Selmer USA & Bundy Serial Numbers

Which Selmer Do You Have?

Paris, Selmer USA, or Bundy

Selmer is really three different things to a saxophone buyer, and the name alone will not tell you which one you are holding. Settle this before you look up any number — it decides everything that follows, including what the instrument is worth.

• Selmer Paris — the professional instruments: Balanced Action, Super Action, Mark VI, Mark VII and later. Engraved Henri Selmer Paris, stamped Made in France, serial prefixed with M.
• Selmer USA — built in Elkhart, Indiana. Sold under the Selmer name in the American market, but a separate operation from Paris with its own numbering.
• Bundy and Bundy II — Selmer's student line, also built in Elkhart. Named after George Bundy, who held the American distribution rights for Selmer, and built for school band programmes rather than professionals.

The confusion is understandable, and sellers do not help: a Bundy is very often listed simply as "a Selmer". If the bell says Elkhart, or the horn carries the Bundy name anywhere, the Paris chart will not date it.

Which Chart Applies to Your Horn

Four cases, and what to do in each

US-built Selmer saxophones do not have a single sequence running through their history. Which chart you need depends on when the instrument was made, because the Elkhart operation changed hands and tooling along the way.

The Buescher Connection

The most useful thing to know about Bundy saxophones is that they are, in a real sense, Buescher instruments. Buescher was a long-established Elkhart maker; Selmer acquired the company in 1963, and the Bundy line was built on that tooling. As a result, Bundy saxophones from around 1960 onwards generally sit on the Buescher serial sequence rather than any Selmer one.

That makes the Buescher serial number chart the right place to look up a Bundy — not the Selmer Paris chart. It runs from 1888 through to serial 1,355,000, and crucially it carries the Selmer-owned era as well: the 1963–64 transition at 381,000, then the Selmer-owned ranges running through to 1982, and a late Selmer-era band from 875,000 onward.

Two practical notes. Those later entries are era bands rather than single years, so expect a range of a few years rather than a precise date. And a Bundy II with a number beyond roughly 1,355,000 sits past the end of the sequence altogether — production continued for some years after the published figures stop, and no honest source can give you a precise year for those.

Where to Find the Number on a Bundy

And how it differs from a Selmer Paris stamp

On a Bundy the serial number is stamped on the body tube, generally on the side away from the main key stack, or on the bell near the Bundy engraving. It is a plain run of digits.

That is itself a useful test. A Selmer Paris saxophone carries its number at the foot of a stamped block that also includes Made in France and a run of patent numbers, with the serial prefixed by the letter M. A Bundy has no M prefix and no French patent block. If you are looking at a bare number with no Made in France above it, you are almost certainly not holding a Paris horn — see reading the stamp block for what a Paris instrument looks like by comparison.

Why There Is No Official Bundy Chart

And what that means for dating a later instrument

This is worth stating plainly, because a great many pages imply otherwise. The manufacturer has never published a Bundy or Selmer USA saxophone serial number table. Conn Selmer, which owns the brands today, publishes serial number tables for Armstrong, Artley, Bach, Benge, Conn, Henri Selmer Paris and King — but none for Bundy.

Every Bundy chart in circulation is therefore an enthusiast compilation assembled from observed instruments, not a factory record. Those compilations are genuinely useful, and for horns inside the Buescher range they are reasonably reliable. But they thin out badly at the later end: the published Buescher sequence stops in the early 1980s, while Bundy II production continued for roughly another two decades.

If your Bundy II carries a long number well beyond the end of the Buescher chart, no honest source can give you a precise year. A rough era is the most anyone can offer, and any page handing you a confident date for such an instrument is guessing.

What a Bundy Is Worth

And whether a repair is worth paying for

Bundy and Bundy II saxophones were the workhorses of American school band programmes for decades, and they were built accordingly: sturdy, reliable and forgiving of the treatment beginners give an instrument. They play in tune and they last. What they are not is collectable, and the numbers made were enormous.

The practical consequence matters more than the valuation. A full overhaul on any saxophone is a significant cost, and on a student horn it can easily exceed what the instrument is worth. If yours needs serious work, get a quote before committing — our guide to saxophone repairers in London lists workshops worth approaching. A service and a set of pads is often money well spent; a full rebuild rarely is.

None of which makes a Bundy a bad instrument to learn on. If you have one and it is playing properly, it will take you a long way. Saxophone lessons are available in person in South East London and online, whatever you are playing.