 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Llewsrac
Date: 2005-05-12 04:34
With the success of Buffets Green Line Clarinets, does anyone have an opinion on how this material could be applied in making a line of Green Line saxophones, or, Green Line crooks?
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Author: kal
Date: 2005-05-12 06:13
The "green" in Green Line speaks to the conservation of wood, not cash.
Alex, is it the conical bore that gets the tarogato lumped in with the saxes? Aside from being made of wood, every one I've seen has had Albert / Muller keywork. I like to think of them as clarinets with obesity issues 
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Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2005-05-12 10:48
A Greenline sax would probably be stronger than the Grafton plastic was, which cracked easily when knocked.
Other polymer composites that were not based on wood dust as a filler would probably be stronger still.
I'm not sure, but I think Greenline clarinets are machined from a molded billet. That would be pretty difficult for a sax body!
But what's the point? Metal is an ideal material for this sort of shape that needs things attached to it.
'Liquidmetal' (trademark) may ge a good alternative if the body or keys were to be molded - very light, extremely strong, rigid, highly resistant to corrosion, good surface appearance, almost as easy to mold as plastic, and comes out of a mold so accurately that razor blades can be cast without needing sharpening.
http://www.liquidmetal.com/
Post Edited (2005-05-12 14:44)
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Author: Synonymous Botch
Date: 2005-05-12 12:02
The relative thickness of the walls in the instrument has a structural support role... saxophone walls are vanishingly thin compared to the outer diameter at the largest sections.
The plastic used in greenline clarinets is quite heavy...
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Author: Brenda Siewert
Date: 2005-05-12 14:51
Synon...what plastic is in greenline clarinets? It's all recycled grenadilla wood compressed into the "greenline" material. Unless there's plastic somewhere on the body that I've missed. I've owned 2 greenline R-13s. Both were very, very nice instruments.
I think a greenline sax would be an improvement. What an idea!
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2005-05-12 15:24
Brenda Siewert wrote:
> Synon...what plastic is in greenline clarinets?
grenadilla dust is the filler material in a resin. It can be called a plastic. It could have been something other than grenadilla dust as a filler, but it's nice to know that at least it 'came from wood' ...
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Author: Llewsrac
Date: 2005-05-12 17:38
A Saxophone body made from the greenline material with standard metal keys, or a metal Saxophone in which the bore is lined with a thin coating of the greenline material would produceand add a new timbre to the woodwind family, not like the tarogato instrument produced by Schunda. With the conical bore of the Saxophone made with the greenline material, I believe such an application would produce a new tone quality much closer to a Human coloratura then our current Saxophones are able to express. In my minds ear I hear a new woodwind voice that is capable of a greater depth of musical tonal emotions, expressions ranging from the most tender warmth to the darkest rage. Using you own minds ear what does your imagination hear from such a constructed instrument?
With the supply of quality grenadilla growing smaller and smaller, there exisit a vast recycling market for all the old grenadilla horns produced in the last two hundred years alone with the possibilities of technical, structural, and tonal improvements across the board.
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2005-05-12 17:50
Llewsrac wrote:
> A Saxophone body made from the greenline material with standard
> metal keys, or a metal Saxophone in which the bore is lined
> with a thin coating of the greenline material would produceand
> add a new timbre to the woodwind family, not like the tarogato
> instrument produced by Schunda.
I personally am clueless as to what it would sound like ... what brings you to these conclusions.
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Author: Llewsrac
Date: 2005-05-12 18:44
A wooden crook applied to an Alto and the marked difference in the tone of that horn. Extending that application to the sax body I believe would provide a tone quality so far unknown.
A engineer crunching the numbers of the sax bore alone with the properities of the greenline material perhaps could provide a better clue to the mystery tone quality.
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2005-05-12 18:51
Llewsrac wrote:
> A wooden crook applied to an Alto and the marked difference in
> the tone of that horn. Extending that application to the sax
> body I believe would provide a tone quality so far unknown.
That much I could probably agree with (no certainty, but a most probabhly occurance).
However, as a former engineer in acoustics, anything further would be sheer speculation. "crunching the numbers" is indeterminate at this point in time; the data points via empirical studies don't exist, and neither does the applied math. The theoretical math does, but it is considerably simplified to allow for reasonable answers.
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Author: Llewsrac
Date: 2005-05-12 19:17
I understand your point on the math. Somewhat like which came first, Music or Music Theory
Create the sax, hear what you created, and go from there. The data will follow.
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2005-05-12 19:26
Mark's point, I think, is that the data will NOT follow --- not everything in the universe has been mathematically modeled. (Speaking as an American) if musical instrument acoustics were of national importance from a defense or political standpoint, then sufficient billions of dollars of public money would have been invested in the basic and applied physics and mathematics to develop a suitably complex and verified mathematical model of those deceptively simple-appearing, but acoustically extremely complex, devices we call 'clarinet' and 'saxophone'. Unfortunately, this hasn't been done, and the simplifications and assumptions that have to be made to generate mathematical models given the limited resources applied thus far, ensure that the resulting models have insufficient fidelity to be of much use in analyzing, designing, or constructing real instruments.
So, at least for the forseeable future, we will continue to depend on empirical observations and our ears, as has been done since antiquity. If you want to know what a wooden sax will sound like, you have no choice but to build one and play it!
Please let us know how it sounds when you're done.
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Author: Roger Aldridge
Date: 2005-05-12 19:55
Guys,
I'm scratching my head over this thread.
As far as I'm concerned, the classic saxophone companies of the 1930's (such as Buescher, Selmer, Conn, Martin, etc) got it right. These are fantastic instruments. I consider the mechanical developments made in the saxophone since then as being more gravy than significant substance.
If one is thinking "green" regarding the saxophone, then the idea of RECYCLING classic vintage saxophones and using them instead of buying new instruments and taking more of the Earth's resources works for me.
Roger
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2005-05-12 21:08
Roger,
Shame on you, you forget to include King in your list of classic saxes of the past! My beloved personal 'daily players' saxophone-wise include two 1925 silver-plated Kings (an alto and tenor), which sound as good as any modern horn and are better built, although the keywork is not as comfortable nor is the action as fast as on the better modern saxes.
Pardon the irrelevant digression. Your point is well taken --- I agree that saxophones probably had reached their pinnacle of ACOUSTICAL development by 1930 or so, which I believe is what you were saying (?). Similarly, I don't think the clarinet has changed in any substantive way since maybe the late 1800s (despite those who claim that Robert Carree's development of the polycylindrical bore for Buffet in the 1950s was significant).
I'll shut up now.
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Author: Ken Mills
Date: 2005-05-12 22:10
Dear Llewsrac; Why don't they make the body of the sax out of stainless steal? Not kidding. I know that it is hard to even drill a hole through that material of any significant gauge. Save the Rain Forests, Ken Mills
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Author: Llewsrac
Date: 2005-05-12 22:27
Question; Have all the woodwind instruments been developed? Is there room for a new woodwind instrument, regardless of if there is even a need for one. I agree the greatest advances in design and craftsmanship took place in the thirties for the Saxophone and post WWII advances in both the Clarinet and Saxophone have been to a great extent refinements upon that work. Where as I am thinking more alone the lines of an evolutionary step to a new woodwind instrument starting with and based upon current saxophone design. "Thinking Outside The Box"
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Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2005-05-12 23:10
New instrument:
We have conical bore and cylindrical, and two methods of exciting the air column. What we don't seem to have is a modern, very small bore instrument like a French Horn, which utilises the higher overtones rather than the fundamentals.
Also, we have no instrument where the air is excited by a device that resembles blowing past a blade of grass stretched tight between slightly opened lips, or mouthpiece equivalent..
Also, consider an excitation method which resembles a voice box, or artificial lips attached to a trumpet mouthpiece. Imagine the mounting of the labia to be of a somewhat firm but flexible material, so that the pitch could be controlled by squeezing the mounting between the teeth, hence stretching the labia.
Somebody will get a basic sound producer and refine it to make a new instrument. For example there has been almost no refinement done to the ocarina.
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Author: David Peacham
Date: 2005-05-13 18:45
There have been plenty of attempts to develop new wind instruments since the invention of the saxophone and saxhorns, but none have caught on to any significant degree. How often do we hear the sarrusophone, cimbasso, tarogato, Wagner tuba, heckelphones, the modern oboe d'amore, the bass and contrabass flutes? Each has its niche, but no wide acceptance. I suspect that the problem is twofold: they are not different enough from existing instruments, and small production volumes mean very high prices.
Or, to take up Gordon's point, maybe we need instruments with different mechanisms to excite the air column. Maybe we could produce modern versions of the crumhorn, the cornetto or the serpent. Modernised recorders and shawms already exist, but, once again, only in a niche.
How about a wind instrument that uses an electrical mechanism to excite the air column, or indeed to provide the air column? Not a keyboard instrument like the organ, but a monophonic instrument where the player has fine control over the pitch, articulation and dynamics.
I like the idea of a modernised cornetto.In fact the old one is already a pretty good instrument. Just very, very difficult to play. (I've tried, a bit.)
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If there are so many people on this board unwilling or unable to have a civil and balanced discussion about important issues, then I shan't bother to post here any more.
To the great relief of many of you, no doubt.
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Author: BobD
Date: 2005-05-14 14:46
I think the labial approach has something goiing for it, Gordie. Certainly the tarogato hasn't made any waves in the musical community but perhaps bagpipes are a possibility.
Bob Draznik
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Author: FrankM
Date: 2005-05-16 13:19
David P...you mentioned modern recorders....has anyone attempted to make a recorder with modern key work? I have heard of a recorder with a bell key.
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Author: David Peacham
Date: 2005-05-16 14:57
FrankM - re modernised recorders. There are three that I know of; I'd be very interested if anyone knows of any others:
1) Mollenhauer make something called a "Modern Alto". This only has two keys (for F and F#) but a different bore and timbre from normal recorders.
2) Mollenhauer also make something called a "Harmonic Recorder". This has four keys, if I remember correctly; still far from modern keywork.
3) The third has full modern keywork, see http://www.strathmann-musicinstruments.de/gbprod_leist.htm. Some of Strathmann's ideas have been licensed by Mollenhauer, so he may not be a complete crank. I've never seen nor heard one of these beasts.
In addition, there is, or was, something called a csakan, which is a nineteenth century recorder with simple-system (I believe) keywork. See, for example, http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:UCdMynl9wIMJ:www.mwemm.com/arta/artafacts_pdfs/ARTAfacts_Vol6No1_MarY2K1.pdf+csakan&hl=en.
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If there are so many people on this board unwilling or unable to have a civil and balanced discussion about important issues, then I shan't bother to post here any more.
To the great relief of many of you, no doubt.
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