About Adolphe Sax
Antoine-Joseph "Adolphe" Sax (French: [ɑ̃twan ʒozɛf adɔlf saks]; 6 November 1814 – 7 February 1894) was a Belgian inventor and musician who invented the saxophone in the early 1840s, patenting it in 1846. He also invented the saxotromba, saxhorn and saxtuba, and redesigned the bass clarinet in a fashion still used in the 21st century. He played the flute and clarinet. == Early life == Antoine-Joseph Sax was born on 6 November 1814 in Dinant, in what is now Belgium, to Charles-Joseph Sax and his wife Marie-Joseph Masson. He was referred to as Adolphe from childhood, and was the first of eleven children, of whom only three survived past the age of thirteen. Following the fall of the French First Republic, the factory where Charles-Joseph worked as a joiner and cabinet maker had closed, and so in 1815, the Sax family moved to Brussels, where he opened a small instrument makers workshop. He was later appointed an instrument maker to the Dutch Royal court. Sax was educated at the Royal School of Music, studying flute, harmony and solfège, and received private tutoring in clarinet from Valentin Bender. He attracted the attention of Joseph Küffner, but ultimately reject a career in performance in favor of his father's workshop. He is said to have exhibited improved clarinets he had either developed himself (1830) or assisting his father (1835) at the Brussels Industrial Exhibition.
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