GUEST: I bought this saxophone when I was in high school.

I actually bought it around my tenth grade year.

We were told by the store that it had previously been owned by a jazz musician.

APPRAISER: You remember what you paid for it?

GUEST: I think I paid $1,500.

My mother thinks I paid $2,500.

APPRAISER: And the year was?

GUEST: 1990-ish?

APPRAISER: What you have is a Selmer saxophone.

Selmer has been, from the beginning, uh, the preeminent brand of saxophones.

All the best professional players have played Selmer horns at one time or another and many of them were Selmer endorsers and played them their whole career.

This horn is considered a large boar horn.

Selmer started building horns in 1922.

This horn is from 1929.

In 1928 they made their first major improvement...

GUEST: Mm.

APPRAISER: ...which was making them large bore.

And this is the first of the large bores.

They made them for four years.

The big bore gave it much more power and much more flexibility in the tone.

The engraving goes below where the bell meets the end bow.

And that indicates that it was made and engraved in Paris and sold in Europe.

GUEST: Oh!

Oh!

APPRAISER: They made very poor cases for their European horns.

GUEST: (laughs) APPRAISER: They were actually like pressed cardboard.

GUEST: Mm.

APPRAISER: And this is a professional American-made case.

So this is a case that somebody replaced.

These are-are really special horns.

Uh, and this is in special condition.

You don't hardly ever see them without wear on 'em like this.

It's heavy silver plate over brass.

And on all the places where your hands touch it, it usually wears through.

GUEST: Mm APPRAISER: And these horns are usually spotted or sometimes even without silver plate left at all on them.

On a retail sales level, I would estimate that this horn would sell for between $3,500 and $4,000 today.

GUEST: Really?

That's great!

APPRAISER: Yeah.

And it has a nice overhaul on it and good pads.

GUEST: Yeah.

APPRAISER: It looks playable as it is.

GUEST: That's great.

It's been sitting under the bed for 30 years.