Jay Coburn

As a teen, he was enrolled in the Royal School of Music in Brussels.

He was an impressive musician, a virtuoso on the flute and clarinet.

When he was about 20, one composer even dedicated a clarinet piece to Adolf Sachs.

Specifically, the bass clarinet.

The bass clarinet was kind of a quirky novelty at the time.

It was difficult to play and sounded kind of nasal, and it was so long that it was difficult to get your fingers in the right place.

It looked a bit like a folded bassoon.

This improvement meant that each instrument sounded more in tune.

And when played together, the bass clarinet sounded more harmonious.

And so in 1835, in his early 20s, Adolf Sachs took his bass clarinet to an instrument show.

And 19th century Belgian instrument aficionados loved it.

In fact, the bass clarinets used in orchestras today still owe their design to Adolf Sachs, a wooden tube covered in keys that curves into a metal bell shape at the bottom end.

The top end crooks into a mouthpiece with a wooden reed to blow on.

With his redesign of the bass clarinet, the name Sax was beginning to be known in musical circles.

But if he really wanted to make the big francs, he had to move to Paris.

In 1843, Adolf Sachs set up a workshop there and got to experimenting.

He came up with new families of horns.

The sax horns, which were valved brass instruments that looked a bit like upright trumpets.

And the saxotrombas, which were valved brass instruments that looked a bit like upright trumpets.

And perhaps it's worth noting here that Adolf Sachs didn't really invent these instruments so much as improve on things that already existed.