Straight bari
Here's a picture of Jay Easton's straight saxes:
Soprillo, bari, sopranino, tenor, and C soprano
Here's a picture of Jay Easton's straight saxes:
Soprillo, bari, sopranino, tenor, and C soprano
There have been curved basses and baritones. They just aren't in production anymore. The current curved low horns would be the Tubax series from Eppelsheim -- if you want contrabass.The straight saxes are cool looking, but I keep thinking that a bass sax curved into a sousaphone or helicon shape would have some real practical applications. I'm sure the engineering would be difficult--curved rods obviously would not work, so the mechanism would have to be reconceptualized. The bell, without as much flare as a modern sousaphone or helicon, would probably look a little like those old European bass horns, some of which were built in the key of F and were pretty small.
Benedikt uses a cable for the altissimo assist key on his bass saxes. Since it connects to the neck, it has an alternate screw-in place for shipping. I don't do altissimo on bass sax and when I did it was rather easy compared to other saxes with alternate fingering, so it mostly stays screwed in the stow position.Straight rods used on a musical instrument could be replaced with Bowden cables, allowing the force to operate key cups to be transmitted any distance (subject to frictional losses, of course) without having the runs to be arrow straight.
I didn't know you could get a patent on looking ridiculous. I'm gonna be rich!'
That makes (some) people that march with them look patently ridiculous.
According to my daughters, I appear to have that patent, already .I didn't know you could get a patent on looking ridiculous. I'm gonna be rich!
I have tried one, once. Peter Jessen had it in for adjustment. He let me try. Very strange, yes it has sax fingerings but you hold your hands at a completely different angle. I am sure that the sense disappears after a short while for the lucky owners, but it gave an odd sense of disconnect from the instrument. BTW, what marvels they are!-- and the Tubax has sax fingerings, so it doesn't matter to me from that perspective, either.