A Copper Alliance Member
Copper in the Arts
Issue #65: September '12 - Cont'd
Super Sax Back
Saxophonist Mike Smith
Photograph courtesy of Powell Flutes
Five years ago he had a thought.
“It was my idea,” he says. “To build an instrument that is built on a famous old saxophone called the King Super 20.”
According to Smith, the American-made instrument, popular in the 1940’s, 50’s and 60’s, was used by many famous sax players such as Charlie Parker and Cannonball Adderley.
“I always thought this was a great instrument,” Smith says. “I thought it was a good time to bring an American made instrument back.”
A collector of vintage King Super 20s, Smith describes how the cost of manufacturing in America led to the eventual phasing out of the iconic King Super 20.
“In the last thirty years there hasn’t been an American-made saxophone,” Smith says.
His determination to resuscitate the instrument led him to engineer John Weir, Toronto, Ontario and Steven Wasser, owner of Verne Q. Powell Flutes in Maynard, MA.
“Each member of that team contributed design ideas to this instrument,” Wasser says, which led to their first prototype.
“Now we’re in production with the alto,” Smith says.
Smith’s current role is that of artist and design consultant with Powell.
“This is kind of Mike’s dream saxophone,” Wasser says.
A prototype of the Powell Silver Eagle saxophone.
Photograph courtesy of Powell Flutes
“Right now we are building twenty-five of them,” Smith says, of orders that are in the process of being filled.
Called the Powell Silver Eagle, the alto, made of brass and silver, retails for $9,390. The all-brass alto version will retail for $7,990.
“This is a very high-end instrument,” Smith says. “Eventually we will make a cheaper line that will be more for students and intermediates.”
Powell also has a tenor sax in development and a soprano and baritone will follow suit, covering the whole family of saxophones.
While some parts of the new sax are made in Maynard, MA, which is Powell Flute’s headquarters, it is put together in Elkhart, Indiana.
“It is a very famous part of the country where they made a lot of musical instruments from the turn of the century to the 1980’s,” Smith says. “We hired some of the people that used to work in the industry.”
The Powell Silver Eagle saxophone.
Photograph courtesy of Powell Flutes
Prior to production, Powell had a couple of prototypes test-driven.
“I brought them all around the country for different musicians to try and they gave favorable reviews,” Smith says.
The research and development in creating the Silver Eagle was intensive, along with setting up the capability for manufacturing.
“We started from scratch basically,” Smith says. “We bought some of the tooling from a factory in Germany. The acoustic design and all of that tooling had to be made brand new, other than the keys.”
Smith and Wasser describe attributes of the Silver Eagle that make it unique.
“Some of the build quality is different. There is precious metal on it – it is made with a sterling silver neck pipe and bell,” Smith says. “The body is made of brass and the tone holes are made of silver.”
Holes of a saxophone are typically built in and then drawn up.
“Ours are actually silver brazed to the body,” Wasser says of one of his primary design contributions.
The intent from the beginning was to take the basic design of the original instrument and modernize it.
“We built on something that was old and tried to improve it,” Smith says.
Wasser credits an overall team approach that brought the Silver Eagle to life, ranging from contributions in product development and technology to finance, equipment and tooling.
“The two people that are now quarterbacking and driving this to the finish line are Ed Kwityn and Daryl Greising,” Wasser says.
“We have done the design work and it is Ed and Daryl who bear the responsibility for taking the design and making instruments that we can deliver to musicians.”
Resources:
Powell Flutes, 1 Clock Tower Pl., Maynard, MA, (978) 461-6111
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Zenfire Guitar Picks: Exploring the Unique Sounds of Copper
Handcrafted phosphor bronze picks.
Photograph courtesy of Zenfire
“Standard plain copper is too soft for a long lasting guitar pick---it wears out too quickly,” he says. “So, I added a hardening agent that allows me to make a pick that can literally last for years.”
He’s been making picks for 30 years and has been playing guitar since he was just six years old. Although he originally using traditional plastic or nylon guitar picks, he was never happy with the sounds they produced.
“Nothing fit or sounded right,” he says. “Guitarists are traditional, many of them have never moved beyond the plastic pick. There are many materials which are better, more natural, like copper,” he says. Woods experimented with brass, aluminum, and plain copper but he noticed that the picks were wearing out. That’s when he discovered Phosphor Bronze, also known as tin bronze, which are alloys containing copper, tin and phosphorous. The addition of tin increases the corrosion resistance and strength of the alloy, being perfect for a guitar pick.
“But the copper is a very good sound for a pick, so it was a matter of finding a property that was harder,” Woods says. “It makes a difference, you get more of a glassy tone; the sound stands out more with a harder material, like brass or copper.” He buys scrap from various metal recyclers and uses templates to hand cut the copper, and then he hand files them, using only steel wool to shine the copper and bronze picks. He also does custom orders on his picks because everyone is looking for something different. “A more rounded tip will give a sharper attack,” he says. “These are hand made, not mass produced, and I put a lot of myself into them.” He was driven to make the picks because he needed to make something better than what someone could buy in a store.
Although he does craft some picks from aluminum and steel, he prefers the copper and brass picks himself. “They look so good and are easy to work with,” he notes. And given that many guitar strings have a phosphor bronze coating on them, it seems that the copper pick and copper coated strings work seamlessly together.
"After 40 years of playing guitar I have not found another pick that works as well, feels as great, lasts as long, and keeps me as eager to practice and play as the very picks I created for myself," sayd Woods.
Resources:
Zenfire Picks, Temecula, CA
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Gilded Days: Antique Sheet Music Finetuned by Copper
This copper plated brass bracelet featuring the word "Birds" on vintage sheet music mingles the whimsical ways of Tess Fedore's style and her unique materials.
Photograph courtesy of Tess Fedore
Living in Quincy, MA in Norfolk County, Fedore grew up around the Boston area and is known to frequent antique shops in search of the paper materials for her jewelry. This includes necklaces, bracelets brooches, earrings, but also cuff links, tie clips and the occasional ring.
Originally starting out with decoupage work, she experimenting with antique sheet music, making use of the tiny scraps of leftover pieces of paper marking years of instrumental history.
Her childhood interest of working with bead sets led Fedore to transition her old curiosity to jewelry in a more mature form and a captivatingly vintage-swept style. Her successful expression of talents beams of appreciation for classic yet romantically-geared accessories.
In 2010, Fedore opened her Etsy shop, which today operates under the moniker Gilded Days.
The often antique appearance of copper stirs at Fedore’s senses very fittingly with the pendant frames, chains, jump rings and clasps she fastens together in her final pieces.
“It’s not a static material—the patinas are always changing,” she says. “And it reminds me of the old buildings in Boston and the copper roofs and awnings that have all become green with that turn-of-the-century look I really love.”
“It’s just a warm, pretty color that really sets the sheet music off well,” she says.
Copper plated necklaces incorporating copper wire-wrapped beads are something Tess Fedore is delving into more recently in her work.
Photograph courtesy of Tess Fedore
“I love the gold tones of bronze and it’s mellow yet classic look,” she adds.
A copper plated brass bracelet Fedore recently created, featuring the word “Birds,” is from a book by composer Sigmund Romberg, whom she hadn’t heard of until a collection of his songs met her fingertips. The old font has its own enticing lure to the eyes, too.
While she works with antique sheet music from all sorts of composers, she’s noticed that the book of Romberg’s works has curious word pairings and beautiful lyrics that turn out to be great accents in her necklaces and bracelets.
“It just combines everything I love,” Fedore says in describing her academic background in archeology and her deep affection for music juxtaposing well through her jewelry-making.
Last autumn, she noticed that about one out of every three of her pieces sold shipped to either Australia or New Zealand, as she’s learned that more people there have a lot of admiration for hand-made culture, compared to the U.S.
While most of her sales span across the U.S., she’s sent jewelry overseas to Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, England, Japan and also nearby Canada and Mexico.
During the early Sundays of autumn, Fedore is a part of the SoWa Open Market in Boston. Her jewelry is also featured at area boutiques around the city from time to time.
Hearing the stories of those who find meaning in the little sets of words she snips caringly with scissors and incorporates into her jewelry is a lot of what Fedore finds most special about what she does.
“Touching something that somebody touched 100 years ago and making a connection with a piece of material” is what she enjoys most about the whimsical nature of working with preserved sheet music and the light hint of copper and bronze.
Resources:
Gilded Days, Quincy, MA, (617) 678-3577
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Copper in the Arts: NEWS
New Works by April Wood on View at Austin's AMOA-Arthouse - August 24, 2012
April Wood, Feeding the Hunger 10, 2011. Copper,
brass, rubber, 8"h x 8"w x 6"d.
Photograph by Joseph Hyde.
Her work takes on a drastically new dimension when inside a person’s mouth. The stem is “consumed,” leaving the petals viewable. The oral contact resembles the ongoing connection between sustenance and weight management, as the hollow center of the sculpture allows for small amounts of food to pass through. For Wood the mouth is main portal into the body, able to receive as well as prohibit.
Wood is a Texas native based in Baltimore, MD. She received her BFA from Texas State, San Marcos and her MFA from Towson University. She has exhibited at Rutgers University-New Jersey, Penn State-Pennsylvania and will be at an upcoming 2013 show at the Museum of Arts and Design, New York. Wood is also a visiting instructor at the Corcoran College of Art & Design in Washington, DC, an adjunct instructor at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland, and an adjunct professor at Texas State-San Marcos. This is the artist’s first solo museum exhibition in Texas.
Resources:
AMOA-Arthouse, Laguna Gloria, 3809 West 35th St., Austin, TX, (512) 458-8191
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