Chu Berry - The "Chu Berry" Saxophone

The "Chu Berry" Saxophone

"Chu Berry" is the unofficial name of a series of saxophones produced by the C.G. Conn company during the 1920s, though it is more accurate to refer to them as the Conn 'New Wonder' Series II. Even then significant ambiguity remains.

Firstly, C.G.Conn never used the term "Chu Berry" to refer to any of their saxophones. Furthermore, Berry actually played a model of tenor sax generally known as the Conn "Transitional", and is not known to have ever played a New Wonder Series II. Some saxophone owners (particularly on eBay) use the term "Chu Berry" in reference to any Conn saxophone made between 1910 and the mid-1930s, including soprano, alto, baritone and C melody saxophones, none of which Berry played.

Unfortunately, the term "Chu Berry saxophone" is misleading (and therefore potentially meaningless) because it has no accurate and universally agreed definition. This easily causes confusion e.g. to non-experts the Conn New Wonder Series II looks very similar to the New Wonder Series I or the "New Invention" model of circa 1910. To complicate matters further, there was no abrupt cut-off point between the New Wonder Series II and the 6M or 10M. Instead, there was a gradual evolution in the design. Between 1930 and 1934 (approximately serial numbers 244700 to 260999) Conn manufactured around 17,000 "Transitional" (or "cross-over") models. Most of these so-called "Transitional" saxophones were altos and they combine some features of the New Wonder Series II with others from the later Conn 6M (alto) and 10M (tenor) designs - in varying percentages. For example, early transitionals can be 80/20 New Wonder II and 10M, others are 60/40 or 50/50, whilst the later ones are 30/70 etc.

Suffice to say a number of progressively different transitional Conn saxophones were produced as designs evolved. Sometimes these design differences are obvious e.g. early transitional models have split bell-keys compared to later ones with the single-sided 6M and 10M bell-key layout, whilst both types may have a "nail-file" G# key. A more subtle difference is that very late-production transitionals have a Conn 10M "shot glass" style octave-key vent on the neck as opposed to the earlier dome-shaped octave vent found on the New Wonder II. When examining early-model transitional saxophones the differences can be quite minor (closely resembling the New Wonder Series II, except for having a modified high E-key on the side) and therefore detailed background knowledge is required to correctly identify them. Unless the owner knows which design features to look for, both early and late-model Conn transitionals can be misidentified under the all-encompassing label of "Chu Berry saxophone". As a result, the official Conn model names used by the manufacturer are preferred, because there is a clear, accurate definition and therefore the possibility of misunderstanding is much reduced.