King
Made by H.N. White.
Showing all 9 results
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King Alto Saxophone Original Gold Plate Old Pads Beautiful Engraving 105999
$ 1,200 -
King SilverSonic Alto Original Lacquer Mint Exceptional 448357
$ 6,500This is one of the best playing King altos that you will find! It’s freshly overhauled, and it’s in near mint condition with original lacquer and absolutely gorgeous condition. This is pretty amazing to play. Tyler said it’s a stand out player as well, when he gave it back to me after recording this clip.
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King SilverSonic Tenor Cleveland ‘Series III’ Double Socket Neck Good Pads Plays Great! 376648
$ 5,950This amazingly clean Series III King SilverSonic tenor is a great deal! It is priced a little low because someone lightly polished the silver on the bell to keep it shiny, but did not touch the gold inside the bell, nor any other part of the instrument. So it’s entirely original lacquer on neck, body tube, keys, bow, and inside the bell, but the silver on the bell has been relacquered. If you look at the horn in person, this is very evident. The engraved B and Bb key cups, for example, are definitely original, as is the body tube. The neck has a tiny amount of original lacquer intact near the octave pip.
The pads are in good shape, and the horn roars on them! They are leather, with medium sized flat metal resonators, which is a great, authentic setup for a King. The tone is FAT, and sort of Dark-Bright, which sounds like an oxymoron but isn’t. The tone is big and fat and thick, but has tons of projection and edge, so it sounds dark and bright depending on how you think of it. That could be the definition of the “King thing” (those who play them, know).
anyway, past repairs: the double socket has been resoldered on the neck, probably so the neck could be fit in the last overhaul. It’s nice and round in the inner socket, as it should be. There’s minimal evidence of any other repairs. Maybe some small dings removed on the back of the body tube? Maybe not. No other resolders; no signs of other damage. It’s a remarkably clean example of a SilverSonic tenor, which is the horn everybody wants, whether they know it or not.
The Series III in the title refers to how this horn has the updated keywork. If you like modern ergonomics, then the Series III is the King for you. Warm and fat like the Series II, but easier to get around in and cheaper (and findable) in solid silver neck and bell like this one.
only one available! -
King SilverSonic Tenor Cleveland 433140 Very Good Condition
$ 5,750 -
Sold Out
King Super 20 Alto Series III Original Lacquer Very Good Condition 376523
$ 4,950On hold Oct 2022. Great King Super 20 alto that is also on the affordable side for one of the best vintages. This is 376523, double socket, solid silver neck, engraved bell keys, underslung octave key, but the more modern style pinky keys and a tone that is more like the ‘full pearls’ Super 20’s. This horn just got a full, top shelf overhaul with Pisoni italian leather pads and nice reusable slightly domed, metal resonators. It feels brand new under the fingers, and it is still in excellent original cosmetic condition. Only one available! $4950 incl the overhaul, which is about what you’d pay for a Yamaha, and this is much better and holds its value better too.
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King Super 20 Tenor 1947 Full Pearls Original Lacquer Good Pads 290165
$ 5,850This is a beautiful original lacquer King Super 20 tenor saxophone from 1947. It has the light ‘coca-cola’ lacquer that these almost always have in the 290k range. The pads are in excellent condition and almost new. These late 40’s Kings are wonderful players. Big, dark, spread, powerful tone with lots of projection. The neck has the matching serial to the body. It’s kind of amazing to me that you can still buy an original King Super 20 tenor with a good overhaul and full pearls, solid silver neck, and full pearls on all the side and palm keys for this kind of a price. Heavily marketed Taiwanese horns are priced in the same range.
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King Super 20 Tenor Full Pearls Very Good Condition Good Pads 308996
$ 6,500This is the Super 20 that most people want. This is the version with the more modern LH pinky (spatula) keys, but that still has ‘full pearls’ on all the key touches, double socket, solid-silver neck, and engraved bell keys. It has had a recent repad, and I just got it freshly checked out and setup, so it’s playing quite well. There aren’t many original lacquer Super 20’s from this most desirable serial range in the world. Far fewer than people realize! There are about 10x as many 5-digit Mark VI’s as there are full pearls Super 20’s.
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King Zephyr Special Alto Near Mint Recent Overhaul 266751
$ 5,750This is about as nice an original lacquer later example of a King Zephyr Special alto as I have seen. This comes from the collection of Theo Wanne, and has a fresh overhaul done for Theo within the last year or two. It has been in his collection, so not played much since the overhaul and is basically fresh and ready to start being played again by someone. My main alto is a Zephyr Special, as is Matt Stohrer’s, and Theo loves and collects them as well. They are among the best sounding altos ever made, and they just do everything pretty well. The tone is warm, powerful, medium spread, and dark and velvety. Not dark like a Conn though – more focus, more projection, and more of a ringing set of overtones, where a Conn is a bit more spread and fat. It’s just an extremely pleasant tone that you get on these. Every single one I’ve ever sold has gone to a buyer who was thrilled with the sound. The keywork is not modern – it’s ‘light flute-like action’ as King described it in its original ads from the 30’s. Not heavy and snappy, but light like a flute, and fairly small amount of key travel to close a tone hole. Intonation is good with a Meyer or really whatever you want to use, though flexible compared to modern horns. You can bend notes around how you want, for better or for worse.
These are among the most beautiful saxophones ever produced as well. Hand engraving, pearls everywhere you touch, solid silver double socket neck. They’re great. And this one has almost all of its original lacquer intact, which is pretty incredible.
If you want to join the Zephyr Special club this would be a great way to do it. It’s already overhauled, and still priced very affordably compared to modern altos, with a tone like nothing else!
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Powell Silver Eagle SE10 Alto One of 18 Made – all options solid silver +Matt Stohrer Overhau
$ 12,000For your viewing pleasure, this is one of the 18 Powell Silver Eagle saxophones made. Powell conceived of an ambitious project to bring back an American-made saxophone of the highest quality. Inspired by the Super 20 SilverSonic, the Silver Eagle reproduces the bore while adding solid silver soldered tone holes and modern keywork. Powell sadly ended their project after making only 18 saxophones, despite high demand, due to the high cost of production. This horn plays like a good super 20 but a little more evenly, and has been completely overhauled by Matt Stohrer. This is the ultimate collectible among modern saxophones, and it is also a burning player. Asking price is just what these cost new, plus a little extra since it got a $1500 overhaul on top of that! It’s not even inflated for the collectibility value, which is probably not smart of me, but there it is. If you want to discuss all the details of this project, I can put you in touch with the people who built it. These were most definitely a new saxophone bore and neck design, inspired by the best King Super 20 SilverSonic altos, both according to them and according to the folks who bought the tooling and mandrels when the project ended. The keywork is modified from tooling bought from B&S, which accounts for the pinky table that sticks out farther than it would on something like a Yamaha.
There is most certainly only one available. This one has all the possible factory options, which only a subset of Powell Silver Eagles had – including the solid silver tone holes and even cryo treatment. Of the 18 saxophones built, I know at least a couple of them were brass bell, and some others lacked other of these features. This is one of the ones with everything, which makes it even more collectible. Includes the original accessories, case, and paperwork.
Just for fun, here’s Matt Stohrer’s repairman’s overview from when he overhauled it.