Antoine-Joseph, nicknamed Adolphe Sax, was born on November 6th 1814 into a family that manufactured musical instruments for a living. They lived in in Dinant, an industrial, prosperous, calamine-pits town in Belgium, where his father, Charles-Joseph Sax, had a musical instrument factory.

Antoine-Joseph Sax, sure of his values and with a relentless need for action, demonstrated that the tone of an instrument was determined not by the nature of the material used but by the correlation between the column of air that was formed within an instrument and the state of the surface of the material used. Convinced of this principle known as ‘the proportions’, he perfected, expanded and completed the family of nearly all the wind, brass and wood instruments. He also invented the saxhorns (1843), the saxotrombas (1845), the saxophones (1846) and the saxtubas (1849)…. He would obtain a total of 46 patents.

His name is also linked to the medical world due to a campaign for the wind instruments as a means to prevent and heal lung illnesses.
- Contemporary Universal Dictionary, Hachette 1880.

Antoine-Joseph Sax, with his ever-inquisitive mind, never ceased studying, inventing and perfecting his instruments, and that led him winning a prize for the invention of the saxophone in 1867. In fact, this was the only prize ever awarded in Paris for the creation of a musical instrument.

However, sadly, after various financial setbacks, he died worn out and totally ruined on February 7th, 1894 at the age of 80. His most specific invention, the saxophone, was almost forgotten ….

The invention of the Saxophone

The saxophone was a new musical phenomenon that appeared and was perfected in the middle of the 19th century. Since then, no changes have been made to the construction of the instrument and it remains essentially the same, in terms of the proportions of the body as well as the principle of sound emission.

Antoine-Joseph spoke of a dream:
"… to create a wind instrument that by the character of its sound would come close to the string instruments while possessing more power and intensity than these existing instruments! "...

..."I have made such an instrument in brass and with the shape of a parabola"

The factory Sax has been bought by the Selmer company in 1928.

The mouthpiece of a the saxophone has a beak with simple reed and therefore belongs to the wood instrument family.

Today, we have a quartet of saxophones:
The soprano saxophone in B flat
The alto saxophone in E flat
The tenor saxophone in B flat
The baritone saxophone in E flat

The alto saxophone is considered to be a learner’s saxophone.
The tenor saxophone is most often used for the Jazz style.

The use of the saxophone

Among the most famous saxophonists, we cite only Duke Ellington….

In the classical world, the most famous composer is Maurice Ravel who composed his Bolero with two saxophones: the soprano and the tenor (both on E-flat).

Today, the saxophone evolves in a Ska-Reggae style, most particularly in a form that attracts the younger public…

We also have excellent contemporary saxophonists but for understandable reasons we have no right to cite them here.Thank you for your consideration n this matter.