One of my favorite places to read about the quality and playability of any particular make of saxophone is Stephen Howard’s Repairs & Restoration site. Here is a serious repair tech and player who doesn’t sugar coat his observations and findings. Hey if you are a serious sax player, have you book marked this yet!

So I was very interested to see what he thought of my new fav axe, the Selmer Ref 54s. Now mine is the Hummingbird Limited Edition but that differs from Stephen’s review in mainly cosmetic ways including this stellar engraving and unique dark vintage finish.

But the funny thing about this review is everything he groused about, I DIDN’T FIND! Maybe it’s because I get most of my horns from Kessler Music in Las Vegas. And they seriously know how to set up an instrument. I’ve probably bought eight saxes and three or more clarinets from them and I have never had sticking keys, shoddy keyworks, or intonation issues. I have sent many friends to Dave and his father Chuck Kessler’s website to buy instruments. And more than a few of us have made the trip to the mecca that is the Kessler Music shop to try out our dream instruments.