There really wasn't a lot of spread in the tone. That's good for ensemble playing or studio work, but not so great when developing your own individual sound. This really means that you'll end up with more or less a generic horn.
SELMER REFERENCE 54 ALTO AMAZON PLUS
There is a plus side and a minus side to such consistency. The other thing is that the tone was consistent on all of the References I've tried, much more so than on the many Mark VI's I've played. No doubt about it, it is a fine horn indeed. It has the characteristic darker mellower tone that is normally associated with Selmer. It was here that I couldn't figure something out. I put the mouthpiece to my lips and then I blew into it. As always I used my usual set-up which is a Meyer 6M mouthpiece with a Rovner ligature and a LaVoz medium reed. The first time I held it in my hands I was eager with anticipation. Just by its looks and feel, not to mention the price, I expected it to have a sound worthy of its name. Now for what I consider the most important thing about any saxophone, and that is the sound. Again, at the Selmer's price point, this should not be an issue as far as I'm concerned. How many have I tried? So far I've played a dozen of them, and found exactly the same issues with the octave and front high F key. Once again I found this true on all of the References I've tried. It was set slightly higher than the other keys, so that when I rolled my finger to press it down, it got caught in the space between the keys, again causing a slight delay in the response of the note.
The other thing was the front high F key. Of course, all horns should get a good set-up, but at the price of the Selmer, this shouldn't be an issue on every horn. This means that a tech will have to make the adjustment to this key when it comes out of the box. This has been true on every Reference 54 I've tried. You can also feel it in your mouth as you play as if someone tapped the neck with a stick. This also causes a split-second lag time in the response of the note. So far on all the References I tried, I noticed that the octave key comes down with a pronounced thump or more accurately a heavy clunk because there seems to be a split-second lag-time from when you press the key to when it closes. Everything snaps into place, except the octave key. It feels good in the hands, and all the keys fit right under the fingers as you would expect from a Selmer. When you pick up the horn, you can feel a horn of substance. The only nod to the original as far as the keywork goes is a pearl for high F instead of the teardrop key more in use today, and a round instead of elliptical pearl for the side F# like you would find on a Mark VI. What they did was to take a 1954 Mark VI alto which they found in New York which epitomized the best aspects of the model in terms of sound, study its specifications and then reproduce it exactly, with only the keywork updated. Selmer was no longer the dominant maker of saxophones. For one thing, companies like Keilwerth, Yamaha and Yanigasawa were building quality saxophones, giving Selmer their first real competition in years. Selmer realized that the increased demand for Mark VI's on the vintage market represented an opportunity for them to reclaim some of their prominence. With this saxophone, prominent American brands like Conn, Buescher, Martin and King would soon cease all saxophone production or be reduced to making only student level horns, or go out of business altogether. What was interesting about the Mark VI was that Marcel Mule, the eminent classical saxophonist had a hand in its design, yet classical players didn't take to it, but jazz players did in droves and soon it seemed almost no one played anything else. Of course it was forgotten that when the Mark VI replaced the Super-Balanced Action, many players of the time were saying the same thing.
Still, there were enough players and collectors bemoaning the fact that there was no longer any Selmer saxophone that could compare to their beloved Mark VI's.
SELMER REFERENCE 54 ALTO AMAZON SERIES
It was replaced by the Mark VII, which did not receive a warm reception from Selmer devotees and the saxophone market in general and consequently, after only a couple of years, was replaced by the Super Action 80, followed by the Series II and more recently the Series III. It was produced from 1954 through 1974, a twenty year run.
The Selmer Mark VI is probably the most popular and also most costly vintage saxophone on the market.
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