Which brand?

[Jeffrey Chen]

I'm planning to buy a pro soprano sax, but am not sure which is a better sax? Yamaha or Yani?? Can anyone give a professional advise? I am not able to test the different sax as we do not have shops selling thus would need your advises.

Thanks
Jeff

[Dave Dolson]

Jeffrey: Welcome to SOTW.

Your question is just too subjective to answer objectively. Both are good horns - I've owned both and have played LOTS of others from those two manufacturers.

My subjective answer is Yanagisawa . . . I own three Yanagisawa sops and no Yamahas now. DAVE

[shmuelyosef]

ditto...'better' is not a relevant term. Sounds like you are a relative novice to playing soprano. Look for a reasonable deal on either one in good repair (i.e. from a reputable known reseller or new), just buy it and learn to play it as well as you can. After 5-10 years of hard practice, you will be in a much better position to revisit this question. In the meantime, your time is better spent practicing on a known excellent horn (any Yanagisawa or any Yamaha from the 4xx or above) than worrying about which one to buy.

[BlueLight]

I agree w/ everything said above. Both are great, I own a Yamaha Alto and a Yani Tenor, and I like certain things about both of them.
Although you need to go deeper than just the brands. What are you deciding between?
Are you deciding between a Yamaha Student Sop vs a Yanagisawa S992? In which case I'd say go w/ the Yani. But if it were between say a S992 vs a YSS-875EX then that would be a tough a call for me for sure. But, if you want my personal pick between those two, I'd say Yani. Just because I love the table keys on them, and despise the table keys on the Yamaha.