Amazon's $69 Digital Sax Killer?

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In this video, I dive into my experience with the Vangoa S55, a budget-friendly electronic wind instrument (EWI). Initially, I made some mistakes, like not calibrating the instrument and misinterpreting its capabilities. However, after a couple of weeks of practice, I discovered its true potential! This little EWI, although not a saxophone replacement, offers unique features like a breath sensor, MIDI compatibility, and an array of inbuilt sounds. Join me as I explore its capabilities, demonstrate its sound library, and share my final thoughts on whether it can compete with higher-end models like those from Yamaha and Roland. Whether you're a composer looking for a new tool or a sax player exploring the world of MIDI, this review is for you.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction
00:49 How digital saxes work
03:22 Unboxing
05:22 First impressions
05:58 I have thoughts...
07:47 Sound test
09:00 MIDI wind controller
11:21 Final thoughts

Questions about anything in this video? Please leave them in the comments section below!

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-- RECOMMENDED BEGINNER SAX GEAR --

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TENOR SAXOPHONE

Yamaha YTS-280 ►► Currently unavailable on Amazon

SOPRANO SAXOPHONE

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#saxophone #vangoa #saxtuition

[sludgebob]

“We as sax players”
Me having never touched a saxophone: ah yes

[bodhibeats]

Great review, looks like an impressive instrument for the price. Advice on EWIs: don’t think of them as a “digital sax.” Think of them as a synthesizer you can control using some of your saxophone technique. You’ll be way happier with the results when it’s framed that way. 😁

[crunchysteve]

I'm a guitarist/bassist and I was an early adopter of the YouRock Guitar. Essentially a video game controller that used actual guitar technique to generate MIDI data. I love it! It's not about being a precise instrument that reproduces the acoustics of of the real instrument, it's that it gives you the tools to express your technique on sounds that the acoustic instrument can't give you, ever. And yeah, the YouRock has some setup and getting used to. It was fun to learn and gives me sounds my pedal board never could.

[dvdaltizer]

why the heck did the algorithm show me this and why did we all click? LOL

[joel]

I play a Synthophone by Softwind instruments. It is a midi controller built into a real saxophone. Real sax fingerings and a real sax mouthpiece. It has no internal sounds. I use audio-modeling Saxophones. This combination is the best there is but also the most expensive. The saxophone patches (all four saxophones) cost $250 and the Synthophone was $3, 600.
I submitted a video of me playing to the pro players at SaxSchool online, where I study, and they noticed that each tone was in perfect pitch and the dynamics sounded unusually good. Plus, the silver plate in the bell is a dead give-away, although I have played garden parties, and no one has asked about why the bell is closed off. There was no criticism about if it sounded like a sax or not. The owner of the school said it sounded very good. Interestingly, I have received some criticism from people at another sax site, but only after I revealed what the instrument was. Their ears told them nothing until there bias was unleashed. It was like a double blind auditory study. Some people allow their previous exposure to inform their opinions rather than admit their ears don't support their conclusion. In my experience, the pro player listeners were far more accepting. My fellow students, not so much.
I played for a year at another learning site where we submitted recordings for evaluation by the pro staff. Nobody detected I was not playing an acoustic saxophone. In fact, they said my tone and dynamics were very good. This instrument has set the embrasure struggles aside from the beginning, allowing me to focus on improvisation, rhythm, note choices, harmony, etc., without the instrument getting much in the way. Coming from the flute with nearly the same fingerings made my journey a bit easier, although the key spacing and spring resistance are very different and a challenge, especially the little finger low notes just the same as an acoustic sax because the synthophone is an acoustic sax. It took me 2-3 years to gain some level of fluency on those low-tone fingerings, just like an acoustic sax would have. A bonus was that it helped my arthritis in my old, busted-up hands and fingers. It hurt like hell when I first started. Initially, I chose to play the Synthophone because I knew how long it would take to overcome the embrasure challenges after playing flute for decades. Delightfully I learned the air requirement is less air unlike an acoustic sax which requires more air. A lot more air. Yes, it is an expensive setup, but I have never regretted it in the years since making that decision.

[saxman]

I have played sax for over 60 years, some pro work, but mostly just making music albums (CD's and sound cloud) for myself and friends and family. My biggest challenge through the years was backing tracks. If I was still active, this would be perfect. Makes me want to go back and start creating again! LOL. Thanks for the review. Great video!

[taosophymusic]

Great review. As a former trumpet player who has lost his embouchure this might be a way back into musical expression with a wind instrument. The only part of this video that bumps me is 10:35 –where a non-sax sound is played like a sax. It’s a misstep a lot of keyboard and synth players make when playing a realistic traditional instrument sound with keys. If you’re playing say, a flute sound from a synth, you can’t play, let’s say, chords the same way as you would a keyboard sound.

Also the choice of sound for that track seemed to not match the track.

[EandVEntertainment]

I really would have liked to have seen you use this as a midi controller with a Sax virtual instrument. There are quite a few decent ones out there, and I am really curious how using a wind specific controller like that would compare to just using a keyboard controller.

[eh]

Thanks for the explanation about midi and the difficulty in emulating the sax.

[fgerv]

Been playing wind controllers since the Lyricon in the 80’s. Use an AE05 and SWAM sounds to blend in a big band. Fill in when we are missing instruments. I also play alto, tenor and clarinet. My WARBL2 is much smaller but has less keys but I use a mod sax like fingering. It has shake vibrato and other motion sensors. I did experiment with attaching it with Velcro to my AE to use the shake and motion features. It didn’t add much but I am thinking it would to this one. Yours has more fingering and the WARBL2 has a good shake vibrato. For $70 what do I have to lose. Both have BTLE. I actually like shake vibrato on the SWAM trumpet and trombone better than the AE’s lip sensor. Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

[faylmusic]

As a producer that plays the saxophone this is great! I was searching a long time for something that transfers the feel that you can have with a real instrument and this seems to be the most affordable option

[walt_the_dolt]

Thanks for not talking poorly about midi. Most artists are not limited by midi but rather their abilities. Midi instruments with post processing, a good sample library, and some decent dynamics will sound very good and almost indistinguishable from a real instrument in many cases (to your average person that is). Obviously there are some instruments that are harder to replicate than others like the saxophone. But even then, if you just want something simple, a sampler will do the trick.

[drew]

Saw a midi demonstration back in the 1980s. They used an electric guitar with a midi controller and an Amiga computer. Turns out the Amiga was more powerful than many computers today. I was so impressed by the use of the midi with a professional musician, who was the demonstrator.

[rebeccaabraham]

I bought the S56 model about 8 months ago. The keywork is different and the body shape is slightly different, which makes it feel like an anorexic, minaturised Akai. Essentially though - it's the same instrument - but upmarket! It's absolutely brilliant - from the point of playing flute for almost 50 years - and I love it. However - I made a plastic 'octave-rocker' and glued it over the + and - octave switches - which makes the switching more natural and far easier. I also carved a simple wooden finger rest and fitted it with a hook for a lanyard - and glued it in the appropriate position. It's now a very much better instrument to play. I love using it as a midi controller - but it appears to be sending the breath control as cc11 - so I midi-map that to the master volume on my softsynths; I'll have to use a host program instead of the standalones to try and map to multiple controls. As far as the synths go - I play DiscoDSP's OB-Xd, Dexed... and Fluidsynth (soundfonts) - and have a lot of fun! I also find that some of the internal sounds 'beef-up' if you play them through an external amp - I use a little 10W JVC. Treat it as it is - it ain't a sax - but it's an instrument in it's own right - and too much fun not to take everywhere! PS - don't forget to use the supplied mouthpieces - and breath sensitivity level S3 seems to be the best!

[danieleeugeniolucchetta]

Roland is the way in digital woodwinds. I am a professional saxophone and clarinet player and I tested almost everything on the market

[CreativeSteve]

i've been slowly learning the Aerophone on and off now for the past year. I have been loving the journey and somehow it showed me your video today which I'm thankful for. Iwi looks like a fun instrument.

[michaelteter]

My old Yamaha WX-7 is still remarkably good. My #1 complaint about midi wind instruments is the difficulty in finding a sound that doesn't feel "cheesy". I don't need an exact real sax sound, but there must be some sound somewhere which doesn't sound cringy.

[CDRaff]

1:50 I got SUPER into midi music in the mid 90s. I grew up in a small town that was 60 miles from the nearest music store and we only went into the city once a month or so; we did have internet though. So if I got really into a band or song I would just download the midi files and listen to that until my family took a trip to the city and I had the money to spend on a CD. I listened to the midi rendition of Weezer's Blue album for the better part of 6 months before I could get the actual album.

[ericMT]

For $99 you can get an i8-pro that has an actual 5 pin MIDI out that you can use to control any synth with a MIDI in port. Including a modular synthesizer with a MIDI to CV converter. For people that don’t want to use a DAW, you really need a 5 pin connector or a MIDI host device to convert USB to midi or CV/gate.

[MTexas]

I'm a wannabe composer and just looking into ways to make my compositions come to life a bit more. This was a fantastic introduction to this instrument and the instrument family as a whole from a digital composer's perspective. Thank you so much for making this!