Any serpent players here? (hey... it's trombone-adjacent!)
Posted: Thu Nov 14, 2024 2:30 pm
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.
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.
