Michael's Saxophone Page

 Contrabass Story

After deciding to add an Orsi contrabass saxophone to my collection, I contacted the L.A. Sax company in San Antonio in November 2002, and placed my order. L.A. Sax informed me a few days later that production of a contrabass saxophone was already in-progress and could be delivered in 3-4 months.

L.A. Sax notified me on Tuesday, March 4th, 2003 that the contrabass saxophone had arrived and sent me photo’s via e-mail of it being unloaded from the truck and of it being uncrated. They offered to ship it to me – however, since I live in Dallas and San Antonio is only 5 hours away, I made plans to personally pick up the contrabass saxophone.

On Friday morning, March 7th, 2003, I left Dallas for San Antonio to pick up the new contrabass. When I arrived at L.A. Sax, they took me to the demonstration room and I saw for the first time in person my gleaming, new, contrabass saxophone. It was already mounted on its specially-made stand. I stood there for a moment and just marveled at how truly big it was. I then positioned my hands on the keys and felt the key action – surprisingly smooth and light for such a big horn. The mechanisms were very precision and balanced – no clickety-clank that you so often hear with vintage big saxophones. So far so good.

Satisfied with the feel of the horn, I was ready to see how it played. Having never played a contrabass before, I had no idea what to expect next. I sat down in front of the horn, took a deep breath, used my best baritone/bass sax embouchure, and blew into the mouthpiece. Nothing. Wow! Not a good start. Hmmm …trying again, I blew more forcefully and played about a 16th note before the sound stopped. Well, at least it was progress! Suspecting the problem was a lack of continuous air support, I tried again and concentrated on maintaining air pressure. Presto, it worked! I went up and down the scale and was pleased with the big horn’s intonation. The low Bb felt like an internal massage and sounded wonderful. Afterwards, I checked all my teeth fillings to ensure they were all in their original place.

Not surprisingly, the contrabass saxophone takes a lot of air – just like a tuba does. With the contrabass saxophone, I noted it requires sustained high volumes of air to provide the air pressure needed by the big reed to vibrate at such low-frequencies. Once I realized and fully appreciated this, the contrabass sax and I got along just fine.

Satisfied with the horn and ready to head back home to Dallas, I paid L.A. Sax and they loaded it into my pickup truck. I must say that the L.A. Sax folks were very helpful and friendly and it was a pleasure doing business with them from start to finish. At 4PM, I began the return trip home to Dallas.

I arrived home at 10PM (rush hour traffic in Austin, Texas slowed me down by an hour), ate a quick supper, jokingly said to myself “Are you ready to rumble?!?!?!” and commenced to playing the contrabass and learning how it likes to be played and all of its nuances. At 1AM, the long day, the excitement, and the long drive caught up with me and I decided to call it a day.

On Saturday, March 8, 2003, I brought my new contrabass (and my baritone sax) to a 9AM orchestra dress rehearsal at the Dallas Apparel Mart (scenes from the movie Logan’s Run were filmed here, by the way) and played music written for tuba. Although I was still inexperienced with the contrabass saxophone, I did well enough that the orchestra conductor asked me to perform with it that evening. The performance later that evening went very well – Dallas Mayor Laura Miller was in attendance. One other thing I will say about the contrabass saxophone: It certainly is an attention-getter. Several folks in the audience were fascinated with it and asked to hear it.

I hope you enjoyed my story of the first couple of days with my new contrabass saxophone. Check back for updates as the story continues.

To hear my contrabass sax, click here for my solo performances page.

Click here for more information about my Orsi contrabass saxophone.

Click here for information about my new Keilwerth bass saxophone.
 

At the Dallas Apparel Mart before show time, the horn is all tuned, warmed up and I'm ready to play, March 8th, 2003.

At the Dallas Apparel Mart before show time, Sheryl helps me tune those seismically low vibrations, March 8th, 2003.

From Milan, Italy to San Antonio, TX USA - the contrabass saxophone is unloaded from the delivery truck at the L.A. Sax loading dock, March 4th, 2003.

The uncrating process begins, March 4th, 2003.

Uncrated from its shipping container, the L.A. Sax folks remove the protective factory wrapping from the contrabass saxophone, March 4th, 2003.

My, what a difference 4 octaves make! From Eb sopranino to Eb contrabass, I test-play them both at L.A. Sax, March 7th, 2003. I like the sopranino and plan to get one.