Any serpent players here? (hey... it's trombone-adjacent!)

[jonathanharker]

Perhaps this is too off-topic for this forum, in which case apologies, but I feel it is at least trombone-adjacent!

Getting the Serpent article up to GA status involved many rabbit holes and finding out all sorts of interesting stuff. So, I've just 3D-printed and glued a plastic serpent together, mostly for fun, because 1. it was comically cheap, 2. why not, and 3. see (1). Plans by Mark Witkowski are based on a 19th c. Dittes model serpent in the Oxford Bate Collection, and can be obtained by emailing Paul Schmidt who runs the Serpent Newsletter. He has also put up a video on YouTube of how to go about it, which I followed. I used JB Weld Plastic Bonder (a two-part adhesive) rather than inhale a load of nasty solvents (but mainly because I couldn't easily obtain dichloromethane), which seems to have worked fine. I have a friend who would like to turn a mouthpiece out of hardwood based on the plastic one that comes with the 3D plans. It makes a good sound! Well, good as far as I can tell, for someone who's never played one before, on a crummy printed plastic mouthpiece. I'm hoping to get a friend at a repair shop to bend me a brass bocal out of some old bits of tenor horn or saxophone neck, which might be an adventure...

Anyway, I'd be interested if anyone else plays or owns a serpent, and what their experiences are. As far as I can tell this is the first and only serpent to exist in New Zealand; in Australia, Scott Kinmont (Sydney Symphony Orchestra) plays one.

bruno-serpent.jpg

[bbocaner]

Yes, I have a serpent from Pierre Ribo and I have played a few professional gigs in period instrument orchestras on it. Yours looks cool!

[BGuttman]

Especially cool with the cat

[andym]

Nice job. I’ve been intrigued by serpents since seeing them in the NY Metropolitan museum and have pondered getting a 3D printer to make one from those plans. Glad to hear that it sounds good.

[jonathanharker]

I received the wooden serpent mouthpieces just in time for Christmas, turned from beech - they are very nice to play!

[harrisonreed]

Doug Yeo posts here some times. I think he plays that.

[ghmerrill]

That's a nice article. At some point you might want to add to the Bibliography Donald Stauffer's book A Treatise on the Tuba where the fourth chapter ("Forerunners of the Tuba") discusses the serpent in relation to the ophicleide, Russian bassoon, and a few other later instruments.

In 2011 I played in a large Tuba Christmas event in Greensboro, NC

where one guy showed up with a serpent:

If you look at the pictures of the group playing the concert, he's the guy in the check shirt and baseball cap, fourth row from the bottom, second one in from the stairs.

Serpent.png

It's difficult to see any part of the serpent, but it's there. I don't think anyone could hear it among all those (120+) tubas and euphs, but it's the thought that counts.