The sax.co.uk crew with sax players Jody Espina
and Vaughan Hawthorne-Nelson
sax.co.uk was started in 1995 by Phill Straker (pictured left in corny pose), originally trading as The Sax Rental Company. Phill had spent 30 years working in the music business (he's older than he looks!) importing, buying, selling and playing in numerous bands. His current band The Big Kahuna are pictured right.
The original intention, other than just making a living, was to make saxes easily available to all the adults who kept bumping into him at gigs declaring, "I wish I could play the sax."
Music shops can be intimidating places, some have only one token sax on display and often no one in the store can play it! Phill put together a comprehensive sax-pack containing all you needed to get started and made it readily available by mail-order and on an inexpensive hire basis. The sax-pack hire was an immediate success and guess what - over 90% of these wannabe sax-players found they could play and bought their hired instruments. Now, many years on literally thousands of adults are enjoying their saxes and the walls of the showroom are covered with letters from grateful customers.
Partner in the business is Chris (Christine) Straker
who is in charge of finance.
Together with office manager Sheila Williams she looks after administration and
the 600+
customers currently hiring their first saxes. This is the foundation
stone on which the company is built requiring a high degree of personal
attention.
With the growth of The Internet the business became sax.co.uk and evolved into the leading supplier of saxophones on the world wide web. The website has several hundred pages of sax related information and has thousands of visitors each week. Nowadays over 50% of customers are confident to buy outright rather than hire and the product range has grown to cover all leading makes of saxophone and sax-related accessories. The Internet has brought customers from all over the world and each week saxes are shipped to the USA and beyond. sax.co.uk has a reputation such that professional sax players worldwide are confident to buy direct and be supplied mail order.
Store manager,
sax player, teacher and technician Jim Cheek oversees the setting up of each and every
instrument to ensure they are supplied in perfect playing order. The same
care and attention is given whatever the value of the sax. He also
heads a team of sax players providing help and advice in person via the phone &
over the internet.
Jim is currently playing with Brighton 8
piece funk band “Return of the Bump Squad”
www.returnofthebumpsquad.com
Jules Lawrence
has been a member of numerous blues, jump-jive and rock bands along the
South Coast for several years. A player of the tenor and baritone sax & blues
harmonica, he is also one of the very few people who's ever bothered to work out
how to get a tune out of a musical saw.
As a member of country blues outfit, The Swamp Things, he has shared stages with
Jools Holland's Rhythm and Blues Orchestra, Paul Jones' Blues Band, RL Burnside
and Alabama 3 as well as touring Europe on several occasions. As a member of The
Dime Store Jive Revue, he also spent time playing in New Orleans as part of a
Burlesque festival.
He has also worked on producing live soundtracks for silent movies, performance
art pieces & is currently a
member of Jump Jive/ Rock & Roll Big Band- Fat 45 www.fat45.com
Sax advisor Scott Jenkins
recently completed his BA in Jazz at Middlesex University. He was the youngest
ever teacher to be taken on by the Kent Music School at the age of 18. He is
Musical Director of The Invicta Jazz Orchestra, he has toured professionally and
played with the National Youth Jazz Orchestra. He teaches saxophone and still
studies himself under Derek Nash. Scott plays with soul group Loose Change (www.loosechange.co.uk)
and sax quartet Rac-a-saX (www.myspace.com/racasax).
Sax advisor Bill Cox has
spent most of his working life touring the world playing sax, guitar, singing
and sound mixing with various professional bands including Fast Freddies
Fingertips, The Pioneers, Barry Biggs & The Show Stoppers.
Bill is currently singing backing vocals and sound mixing for The Big Kahuna (www.big-kahuna.uk.com).
OK, Jamie Straker is a guitarist but he has promised that his New Year's Resolution is to learn to play the sax. Jamie helps contribute to the site and many other customer related issues.
Florence Spinone -Head of Security.
Pictured here in reindeer disguise (she's really a dog). Highly
trained sniffer dog Florence was forced to leave the UK Customs Service after
she was discovered to be enjoying her work too much. A smiling Florence insisted
she had to make a large final sniff "just to make sure
man" and that it was unfortunate that this resulted in the loss of the
evidence.
Bill joined the team
after taking early retirement from a career in public service. He still
wishes to play a role in public life and would therefore be keen on hearing from
any bands requiring a tenor sax player. He is experienced in big bands,
parties, weddings, summit meetings for heads of state, nuclear disarmament negotiations
etc.
May
2nd 2006 we moved to Crowborough, East Sussex, creating the
world's largest saxophone showroom. This was the culmination of a two year
project during which we sat down with an architect and designed a purpose built
facility from the ground up. The 5,500sq.ft. building features four "studios"
for play testing, a large fully equipped workshop and a spacious contemporary
showroom. Many of our customers are supplied by mail order
but we’d love to see you if you prefer to visit. We've even catered for those
accompanying you with free refreshments and a comfortable seating area with TV.
We usually have over 300 saxes in stock and a
large range of mouthpieces and accessories. You are welcome to try them out
without pressure or obligation. Please phone if you need directions
or to check
stocks.
Opening Hours:
Monday - Friday 9am - 5pm
and Saturday 10am - 4pm.
Click
here for a map.
.
Spacious contemporary showroom.
Straight and curved soprano saxes.
From the tiny Soprillo to the Giant Bass (top right)
Over 300 saxes in stock.
Hundreds of useful specialist accessories.
Sound proofed studios for play testing.
Somewhere for the family to relax while you play!
www.myspace.com/saxcouk Make
contact with sax players via myspace.
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