SOLD/TRADED
Here is a beautiful piece of American craftsmanship from 1926, a Conn New Wonder Series II alto saxophone in burnished gold plate with elaborate engraving.
Let’s just get down to the nuts and bolts here: when I am done restoring this horn, this will be a stunningly beautiful alto with power and richness of tone that is hard to find anywhere else. I am not prone to superlatives, but I would go before a jury and win in defense of the statement: Conns from the 1920s have the biggest tone of any saxophone ever made.
The drawback- depending on your point of view- is that this is not a sleek, modern, comfortable ride.
Playing this horn, you aren’t this:
You are this:
This is no meek beast. You don’t play a Conn from the 1920s with your frontal cortex alone. You will be muscling this horn around, and it will push back. These horns have ideas of their own, and not everyone can- or wants to- have a relationship like that with a saxophone. But for those who do, the rewards are a tone that will cause non-musicians in the back of the house to sit up and look to see where that sound is coming from.
This saxophone is in good physical condition with nearly all of its plating intact (the original plating thickness on the burnished Conns was incredibly thick) and the full overhaul that will be done to this horn will be about 40 hours of labor and will bring it back to mechanically ideal, playing as its maker intended. It will provide years of trouble-free service and with good stewardship will still be making music 150 years from now.
Photos below are pre-overhaul, and shows the instrument in been-in-a-case-for-decades state. The gold will clean up considerably (indeed I imagine it will look nearly flawless- gold being non-reactive holds up very well to time) during the overhaul, and will likely look much like this (with the exception that this horn is fully burnished throughout, and that horn in the linked photo is burnished keys with matte body). Catch me before I do the work and I can do the overhaul to your specs. Photos will be updated once the overhaul is complete.
Price: SOLD/TRADED
Email or call me using the contact page if you would like to purchase this instrument.
