Yamaha – YDS-150 – Digital Saxophone

The YDS-150 is designed to be a saxophone that would allow anyone to experience the joy of performing, anytime, anywhere. The groundbreaking new wind instrument retains the full expressiveness of the saxophone, yet unlike an acoustic saxophone it can be as quiet as you want, making it more convenient and easier to play.

FEATURES

Volume Control
The rich sound of the saxophone is captured in all its beauty for you to play, yet the instrument can be as quiet as you want. You can adjust the volume over a range of 15 steps, and enjoy playing without worrying about the volume—day or night. And if you want total silence and focus completely on your performance, simply connect a set of headphones.

Integrated Bell Acoustic System
Yamaha’s unique Integrated Bell Acoustic System gives you the best of both worlds—high-quality digital sound with the full expressiveness of an acoustic wind instrument. This new, advanced system, consists of speaker units, enclosures, acoustic pipe and a real brass bell, responds to your breath from the mouthpiece, and digitally creates sound that drives the speakers, causing the brass bell to resonate and vibrate. In fact, the entire instrument resonates with the sound, and that vibration comes back to you—to your mouth from the mouthpiece and to your fingertips from the keys. The result is an instrument that breathes, moves and vibrates along with your playing, giving you all the expressive feeling of an acoustic saxophone with the comprehensive capabilities of a digital instrument.

Mouthpiece
In order to enable the most naturally expressive and comfortable playability, the YDS-150 features a mouthpiece designed the same as that of an acoustic saxophone. It can also be conveniently removed for easy maintenance.

Key Layout
The key layout of the saxophone is essential for playability and feel, and the YDS-150 has been designed based on Yamaha’s flagship model of acoustic saxophone for the most natural playability and smoothest feel. In addition, you can use the dedicated app to change the fingering and customize it to your own needs.

Brass Bell
The high-quality brass bell is made of the same material as used on Yamaha’s acoustic saxophone. Drawing on our extensive know-how and experience of making acoustic instruments, we designed this bell to gorgeously reproduce the long reverberation peculiar to wind instruments as well as the delicate sonic nuances sounds when playing pianissimo. Moreover, the authentic resonance causes the entire instrument to vibrate, and lets you truly feel the music as you play it.

Breath Sensor
Simply by blowing into the mouthpiece and playing the keys with correct fingering, you can produce a perfect acoustic saxophone sound—like a professional player—without having a perfect embouchure (mouth shape). The YDS-150 has a breath sensor that detects the intensity or pressure of your blowing, letting you minutely control not only the volume of the sound but also the tone.

Whole-Tone Sampling of Professional Players
The YDS-150 uses sampled sounds of Yamaha’s acoustic saxophones—soprano, alto, tenor and baritone—meticulously recorded in whole tones with professional players, letting you fully enjoy performing without any unnatural sound.

Authentic Saxophone Tone in 4 Types, 46 Presets – Covering All Musical Genres
The YDS-150 lets you instantly change the tonality, range, and timbre of each of the saxophone types—soprano, alto, tenor or baritone. Moreover, each of these saxophone types have different saxophone Voices that correspond to various playing techniques and musical genres, from vibrato playing and jazz to classical music. In total, the YDS-150 has 73 instrument sounds, with 56 saxophone Voices, and many other instrument sounds—including electronic instruments, as well as acoustic wind instruments such as shakuhachi, Irish pipe, and more—letting you perform authentically in virtually any music genre.

External Connection Terminals
Equipped with an Aux in terminal for connecting with other devices, such as smartphones and audio players. You can jam along with music on an external source* or play along with other musicians.

*Only available when using headphones or outputting from the headphones terminal.

Dedicated Case
Comes with a soft case that lets you easily carry the instrument over your shoulder

SPECS
Dimensions: W 110 mm x H 699 mm x D 103 mm
Weight: 1kg (excluding batteries)
Bell: Yellow brass with gold lacquer finish
Key System: Same fingering as a saxophone with High-F#, Front-F, and Low A
Control: Analog
Tone Generation Technology: AWM Sampling
No. of Preset Voices: 73 (including 56 saxophone voices)
Keys: Eb, Bb, C (Sync with voice)
Tuning: 427.0Hz〜440.0Hz〜453.0Hz, approx. 0.5Hz increments
With Bluetooth audio
Effects: 5 types (for headphones)
Connectivity
– Headphones: Stereo-mini
– AUX IN: Stereo-mini
– USB to HOST: Micro USB Type-B
Power Supply
– USB power adaptors: 5V/1A (micro USB Type-B)
– Batteries: 4 “AAA” size alkaline [LR3]) or Ni-MH rechargeable [HR3] batteries
Power Consumption: 4.5W (when using USB power adaptor)
Auto Power-Off Function
Included Accessories
– Mouthpiece
– Reed
– Ligature
– Mouthpiece cap
– Soft case
– Strap