gglassmeyer

This horn has step bore design where the bore changes at specific parts of the horn. Most everyone initially thinks this horn is tight. If you tried it for an extended period of time you'd find you could play more efficiently with a bit less effort. The attempt by Yamaha and Bobby Shew was to make a horn that could fit well in any playing situation. It's a nice horn, but I think you could find one for less than $1000 used.
Try to convince him to let you play it for a couple weeks, if your opinion of the horn changes and you like it, do some research to see what a current asking price is and make an offer.

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Greg Glassmeyer