It’s a good bet that many of us have not heard of the medical imaging technique called micro-computed tomography. Although we’re likely familiar with the term CT scan, in micro CT scans the pixel sizes of the cross-sections are in the micrometre range (one millionth of a metre). This allows for the recreation of incredibly precise 3D models.
Source: SecretDisc on: commons.wikimedia.org
Even if micro-computed tomography is not something you’ve heard of before, you’ve likely heard of 3D printing: a process by which an industrial robot is used to print a three-dimensional object. (I recently wrote about the world’s first 3D saxophone.)
Micro-computed tomography + 3D Printing + Antique Musical Instruments = Sounds like you’ve never heard before
Think of the practical applications if a person were to combine these two processes together. That’s just what Dr. Robert Howe (a medical doctor by training) suggested to his PhD advisor, Richard Bass. Bass is a professor of music theory in the Department of Music, at the University of Connecticut’s School of Fine Arts.
You see, Dr. Howe is more than just a doctor, he is also an oboe player, and holds undergrad degrees in music and chemistry. Howe has always had an interest in antique wooden musical instruments, and has been researching and publishing in scholarly music journals over the past couple of decades.
Though his PhD research, Dr. Howe began exploring precisely how 18th and 19th century instruments were built. And by precisely, I mean that term quite literally, since thanks to micro-computed tomography, measurements to within thousandths of a millimetre can be measured.
The goal of this research is to be able to reproduce instrument parts—through 3D printing— in such an authentic way, that musical instruments that have been unplayable for perhaps centuries, are once again brought back to life.
Howe and Bass have joined forces with an assistant professor at Manhattan College in Bronx, N.Y, Sina Shahbazmohamadi. Dr. Shahbazmohamadi has developed a new way of using micro-computed tomography for antique musical instruments, and all the materials that they are made of. Together they are studying a wide variety of instruments and mouthpieces, including original Adolphe Sax saxophones.
Density does matter
Among the trio’s early research findings is something that some woodwind players might find interesting: A material’s density does matter when it comes to an instrument’s response and sound. What does this mean for saxophone players? Well actually quite a bit potentially, if you think about modern mouthpiece composition.
Have you played a Dukoff Silverite mouthpiece? Compare its response and sound to that of a comparable stainless steel Berg Larsen. To me these two pieces are like night and day. This density finding might be yet one more part in the overall explanation of what makes mouthpieces differ so wildly beyond the facing; tip opening; chamber; and baffle differences.
What does this mean for Adolphe Sax saxophones?
The researchers involved in all this antique musical instrument research are very interested in being able to recreate missing pieces for instruments that are hundreds of years old. The goal: to get these instruments up and playable again. For example, when it comes to saxophones, this is how they explain the work that they are doing:
“In his patent of July 1846, when he patented the saxophone in France, he only drew the mouthpiece for the bass saxophone,” Howe says. “He said this is the mouthpiece for the bass, but [that] the others could be made in the same proportion, as necessary.”
The researchers have access to an original mouthpiece created by Sax for a B-flat tenor saxophone and believe that if they can scan that part, they can proportionately scale it for six original Sax instruments of varied tones – and then use 3-D printing to create appropriate mouthpieces so they once again can be played.
Source: How researchers are resurrecting antique musical instruments
Reproducing original Adolphe Sax mouthpieces would allow audiences to hear what saxophones sounded like when they were first invented: What Adolphe Sax intended them to sound like.
For your listening and viewing pleasure, here is a small sample of the work that the researchers have done using micro-computed tomography and 3D printing. The results are quite remarkable, and perhaps not at all what we as modern saxophone players would expect.
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Written with content from: How researchers are resurrecting antique musical instruments, Nov 14, 2014 by Kenneth Best, Bret Eckhardt, phys.org
Theo and Mal, thank you for your comments on my research. Theo, you make some unequivocal statements about the morphology of Adolphe Sax saxophone mouthpieces. Do you have access to any such mouthpieces? If you do, I would like to know of them. To my knowledge there are only three such in existence, these being my tenor, a baritone in France and an alto in Britain. The tenor sax in the first frame of the video is a C tenor serial 40582, it is indeed wrapped in string. THe pads don’t seal so it plays poorly in my video. The Bb tenor is 39116.
I would only consider a mouthpiece to be an authentic Adolphe Sax if it has the Sax stamp.
My oldest mouthpiece is made by Vogelweirth, who worked with Pèllison.
My statements come from the comments of Raschèr on changes in mouthpieces since Adolphe.
There are Rascher adepts (like Pete) who might get a better tone out of your mouthpieces as they are used to this type of mouthpiece. This year I met his doughter Carina briefly in Tilburg who might know more on this subject.
The waxed thread interests me as this area of the saxophone has a large influence on the sound.
Cork and thread have different sound isolating properties.
The saxophone neck just before the thread is visible conical.
Do you know if the part below the thread is also conical or straight?
It seems trivial but it does affect the sound of the saxophone.
I meant Carina Raschèr daughter of Sigurd Raschèr.
As an afterthought:
The tenor in the first picture of the youtube videa does not have a neck cork.
It looks more like a waxed thread.
The original mouthpiece made by Adolphe has a diameter which is more close to the brass of the neck than in the present saxophone. Only a very thin cork will work.
Adolphe Sax started as a clarinet player. His mouthpieces have large chambers and a straight (or no) baffle, just like clarinets. It is not a big surprise that they sound more like clarinets than the present saxophone.
We have the Raschèr adepts to remind us. (I guess they do not use baffles, but I am not shure.)
It is proved scientifically that the difference in sound of a saxophone by material is not very big.
The influence of a small 0,2 mm baffle, a few mm more conical body and other size differences are much bigger. This is misinterpreted as a proof that no people can hear differences in the sound of a saxophone by material.
When we discuss small sound differences, that can be heard by the trained ear, but not by the majority of people, it is possible to find statistically sound tests, of the influence of material on the saxophone sound, like the density of material.
The tomography measures more accurately than Sax could work.
Details of around 0,05 mm can be made by hand.
Only some 3D printer can make details of 0,01 mm.
Did they measure both mouthpieces to see the difference?
They sound even more like clarinet/string hybrids than the modern “classical sound” strives for. Perhaps the modern sound evolved out of a desire to /not/ sound so much like other woodwinds, considering the rather significant technical limits of a saxophone versus a clarinet. Also, volume — if you’re going to give up a great deal of range, you should get something in return. A wide conical bore offers power, something mouthpiece designs seem to have increasingly favored from the 1930s onward. As a side benefit, bright mouthpieces also typically make it easier to get into (but not necessarily to control) the altissimo range.