David Weiss, oboist who mastered musical saw, dies at 67

LOS ANGELES -- David Weiss was a world-renowned oboist who spent 30 years with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. But that's not what got him featured appearances on "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" and "Prairie Home Companion."

In an unlikely pairing for a classical musician, Weiss also played the musical saw. Using a violin bow across a Stanley Handyman crosscut saw bought at Sears for $7, he played folk songs, Beatles tunes and Igor Stravinsky pieces.

"I shall never forget his wonderful interpretation of the oboe part in Richard Wagner's 'Tristan und Isolde,' " longtime Philharmonic music director Zubin Mehta said this week in a statement, "nor will I forget seeing him play the musical saw on a street corner in Vienna during one of our European tours."

Weiss, 67, died May 24 while surfing off Pacific Palisades, said his wife, Alpha Walker. He collapsed near shore after riding in on a wave; the exact cause of death has not been determined.

In addition to being the principal oboist with the Philharmonic from 1973 to 2003, Weiss taught the instrument at the University of Southern California and the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara.

It was his love of the saw, however, that set him apart from other orchestra musicians. The instrument, which is bowed and bent to produce an unearthly sound that could accompany science-fiction movies, was popular in vaudeville, then largely died out. Weiss first heard it, live, at a party that changed his life in more ways than one.

"He met the saw and me at the same party on New Year's Eve," Walker said of the gathering on the eve of 1981. A guest played "Auld Lang Syne" on the saw, and Weiss was hooked.

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The instrument, he said in 1991, "exudes certain sounds that you just can't get on any other instrument."

He began practicing vigorously and two years later won second prize at the Festival of the Saws in Santa Cruz.

For fun, Weiss would practice on the Venice boardwalk. Someone with a connection to "The Tonight Show" heard him there, and in 1983 Weiss found himself sitting next to Johnny Carson and playing "Danny Boy."

Weiss was born Feb. 8, 1947, in New York City. His mother, Marcia Neukrug Weiss, was a piano teacher, and by the time he was 3 he was playing the instrument a bit by ear.

The family moved to Los Angeles in 1953, and Weiss showed such affinity for the oboe that at the age of 11 he was accepted into a student music program at USC. At age 15 he won a competition to solo at a Los Angeles Philharmonic concert. Later, he also played for movie and television soundtracks.