisawa design, but whether by design or accident they seem to have
ended up with a remarkably vintage-like tone. As a player I prefer the
'modern' sound, but as an enthusiast I love the vintage warmth. I felt
the Bauhaus bridged the gap very nicely - and as such it's a viable alternative
to these rare and expensive vintage curvies.
Re-reading my review of the straight version I'm pleased to see that
I found many of the same characteristics on the curved soprano. It had
the same focus of tone and that lovely, rich warmth. Players tend to say
that curved sopranos sound different from their straight counterparts
- but this is by virtue of having a bell that curves upwards. Listeners
will be hard put to notice anything different, but the player gets more
of an earful!
And as with the straight soprano, this beautiful Buescher walks right
into the hall of fame. It's a gorgeous, responsive little horn with bags
of character.
If all this has made you jealous then here's the killer. The chap who
brought this little beauty in also brought in a nice old Aristocrat alto.
Both these horns, and a clarinet, and a selection of mouthpieces were
all bought from a charity shop...for less than £100 in total. Lucky,
lucky, lucky!
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