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Are vintage Selmer ligatures that special?

13K views 42 replies 25 participants last post by  ving 
#1 ·
Lately I've been seeing a lot of people play those vintage selmer two screw ligs. Not the silver 3 band one. It looks like a regular stock lig, yet I know some people who would rather play those than anything else. What makes them so special? I'm just curious cause they look like any other stock two screw lig.
 
#3 ·
The dont sound different. One thing I like about them is that the screw mechanisms are very well made. I am not an engeneer but I notice that even when old the screws turn really nicely, unusually so. I dont know what was done to give them that feel that they have but it is nice.

I wont go out of my way to buy them but I dont tend to get rid of the ones I come across.
 
#8 ·
The dont sound different. One thing I like about them is that the screw mechanisms are very well made. I am not an engeneer but I notice that even when old the screws turn really nicely, unusually so. I dont know what was done to give them that feel that they have but it is nice.
I am an Engineer and my guess is probably a tighter tolerance thread (translation, more expensive to cut, thus it got changed). That being said, I have no vintage ligatures to use to base my comparison.
 
#4 ·
What makes them so special? I'm just curious cause they look like any other stock two screw lig.
I could not find many good two screws stock ligature, except maybe yamaha.
Selmers are not "vintage" since they were produced until a couple of years ago.

Nice softish brass that easily adapts to the mouthpiece. My other similar one is the one that comes with my Taiwanese horn.

They are easy to setup, do not require particular caps, they do what they have to do.
 
#5 ·
It's the Lord Of The Ligs

One screw to hold the reed,
One screw to bind it.
Two Screws to tighten it,
And on the mouthpiece find it.
 
#18 ·
That was great!
 
#7 ·
I think the fundamental question is, "Are any ligatures that special?" As long as the lig fits the mouthpiece well, and holds the reed with the desired amount and location (i.e., on the sides, or all the way across, etc.) of pressure, it's fine, but probably not better than another lig that does the same things.
 
#10 ·
I use these on everything and as Sigmund451 said, the screw mechanism is excellent. They fit my mouthpieces very well and adjust very well- which is really what one wants in a good ligature.
I got sucked into ligatures for a while years ago, in he 80's when the winslows and rovners were the rage. Some of the old harrisons were great and a lot of guys still use them, Dan Higgins among them, but I find the selmers very reliable and better than the few ligatures I chose to keep after I sold all of my 'fad' ligs.
 
#12 ·
The Rico H lig is not anywhere as good as the standard gold brass Selmer one. Either that, or I just don't like it much at all. It's a 2 screw and theorectically it should work just the same, but it's a reversed lig with the screws on top, something that I don't particularly like. It is also lacquered in a way that makes it too shiny/slippery so it tends to slide down off the mpc towards the tip very easily.
 
#13 ·
Huh, how 'bout that? I like the Rico H ligs. The extra mass adds some weight to the sound. :twisted:

It's easy enough to abrade the ID if slipping is a problem. I haven't encountered that challenge with them.
 
#16 ·
Thanks for the replies everyone! Buddy of mine is playing one of these really old Selmer two screw ligs on his Florida Link. He said for him at least, it focused his tone a lot more than the 404 lig. On the other end of the spectrum, one of the big studio saxophonists here in LA just stopped playing his Harrison on alto for one of these old Selmer two screw ligs. He said it let his tone just sing out with a whole lot of flexibility. I figured I'd look into to see if there was a thing going on with these old ligs.
 
#17 ·
Buddy of mine is playing one of these really old Selmer two screw ligs on his Florida Link. He said for him at least, it focused his tone a lot more than the 404 lig.
Maybe I am missing something: a soprano two screw ligature on a metal florida link?
 
#19 ·
Call me crazy, or that it is all in my head, but I am very partial to my old 2 screw Selmer ligs. In my opinion I have a lot better and controllable reed response on all my horns with these ligs. My alto and tenor each have a generic 2 screwlig, Vandoren M/O, a Vandoren Master and Rovner ligs in addition to the selmer models. My soprano has a Rico H a Rovner and 2 screw generic lig as well as a Selmer. I have done a large number of A/B/C testing and I keep coming back to the Selmer ligs. I don't feel there is a difference in sound (except with maybe the Rovner's) , but the response is so much better.

As stated above, the quality of material and workmanship is not matched by the other metal brands. Anytime I drop a Vandoren it gets bent enough that I have to work it back onto a mouthpiece to straighten it up.
 
#20 ·
I have this notion, correct or not, that 2-screw ligs, whether Selmer, Rico, or someone else, are less sensitive to reed issues.
 
#21 ·
We need to remember that string was the lig of choice centuries ago and the first metal ligs were similar to the standard 2-screw. I started using a Gigliotti plastic on clarinet when I played a glass mouthpiece as metal slipped easily and I have used them on alto as well. I currently have that lig, a Bonade inverted, a Rico H and a Selmer 2-screw form the 60s. I see almost no difference among them.
Ok I find I use the Selmer as the hole in the top matches the logo on the Selmer mouthpiece and looks nice. Stupid reason but I like it......
 
#22 ·
#29 ·
I have an old Rovner light that came with a Reloplex in the case with my 45 Martin Tenor. It must be a very early model because the material is something different than the later ones and is quite thin. Anyway the window in the material isn't symetrical and if you line it up so the amount of opening is even on each side of the reed, then the screw is way off center on the top of the mpc. I have to remember to line it up unevenly, unlike the alto Rovner light I have.

BTW, people put Rovner ligs down, but I A/B tested that Rovner lig with all my other tenor ligs and I got better performance with it than with a generic 2 screw, a Selmer 2 screw, the Rico H, and a FL basic brass one screw. I did it several times too just to see if I was imagening it, but that reed on that mpc played better with the Rovner. A non-scientific test of course, but interesting because I had always favored the Selmer 2 screw ligs and assumed that the Rovner and FL would be the worst. Instead they placed one and two. Go figure!
 
#33 ·
I've had a tenor brilhart level-air since 1962. The ligature finally broke where the screw receiver is attached to the sheet metal. My repairman said he wouldn't silver solder it back on because it would just break off again. I tried several of the available ligatures on it and I was panicking. Horn was not as responsive and felt like I had a towel in the bell of the horn. I ended up paying $125 on Ebay for an entire mouthpiece just to get the stock ligature! Back to a responsive feel. Sold the piece to a friend with a rover ligature and he loves it. So, ligatures are something I take very seriously.
 
#34 ·
I have a Selmer two screws and a Marc Jean for soprano.
I've used the Marc Jean with my Slant Signature for quite a few months, because it actually opens the sound.

When I received a Missing Link from Joe, I found that the Selmer worked much better than the Marc Jean on it, both in playing and sounding perspective: more reed friendly, too!

So I tried the Selmer two screws on the Slant again, and it is just so right: focused and expressive.
Definitely it has a more "vintagey" flavor in tone than the Marc Jean (that is very good, too).
 
#35 ·
I have one, and it sounds great. It gets the sound I am looking for. I found an unknown no-name vintage stock brass lig that I use now. I have no clue what it is, but I like it and thats what matters. Its a personal choice. I would say any lig is "special" when it gets the sound you want.
 
#36 ·
I think more of it has to do with the reed than with the lig. If the reed is playing well on a particular day than I think generally the lig is not all that significant a factor and that mpc with that reed will sound pretty much the same no matter which lig you use. But not all ligs hold a reed on in the same exact way and so if there are any changes in the face of the reed that keep it from being totally flat on the table that could affect things for a lig that cannot adjust enough to hold the reed flat. For me the indicator of this is the pop-test. With a really good, well adjusted reed that has no warps in the face and a good lig, I can get up to 4 secs or more before it pops, but if the pop test is almost instant or you actually hear air then the reed has gone out of flat and needs to be sanded.

For example, I started playing a new V16 tenor reed with my Rovner lig and it only require the minimal adjustment to play beautifully. I played it at combo and it was great and I played it to practice a bit at home the next day, also great. I generally save a really good reed only for combo and play a different mpc with a Bari synthetic to practice. On Sunday I did my usual hour warm up before the combo that night and right from the start the pop test was bad, and I could hear air. So I sanded the face of the reed and then it was fine and I got a decent pop test. The Rovner lig cannot pull a warped reed down like a 2 screw often can, but I prefer to flatten the face of the reed with very fine wet/dry paper than just squeeze it to death with a 2-screw. That is going to make the reed less responsive even though it might flatten the face against the table.
 
#37 ·
I have several Selmer vintage ligs, one in silver, other ones in regular brass, modern ones too. Nothing special, good or bad, about them.
The response on the Selmers is nice, the sound is nice, the tone is nice ... but my Ishimori is far superior in every way, to my liking.
Vintage or modern, these ligs are the same old 2 screw lig. Nothing special :)
 
#40 ·
Yep. I agree with that. But I have 402 (good but not vintage), several Rovners, BG Metal Jazz and several stock ligs. I find it unusual that there has been little made by mouthpiece manufacturers in a similar way to Lawton. There are some. Hats off to them. I have never played or seen anything as beautiful or a functional as Lawtons. That includes the cap. And then there is the Lawton sound and playability. Geoff Lawton was an obsessive genius.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
#41 ·
Ive got several old Selmer 2 screw ligs, never really considered them special and kept them as back up ligs to the many fancier ligs I’ve acquired. Until today! Tried one of the Selmers on an older EB rubber link I’ve got and it was surprisingly good. Some earlier mentioned they felt less reed issues with a 2 screw lig, I’d agree at least on this mpc; the table on my link is a little wonky, and with a couple other ligs I really struggled with getting reeds to work. The Selmer just seems to even things out and must accommodate the table inefficiencies.
 
#42 ·
My theory on why they stay in demand is 30 years ago Brecker and other Guardala players discovered the 'formula' for fitting these Selmer metal mouthpiece ligs to their mouthpieces so they could use a quality Selmer product. This really caught on. I was doing the same thing without knowing that others were doing it. The Selmer lig is longer than the regular ones at the time for better reed stabilization with less screw tension and better-made for longer service. Of course they are now used on many other kinds of mouthpieces but you're kind of on your own to find out what fits what.
The 'formula' is (for Guardalas) Selmer soprano for alto and alto for tenor. Probably tenor/tenor for Fat Boy. Once I started using Rovners, I never went back to metals. Except, I am testing a gold-plated Rovner platinum lig now and it is very good.
 
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