The sound of one hand saxing

August 15, 2016 4:07 PM

Neill Duncan is a jazz saxophone player who lost an arm in 2012. He now plays a saxophone designed for one-handed players by Maarten Visser. Two of Visser's designs for tenor and soprano saxophones won this year's One Handed Musical Instrument Trust instrument competition. But Duncan isn't the only player using one, Visser isn't the only one designing them, and saxophones aren't the only instruments adapted for one-handed players.

Emmett Chapman was also recognized in the OHMI's playable category this year (the other categories are concepts and enabling apparatus) for his Chapman Stick (previously).

The design of the saxophone played by Duncan is different than one played by Dr. David McNabb, Professor of Woodwinds at University of Nebraska Kearney, who lost the use of an arm due to a stroke. He plays a "toggle-key" design he developed in conjunction with Stelling Brass and Winds.

In a presentation to the World Saxophone Congress XIII in 2003 (pdf) McNabb and Stelling explain the toggle-key system in detail.

Daniel Stover is a music teacher who also uses the toggle-key design on his converted 1976 Selmer Mark VII alto saxophone.

posted by mandolin conspiracy (5 comments total)

and saxophones aren't the only instruments adapted for one-handed players.

There's a guy named Bill Clements who kills on electric bass with one arm
posted by thelonius at 4:52 PM on August 15, 2016

I used to see Rahsaan Roland Kirk whenever I had to opportunity. (Guy could play four saxes at once, so, unfortunately, he got treated as a novelty act a little too much, but, oh well.)

He had a stroke. So when I heard he was back on stage, I went to hear him play, and he sounded good as ever. Couldn't see him well because on an obstructed view of the stage. Turned out he was playing with one hand, one side of his mouth, etc. He still played incredibly...yeah, he'd had his sax re-rigged somehow, but he would do shit like that anyway. What a musician.
posted by kozad at 5:51 PM on August 15, 2016

Gah that's so cool. Saxophones are a lot more complicated machines than most people realize (mostly because musical notes aren't as evenly spaced as people generally think, and overtones are a bitch y'all). I have to bookmark that PDF to come back to later, preferably while looking at my own horn so it's even more awesome.

Also, if a one-armed guy can wail like that, what's my excuse? Other than shared row home walls
posted by supercres at 8:47 PM on August 15, 2016

This is timely for me. My ten-year-old has just decided to try the violin, but for anatomical reasons will need to bow with the left hand and finger with the right. Reflected violins are a thing that exists, but there's not a middle-school-rental market for them.
posted by fantabulous timewaster at 11:01 PM on August 15, 2016 [1 favorite]

I imagine one-handed saxophone would be trickier than one-handed drumming, but any discussion of one-handed musicians makes me think of MOULTY!
posted by Fuzzy Monster at 9:43 AM on August 16, 2016