Enviroguy
02-05-2007, 08:16 PM
Well, I've mentioned plenty of times that I have a Winston Soprano. This horn is what I believe to be a 350GL before they started printing 350GL on the horn. Mine just says EM Winston - Boston.
When I bought the thing on eBay for about $180.00, it was in just about perfect condition but only came with one neck; the straight one. And no matter what mouthpiece I tried, it played almost a quarter-step flat. In frustration, I ended up getting a hack saw and hacking about half an inch off the neck. This allowed me to play the horn in tune but also caused the opening at the new end of the neck to be considerably larger. This made it play very bright with a trumpet-like sound. And intonation was always terrible.
I tried several homemade restrictors in the neck, but they always just destroyed the tone and made this poor sax sound more like an oboe. The shortened length between the mouthpiece and neck octave vent also just about ended any chance of playing above A2. I used this horn several times in church performances. I always had to keep my eye shut and concentrate very hard to keep the notes in pitch.
But recently, I purchased a couple of no-name replacement necks. One was straight and the other curved. After sanding down the tenons to fit, I found that either of these necks will just about cure the Winston's tone and pitch problems. I played it Sunday for about 200 folks and it sounded great, for the first time. No deep concentration required.
It's very sad that my Winston is basically useless with the original neck. So based on my experienced, I would not recommend the Winston soprano to anyone that doesn't have their own machine shop or at least plenty of saws and tools. ;)
When I bought the thing on eBay for about $180.00, it was in just about perfect condition but only came with one neck; the straight one. And no matter what mouthpiece I tried, it played almost a quarter-step flat. In frustration, I ended up getting a hack saw and hacking about half an inch off the neck. This allowed me to play the horn in tune but also caused the opening at the new end of the neck to be considerably larger. This made it play very bright with a trumpet-like sound. And intonation was always terrible.
I tried several homemade restrictors in the neck, but they always just destroyed the tone and made this poor sax sound more like an oboe. The shortened length between the mouthpiece and neck octave vent also just about ended any chance of playing above A2. I used this horn several times in church performances. I always had to keep my eye shut and concentrate very hard to keep the notes in pitch.
But recently, I purchased a couple of no-name replacement necks. One was straight and the other curved. After sanding down the tenons to fit, I found that either of these necks will just about cure the Winston's tone and pitch problems. I played it Sunday for about 200 folks and it sounded great, for the first time. No deep concentration required.
It's very sad that my Winston is basically useless with the original neck. So based on my experienced, I would not recommend the Winston soprano to anyone that doesn't have their own machine shop or at least plenty of saws and tools. ;)