The Surprisingly Badass Life of the Inventor of the Saxophone

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Simpson former President Bill Clinton and the co-author of this script and founder of today I found out the saxophone has variously been described as everything from the most moving and heart gripping wind instrument to the devil's horn rather fittingly than the instruments in Venza Adolphe Sax was a similarly polarizing figure and led a life many would qualify as fulfilling all of the necessary specifications to be classified as being all kinds of badass born in 1814 in the belgian municipality of Denault sax was initially named Antoine joseph sax but started going by the name of Dolph seemingly almost from birth though why he didn't go by his original name and how Adolf came to be chosen has been lost to history born the son of a carpenter and a later instrument maker Charles sax Adolphe Sax was surrounded by music from an early age becoming especially proficient playing both the flute and the clarinet saxs affinity for wind instruments quickly became apparent in his early teens when he began improving upon and refining the designs of these instruments as well as coming up with many more but we're getting ahead of ourselves here because sax was immeasurably lucky to even make it into adulthood given what he went through as a child described as chronically accident-prone throughout his childhood sax fell victim to a series of increase the unusual mishaps several of which and any customers alive Sachs his first major incident occurred at age three when he fell down three flights of stairs and landed unceremoniously at the bottom with his head smacking on the stone floor their reports of the aftermath vary somewhat from being in a coma for a week to simply being bedridden for that period unable to stand properly young-sax would later accidentally swallow a large needle which she miraculously passed without incidents or injury on that note apparently keen on swallowing things that could cause him harm as a child he drank a concoction of white lead copper oxide and arsenic in another incident sachs accidentally fell onto a burning stove reportedly receiving severe burns to his side luckily he seemingly avoided the severe infection that can sometimes follow this although part of his body was forever scarred perhaps the closest he came to dying occurred when he was 10 when he fell into a river this fact was not discovered until a random villager observed Sachs floating facedown near a mill he was promptly plucked from the river and later regains consciousness but we're still not done here because in another incidence he got blown across his father's workshop when a container of gunpowder exploded when he was standing right next to it yet again courting death the young Sachs was injured while working in the streets when a large slate tile flew off a nearby roof and hit him right on the head rendering him temporarily comatose all of these injuries led Sacks's understandably worried mother Maria to openly say that her young son was condemned to misfortune before adding he won't live sighs his numerous brushes with death also led to his neighbor's jokingly referring to him as the ghost child from dnal besides apparently giving his altar practising for a future audition in a final destination film on the side as noted Sachs made music of instruments in fact he became so adept at this that when the young man grew into adulthood and began submitting his instruments to the Belgium national exhibition for a few years running he was recommended by the judges for the gold medal for the competition it was only the central jury who made the final decision and denied it to him because of his age they explained to him that if he won the gold he would then have achieved the pinnacle of success of the and thus would have nothing to strive for in the following year in the final of these competitions he entered at the age of 27 in 1841 this was actually to be the public debut of the saxophone butts according to a friend of Saks George Kastner when sax wasn't around someone rumored to be a competitor who disliked the young upstart kicks the instruments sending it flying and damaging it too severely to be entered into the competition nonetheless sax was recommended for the premiere gold medal at the exhibition thanks to his other submitted instruments but the central Drury once again denied this to him this was the final straw with sax retorting if I am too young for the gold medal I am too old for the silver now a grown man having seemingly outgrown what it was possible to achieve in Denault sax decided a move was in order choosing Paris as his destination in order to set a shop as to why to begin with in 1839 he had traveled to Paris to demonstrate his designs for a bass clarinet to one Isaac de Coster who is a clarinet player at the Paris Academy of Music the Koster himself also had created his own improved version of the bass clarinet but after hearing hams playing sax his version he was quickly impressed with it and my sax himself he then subsequently introduced sax around town to various prominent musicians giving sax many notable connections in Paris to start from further not long after he was snubbed at the exhibition sax had learned that certain members of the French governments were keen on revitalizing the French military bands and were seeking new and improved instruments to do so after mulling it over for some time he decided to try his hand in the big city upon arriving in Paris in 1842 supposedly with the mere 30 francs in his pocket sax invited noted composer actor Berlioz to come and review his instruments resulting in an incredibly glowing review published on June the 12th 1842 in the journal data bar unfortunately for him this was the start of an issue that would play exacts the rest of his life fitting himself up against the combined might of the rest of the musical instrument makers in Paris who quite literally would go on to form an organization just to take him down but once again we're getting ahead of ourselves here as for Berlioz's review of Sachs's work he wrote Mahseer Adolphe Sax of is a man of penetrating mind lucid tenacious with a perseverance against all trials and great skill he is at the same time a calculator acoustician and as necessary also a smelter Turner and engraver he can think and act he invents and accomplishes composers will be much indebted to Monsieur sacks when his instruments come into general use may he persevere he will not lack support from friends of art partially as a result of this piece sacks was invited to perform a concert at the Paris Conservatoire to much fanfare and success this in turn along with his former connections from his 1839 visit and did not seeing Sachs making many friends quickly among certain prominent musicians and composers who were impressed with its work all this in turn source acts have little trouble acquiring the needed funds to set up the Adolphe Sax musical instrument Factory needless to say this young Belgian upstart who was seemingly a prodigy when it came to inventing and improving on existing instruments threatens to leave the other musical instrument makers in Paris in the dust said rivals thus began resorting to every underhanded trick in the book to try and ruin him from frequent slanderous newspaper articles to lawsuits to attempting to have his work boycotted for example in 1843 one dom Sebastiaan was composing his opera gaetano donizetti and had decided to use saxis design for a bass clarinet which as noted was significantly improved over other instrument makers of the day's versions leveraging their connections with various musicians in the opera many of whom worked closely with various other musical instrument makers around town the threat was made that if Sebastiaan chose to have Sax's bass clarinet used in the opera the orchestra members would refuse to play this resulted in Sebastiaan abandoning plans to use Sachs's instrument in the past and indeed in many such instances whereas instruments would be snubbed or insulted by others sax had been known to challenge fellow musicians besmirching his name - musical duels pitting their talents against one another in a very public way owing to his prodigious skill and not just making extremely high-quality instruments but also playing them sax frequently one such duels in this case it is not clear if he extended such a challenge however whatever the case as one witness to the harassment the aforementioned composer actor Berlioz would write in a letter dated October the 8th 1843 it is scarcely to be believed that this gifted young artist should be finding it difficult to maintain his position and make a career in Paris the persecutions he suffers are worthy of the Middle Ages and recall the antics of the enemies of benvenuto the Florentine sculptor they lure away his workmen steal his designs accuse him of insanity and bring legal proceedings against him such is the hatred inventors inspire in rivals who are incapable of inventing anything themselves his audacious plans didn't help matters as noted when he got to Paris one of the things he hoped to accomplish was land a rather lucrative contract with the French military to see his instruments alone used by them a centerpiece of this he hoped was his new and extremely innovative saxophone while it seems commonplace today in a lot of ways the saxophone was a revolution at the time effectively combining major elements of the woodwind families with the brass as Berlioz would note of this saxophone in his review of it it cries sighs and dream it possesses a crescendo and can gradually diminish its sound until it is only an echo of an echo of an echo until it's sound becomes crepuscular the timbre of the saxophone is something vexing and sad about it in the high register the low notes to the contrary are of a grandiose nature one could say Pontifical for works of a mysterious and solemn character the saxophone is in my mind the most beautifully low voice known to this today exactly when sax first publicly debuted the saxophone to the world isn't clear with dates as early as 1840 - sometimes being thrown around however we do know that during one of his earliest performances with the instrument at the Paris Industrial Exhibition in 1844 sax played a rousing solo from behind a large curtain why well sax was paranoid about his instruments design being copied and as he hadn't yet patented it he decided that the best way to avoid this was to simply not allow the general public see what it looked like this brings us to the military as previously noted French military music was languishing in the scheme to revitalize it in the name of patriotism the French government created a commission to explore ways to reform the military bands in innovative ways two months after announcing this to the world and inviting manufacturers to submit their instruments for potential used by the military a concert of sorts was put on in front of a crowd of 20,000 in Paris on April the 22nd 1845 two bands would perform in the concert with one using more traditional instruments and the other armed with various types of saxophones and other modifications on existing instruments by sax both bands played these same works by composer Adolph Adam the band using saxs instruments won by a landslide two months later on August the 9th 1845 they awarded sax the lucrative military contracted set out to gear 21st moved to Paris this was the last straw when sax a Belgium no less secured the contract to supply the French military his rivals decided to literally form an organization who might as well have called themselves the anti sax club within the ends they went with and apologies for my friend share versus your general de Vere's or instruments de musique which means in English something I can pronounce the United Association of instrument makers this was an organisation to which the most prominent and talented instrument maker in France at the time was most definitely not welcome to join the principal order of business now Sax's lifetime seemed to be to try and ruin sax in any way they could to begin with they adopted the age-old practice of if you can't beat him sue him this was a long-running tactic of the organisation simply designed to tie up saxs resources time and energy in any possible way by keeping him in court the first legal action of this group was to challenge saxs patent application on the saxophone initially claiming somewhat bizarrely that the instrument as described in the patent didn't technically exist when that failed they claimed the instrument was unmusical and this in any event Sachs had simply modified designs from other makers they then presented various other instruments that had preceded it as examples and none of which the court agreed were similar enough to the saxophone to Warren's not granting the patterns next up they claimed the exact design had long existed before made by other manufacturers in other country that Sachs was falsely claiming it as his own to prove this the group produced several literally identical instruments to Sax's saxophone barring foreign manufacturing markings and supposedly had been made years before the truth was that they're simply purchased saxophones from Sachs's company and then sent them to foreign workshops where saxes labeling had been removed and it had been replaced with the shop owners own labels unfortunately for the United Association of instrument makers this ruse was discovered and they had to come up with a new strategy they then claimed that since sax had very publicly played the instrument on several occasions it was no longer eligible for a patent at this point fed up with the whole thing and infuriated sax countered by withdrawing his patent application and giving other instrument makers permission to make a saxophone if they had the skill he gave his rivals a year to do this in which time nobody was able to successfully replicate the instrument with any quality shortly before the year was up with no challenger apparently capable he then resubmitted his patent application and this time it was quickly granted On June the 2nd 1846 apparently not content with just trying to metaphorically ruin his life and business at one point Sachs's workshop mysteriously caught fire and in another an unknown assassin fired a pistol at one of Sax's assistants thinking that it was sax with it being rumoured that the United Association of instrument makers was behind both of these goings-on whether true or not things took a turn for the worse for sax after King louis-philippe fled the country in 1848 in the aftermath of the revolution and with many of saxs high-placed friends now now stood the United Association of instrument makers were able to simultaneously petition to have saxs contract with the military revoked and by 18-49 we're able to have his patterns for the bugles as cylinders and sacks at rambha likewise revoked freeing up his rivals to make these instruments themselves they also attempted to have his pattern for the saxophone squashed but they were unsuccessful on that one sax not once you take this lying down appeals and after a five-year legal battle the imperial court a draw finally concluded the matter siding with sax and reinstating his patterns as well as ordering the association to pay damages for the significant loss revenue in the years that the legal battle had raged nevertheless before this happened in 1852 Sachs found himself financially ruins though interestingly as final downfall came thanks to a friend during this time as noted taxes fighting various legal battles had lost his military contract and was otherwise struggling to keep his factory afloat as when a friend gave him 30,000 francs to help keep things going so I said originally understood this to be a gift not alone whether it was or wasn't isn't clear but when said individual died a couple of years later in 1852 his heirs certainly noticed the previous transaction and inquired about it with sags demanding that he repaid the 30 thousand francs in giving him a mere 24 hours to come up with the money unable to do so Sachs fled to London while simultaneously once again finding himself embroiled in yet another legal drama in this case the courts eventually demanded Sachs repaid the thirty thousand francs causing him to after file for bankruptcy and post down his factory but this is Adolphe Sax we're talking about a man who had survived major blows to the head drowning explosion poisoning severe burns beatings by thugs presumably hired by the United Association of instrument makers an assassination attempt and literally the combined might of just about every prominent instrument maker in his field in Paris fittingly for a man who is quoted as saying in life there are conquerors and the conquered I most prefer to be among the first so Sachs he wasn't about to just quit and so it was that continuing to work at his craft in 1854 Sachs found himself back on top appointed musical instrument maker to the household troops of Emperor Napoleon the third his new benefactor also helped Sachs emerge from bankruptcy and reopen his Factory it's at this point however that we should point out this as indicated by his childhood it clearly it wasn't just other instrument makers that were against Sachs but well the universe as well a year before his appointment by Napoleon the third Sachs noticed a black growth on his lip that continued to grow over time by 1859 this tumor had ruined his such a size that he could not eat or drink properly and was forced to consume sustenance through a tube just to kick him when he was down shortly before this in 1858 Sachs his firstborn child Charles died at the just to going back to the cancer is Trice at this point in 1859 was to be subjected to a risky and disfiguring surgery including removing part of his jaw and much of his lip or submit himself to experimental medicine of the age he chose the latter ultimately being treated by an indian doctor by the name of ruiz who administered some private concoction made of a variety of herbs whether the treatment did it or Sachs's own body simply decided that it would not let something as trivial as cancer stop it from continuing to soldier on within six months from the start of the treatments and after having had the tumor for some six years at this point sizes giant tumor it began to get smaller by February of 1860 the rest of sacs is life went pretty much as what had come before variously impressing the world with his talents and musical instrument making as well as fighting constantly go battles with the United Association of instrument makers attempting to fought him in any way they could whilst simultaneously the musical instrument makers behind it profiting from saxes designs as his patents expired finally fed up with everything then 72 year-old and near destitute sax attempted to get justice outside of the courts with an aptly titled article called appeal to the public published in la musique de famille in 1887 the article outlined the many ways in which sax had been wronged by the United Association of instrument makers and the near-constant often frivolous legal battles he forced throughout his time in Paris with them he then summed up before me I am proud to say the musical instrument industry was nothing or next to nothing in France I created this industry I carried it to an unrivaled height I develops the legions of workers and musicians and it is above all my counterfeiters who have profited from my work while none of this worked it's getting the general public to rally to his defense it did result in many prominent musicians and composers around Paris petitioning efforts acts who had indeed contributed much to the French musical world should be given a pension so that he could at least be comfortable in the latter years of his life the result of this was a modest pension ultimately granted towards the Sens on the side when he wasn't fighting countless legal battles and inventing and making instruments sax also had a pension for dreaming up alternate inventions such as designing a device that could launch a 500-ton 11 yard wide mortar bullet and he called it we're not making this up the Saxa cannon he also designed a truly massive organ intended to be built on a hillside near Paris capable of being heard clearly by anyone throughout the city whenever it was played in the end sax died at the age of 79 in 1894 and was buried in the Montmartre Cemetery in Paris so Sachs had musical skills and you can too with Skillshare now I checked out what musical courses they have and they absolutely do have classes on playing the saxophone now I have no idea how to play the saxophone and no particular desire to learn how to play the saxophone but if you want to you can do it on Skillshare as for me as I mentioned at the top of this video I've done many courses on Skillshare that a bit more up my street video production I did that course on creating Pro video with tools you already own it's a great one I've also done courses on productivity and plenty of other you know creative business related stuff Premium Membership with skill sharing gives you unlimited access to thousands of their classes and there's no kind of individual fee per class so whether you want to feel your curiosity your creativity or your career do it on Skillshare and with two months for free and then a super affordable ten dollars a month if you want to continue it's a far more cost-effective way to learn them with in-person courses so look these super long videos they take a lot to make and supporting Skillshare supports us so please just go through the link in the description below to check out Skillshare it really does us a favour and thanks for watching [Music] you

Channel: Today I Found Out

Views: 523,615

Keywords: today i found out, tifovidz12, tifo, awesome, facts, didn't know, Inventor of the Saxophone, Saxophone, Life of the Inventor of the Saxophone, Badass Life of the Inventor of the Saxophone, Adolphe Sax and his Saxophone, Adolphe Sax, The story of the saxophone

Id: zj5Z0V93XxY

Length: 21min 37sec (1297 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 31 2019