Maison SELMER
History Notes #12 : Super Action 80
For the last episode of the season, Douglas Pipher talks about the last historic saxophone made by the House of SELMER: the Super Action 80, which would be followed a few years later by the Super Action Series II and Series III saxophones.
"Today we're going to talk about the last historical model which Henri SELMER Paris produced: the Super Action 80.
Super Action 80 prototypes started showing up in late around the 304,000 serial number range. Test production runs showed up in the early 312,000 range in the spring of 1981. Full production began in April. For the tenor and the alto, production ran from about 316,000 to 383,000. The sopranos started at about 327,000 and continued to 390,000. For baritone, production started at 319,000 and continued even further until about 432,000. There was no Super Action 80 production of sopraninos or basses. Both of these types skipped the Mark VII and the Super Action 80 model and moved from the Mark VI directly to the Super Action 80 Series II. For the Sopranino, this change was made around 426,000, and for the basses it happened around 435,000.
There were roughly 69,000 Super Action 80 saxophones built, including about 8,000 sopranos, 35,000 altos, 22,000 tenors and about 3,800 baritones. They were finished as follows: lacquer: 63,000 units, silver plate: 5500 units, lacquer bodies with silver plated keys: 2100 units and gold plate: only about 50 units were produced. This was the first model for which all the US market saxophones were engraved lacquered and set up in France. Prior to shipment, a black lacquer was offered, but only about 120 Super Action 80 examples were finished this way, roughly 40 altos, 70 tenors and a small handful of sopranos and baritones.
This episode concludes the model by model overview of the Selmer History Notes video series. Thank you so much for all of your support and your positive feedback. In future episodes, we plan to dig into some specific topics with regard to Selmer Paris production development, special features, rare and interesting models, and a number of other fascinating topics. I hope to see you all soon."
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