Last updated Mar 30, 2008 12:30 pm GMT-5

PVC Saxophone

This is a pretty simple instrument I threw together a few years back. The body is (duh) a hunk of PVC pipe. Glued into that is a plastic plumbing adapter; screwed into that is a little metal plumbing doo-hickey; shoved onto that (perfect fit!) is an alto sax mouthpiece I got at a music store. They're pretty cheap. Total cost was maybe $20?

I drilled some holes down the front and one thumb-hole down the back. I smoothed out the edges of the holes with a pocketknife and some sandpaper, so my fingers can fit over the holes nicely.

Tuning? Who cares about tuning? Seriously, I haven't the foggiest notion how you would make a predictable scale on a wind or reed instrument. So forget it! Carpe Diem!

What's it sound like?

Pretty much what you'd expect a plastic saxophone to sound like. It makes an appearance on the ARMS album, on the song "If You Didn't Have to Make Sense." It's more prominently featured on "Average Garbage Can Man," a song on the apparently discontinued MussMyHair Records Whoopskie compilation tape. Maybe I'll put a little sample of that up.

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