Making a Saxophone Mouthpiece by Hand
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 12 ก.พ. 2022
- This video documents my first attempt at making a saxophone mouthpiece by hand from a solid piece of hard rubber.
Total construction time: 16 hours (over 2 days)
I filmed the entire process, which gave me quite a challenge to edit down 16 hours of raw footage to about 20 minutes.
No play testing was done during the sculpting process aside from the quick reed test you see in the video, and no modifications whatsoever were made to the piece after playing it for the first time. This is not the typical process for dialing in a mouthpiece but I wanted the additional challenge.
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Someone get this man a mini lathe, like ASAP! Cool project
I'm actually building a custom lathe specifically for mouthpieces, it'll appear on this channel at some point!
@@spencerbrodhead Look forward to seeing what you do with it!
I do declare you are a master craft man I'm very impressed with your skill
Wow thank you!
I think this is the most fascinating video I’ve ever seen on TH-cam and I understand my mouthpieces so much more. Thank you so much.
Wow thanks for saying that! I'm glad that people like seeing the process, also I'm planning on making another one within a week or so watch out for that
@@spencerbrodhead
Spencer, I have taken trash, unplayable mouthpieces for my soprano and supranino saxes and worked them into nice playing and sounding pieces. I work on the beak, table, and lay. Also adding a baffle with epoxy.
As I find what I like I want to make some pieces out of hard rubber like you have done. Where can we find rubber blanks?
@@terryhorlick9707 By blanks do you mean a roughly mouthpiece-shaped object that then needs hand finishing? If that's the case I'm not sure what to reccomend
@@spencerbrodhead, thanks for contacting me. To me a blank is a rough chunk of hard rubber. I would cut it to rough dimensions and turn it on my lathe. All the finish carving and smoothing is done by hand.
@@spencerbrodhead I mean a chunk of hard rubber larger than a mouthpiece (I’m working on soprano and sopranino mouthpieces, so not large) which I will work up into a new mouthpiece. I have transformed several old, unplayable mouthpieces into very nicely playing pieces by adding epoxy and carving to the desired specifications. Once I have established the lay, tip and baffle I like best I want to replicate it in hard rubber or brass.
Having been a dentist for over 30 years, precise carving isn’t a huge issue!
Wow, that was really fascinating and I learned a lot about mouthpieces. Thanks for doing this. What a beautiful piece you created!
Thanks!
Homie made a beautiful selmer concept
Very interesting! Never thought I'd see a video about this. Thank you for posting.
I am amazed how you are finding time to practice your saxophone.
Amazing sounding mouthpiece and amazing craftsmanship!
Thanks!
Beautiful mouthpiece and it performs excellently. Great job!
Wow. Great craftsmanship. Thx for this video!
Awesome video. The mouthpiece sounds rich in tone. I'm going to try this with a couple of messed up mouthpieces I have. Thanks for sharing your skill with us.
Another mouthpiece with a lovely sound!!! You are a great player too!!! It’s not only the mouthpiece
Great work. Brilliant video
Great video! John.
Fantastic! Thanks for this class!
Very impressed with your skills Brother . And love the sound to finished mouthpiece.
Great sounding mouthpiece! Beautifully crafted!
Thank you!
Nice !!!!!! Loved it ! Thank you!!!
Woah this is an amazing insight into the trade
Wow, that's an amazing craftmanship, I wish I could do that in my retirement. I have learned what's really important in a mouthpiece for it to function well. Thanks.
Really beautiful work,!!! I'm very impressed.....
Fascinating, thanks!
Congrats! the chamber design and geometry, while not "revolutionary", has some very clever modifications over the traditional pickle barrel shape. I make MPCs for myself too, and then kind of end up looking like that shape too.
A terrific video, a lot of skills and knowledge were brought to this project, evident by the piece sounding good when finished.
Thanks!
Solid work
Hmm….impressive work,and fantastic power sound,with perfect color balance and projection…thank you!
Thanks! Glad you like it
A beautiful saxophone sound.
Good job, man… and what a sweet sound it makes!!!. Bravo
Thanks!
Wonderful!!!
Awesome video!
beautiful work, just to look at it
Amazing!!… soo much effort with sooo much passion bravo👏🙏💕❤️🎷
Thank You!
Huge work with simple tools. Congrats. You are an artist!
Wow thank you!
fantastic job !!! thanks !!!!
I guess you've gotten a really good feel for baffle shapes from all that hand finishing work and a pro facing job goes a long way but it still blows my mind how good that piece sounds!
Thanks! I'm glad you like it, I was a bit surprised myself at the end result, I didn't really know what to expect before I started
@@spencerbrodhead I've been pretty curious to try my hand at designing 3d printable mouthpieces but I've struggled to find any books about it. I don't suppose you'd have any recommendations? Or is this the kind of thing that the masters keep to themselves?
@@EdBordin Yeah there aren't any books on mouthpiece design that I know of. The main tricky part about 3d printing your own mouthpieces is that a woodwind mouthpiece is an extremely complicated thing to properly 3d model, If you ever wanted to try that you'd first have to be very familiar with programs like solid works or fusion 360 (I use fusion) and get comfortable modeling and printing all sorts of various complexity shapes before trying a sax mouthpiece. So it's not impossible but designing and printing a mouthpiece that functions and plays well is way down the line of being able to 3d model shapes with all sorts of double compound curves and such. If you do try it I'd say that very careful measuring with digital calipers is a must!
@@spencerbrodhead thanks for the reply! Yeah that was what I suspected. I found some 2d cross sections of various chamber and baffle styles plus there's even some facing curves. The rest I'll have to just work out in 3d. I've been bunkered down with my calipers and a couple of mouthpieces and I've nearly got the table and beak done before the fun starts trying to cut the baffle 😂
Making a saxophone wood mouthpiece is very accurate.
Thank you for your efforts.
I'm also a saxophone mouthpiece handmade sculptor.
Very cool stuff!! I’m very impressed by your playing, craftsman’s skills and knowledge about the subject! Hands down!
Wow thank you!
Wonderful video.... The only one that showcase a mouthpiece being actually made and tested at the end.
Thanks!
awesome dude ,
INCREDIBLE!!!
Thanks!
Very nice!!!!
Woww
Very impressive work.
And very good playing!
Sounds good too.
What a craftsman you are..and saxophonist.
Thanks for sharing
My regards
Mario
Thank you!
Fantastic job! Next you need to try the same, only using Acetyl aka Delrin! It works a little differently, but machines like a dream. It has vibrational characteristics very much like rod rubber.
Thanks! It seems that you read my mind, I already have a block of Delrin that I'm going to make into another mouthpiece at some point soon.
Beautiful
Thanks!
Verry nice work ! i want one mouthpiece for me !
That was amazing. And it sounds great.
Thank you!
Amazing 👏👏👏
This video lesson is very good.
This is cool
Very nice good job👏👏👏
Very helpful thanks
Wonderfull...big Job...
really impressive work my best compliments !
Thank you!
Genius!!!!
i am not gonan lie, i clicked on this video without looking at anything but ur video, and at the end when i went to look at ur channel for more stuff i realized ur not a giant creator, from all the aspects u put into the video i genuinely thought u were a famous saxophone TH-camr i just so happened not to see before. good job on the whole video
Thanks for saying that, yep my channel is fairly new still, haven't posted too many videos in total
Belo trabalho 👏👏
Heroic!
Thanks!!
I wouldn't be equivocal about protecting the table and rails while working on the chamber. I even do that while buffing. No matter how many times I've adjusted a mouthpiece (decades), I always do this. That paint tape is great for this purpose. If you only have masking tape available, you can adhere a strip of it to your inner forearm, peel it off, and then put it on the table and rails. This reduces the adhesive tackiness and makes it easy to peel off with no residual adhesive. (Fine arts school trick.)
Great video.
Cool, yeah good tip. The blue tape I used here didn't leave any residue, peels off easy. For all the modern pieces I hand finish I never mask off the rails or table and I've never felt like I'm risking buffing those areas, I guess polishing thousands of times will build up some confidence haha, glad you liked the video!
Хороший саксофон и трость тоже😂😂😂
I enjoyed this video. I hope to more like this on your channel. I just subbed.
Thanks! I think I'll make another like this soon
cool
Yes, I agree with you about the potential problems with using wood. I chose Huon Pine because it limited those issues a fair bit. I have thought about making another one with a hard timber and using Tung Oil to seal it. Of course instruments such as Clarinets, Oboes and Bassoons are made of wood but I presume that the bodies, being a bit further away from the source of moisture, don't suffer quite as much as a MP would. Good luck with yours.
yep that's right, and grenadilla in clarinets/ oboes is a very hard wood
Huon would smell and taste so amazing too. I'd be so conscious of not wasting the tiniest amount though, especially when I think of how many hundred years of growth I just left on the workshop floor.
African Blackwood has no problem with saliva, whatsoever. That's why clarinets and oboes are made out of it.
I handmade Baritone Sax MP for myself a few years ago out of Huon Pine which is a beautiful timber, commonly used for boat building because of its natural oils and fine grain that gives it water resistant qualities. It is native to Tasmania Australia. I played it for a couple of years but ultimately decided the sound was a bit softer than I wanted.
Oh cool, actually I'm planning to make another one out of wood maybe this week or next week just for fun, although wood is not the best material for mouthpieces because of its response to moisture/ temperature/ cracking
🔥🔥🔥
Very impressive 🎷
Thanks!
Pretti cool!!! Does any body knows were to find rubber rods in Europe? Thanks
wow
Crazy！but I like it ！
Ist ja cool 💪🏽
Sensacional
Nice. I've been researching and experimenting with designing and 3D printing my own mouthpieces. I've been successful with getting a playable print, which I've uploaded to grabcad, but I'm still working out some design details that I'm not satisfied with. This is video is very enlightening, though.
thanks! yeah 3d printing is great for rapid prototyping, the main thing is to make sure the tables are flat from the print texture but (with a good facing) they can play really well
thats so cool looks like a selmer concept a bit
Thanks! yeah the shank does look like a selmer concept but that was just the easiest shape to make it, the internal geometry is totally different though
Awesome craftsmanship! That's why I never mess with my mouthpieces, if you don't know what you're doing, leave it to a professional.
Thanks!
Great to see you leverage your experience! Give me a call! Would love to catch up!
Amazing video! Where I can buy raw material like this?
We had had some correspondence quite some back concerning dimensions of mouthpieces and method of making these. One of the most difficult parts of the making process is the carving out or shaping of the interior of the mouthpiece. I have since our exchange made many mouthpiece of varying chamber sizes using just plain hand tools. I do not have video making equipment but could gladly send you a series of photos of each stage of the making process. I do not know if the Comments section would accept photos but I know that email would so if you so desire I could send you these on receipt of your email address.
Nice work! Try that with a rod of stainless 304. Takes a couple days longer.
haha thanks! yeah that sounds like a recipe for carpal tunnel, carving stainless steel by hand is the worst
Great work and good playing! 😃 I'd be interested, though: Were you happy with the sound and feeling of the piece when playtesting? Your thoughts on that?
Thanks! Yeah it plays well (much better than I was expecting), but my more recent wood one plays better, not because of the material, just the geometery is different
The shavings and sawdust can be used for other things such as a flea repellent for dogs for example. It should be respected for just how rare and exceptional it is and so nothing is wasted .
I'm not so sure about that, the dust I make is not sawdust it's hard rubber dust mixed with all sorts of other things like the grit from the sanding sponges and other buffing compounds, I would not reccomend putting that on a dog
🤩
Thanks so much for posting this, Spencer - the precision and professionalism at which you are working (and playing) is mindblowing. Fantastic job. One of my sax is a Yamaha Alto and they tend to produce a sound that is too soft for playing jazz (I guess because the lacquering is too thick) - would you give it a chance to modify the sound towards what you go out of your horn with the right mouthpiece or does it need another neck ... or none of the two - I do know that some professionals experiment a lot with their mouthpieces and get them custom-built; difficult to get one of these as a hobby musician. Thanks for your work : )
Thanks for the nice words! As for your yamaha I'm not sure what you're asking, for me to work on the mouthpiece? As far as the horn goes I seriously doubt that the laquer is causing you any issues
@@spencerbrodhead Thanks for your fast reply - and apologies if the question was not clear - I was just wondering whether a different mouthpiece or neck would be more efficient in changing the color of the tone. All the best for your new projects!
@@u2ontour192 Yeah no worries I enjoy answering questions about this stuff. The mouthpiece has the greatest effect for changing the tone and feel of the overall setup, so if you're having issues thats the first thing to change. As long as the neck on your yamaha isn't severly bent or damaged it's almost certainly fine. I play a 1980s yamaha 52 alto as my main and its great, most other yamaha's that are in working condition are very good horns. If the problem that you're having is not getting enough volume, than a jazz style mouthpiece with a larger tip opening would be the first thing to look for. Of course the main contributing factor in tone production is the player, so if there are embouchure issues no mouthpiece is really going to solve that. In my opinion, what contributes to the overall tone is: 80% player, 15% mouthpiece, 5% horn
congratulations on the work. In addition to being very beautiful, the sound was great. Out of curiosity, what compound did you use to polish? thanks in advance.
Thanks! I use Formax brand buffing compound, for hard rubber the first stage of polishing I would recommend the brown tripoli (or the black bar), and then the light blue bar for the final high gloss polish
BRAVO BRAVO BRAVO /
When I do the facing I always end up having a gap from the table going to the rails :(
Good job.
Nice craftsmanship.
Where can I buy hard rubber stick?
Could teach me please?
Thanks, if you google search "german hard rubber rod" you'll find some places to buy it online, depending on how much you need and what size
👏👍
how to order alto sax mouthpiece??? im from california
Me engana que eu gosto! tem uma chave que ele usa e vc pode perceber no finalzinho do vídeo,,, a chave é tipo pisto de trompete... na mão esquerda...
Nice, Do you sell them? I play a bit of tenor love dark sound
Thanks, yeah I'm planning to at some point!
I have 4 years of machine shop experience, 60 years of pro sax experience and would have no idea how to "make a mouthpiece." Baffle height seems to make the biggest difference to me. I believe higher means easy blowing and brighter?
Ah very cool! Yes baffle height is one of the most dramatic changes in mouthpiece design variables, what you said is true.
I currently play a Ponzol on my tenor, one of the very few he built with a moveable baffle, controlled by an allen wrench. I think I will "screw" with it today as a result of our communication. I have spoken on the phone with Peter Ponzol about the mouthpiece.@@spencerbrodhead
можно взять чуть большую по диаметру фрезу. И для камеры и для обработки клюва мундштука. Гораздо быстрее.
Como me gustaría aprender hacer las boquillas yo sería un gusto
How would you source a block (Or cylinder) of rubber? I feel like finding the rubber is a challenge on its own I wonder how hard finding a cylinder of rubber-like you have in the video is. I'm trying to do essentially what you've done here.
What is your experience working on mouthpieces?
@@spencerbrodhead I refaced my trash it came with the cheap 300$ soprano sax 3d printed mouthpiece into slightly less garbage of a mouthpiece. (I had to flatten the table and thin the rails and tip as well as fix some of the baffle. It's an entirely different mouthpiece now. If I'm trying to find a thing of rubber though I'd want it to be a little bigger (Tenor sax bigger)
@@016_ rawkrafted.com/nyh-ebonite-rod-germany-hard-rubber-black-by-the-inch/
you can find some here, although keep your expectations low for what you want to do, you are almost certainly not going to be successful diving into an expert level project like this after working on one mouthpiece, this was hard even for me. I would recomend buying some super cheap plastic mouthpieces and working on those as much as possible, that's going to be the best way to learn.
👏👏👏👏👌👍
Awesome work. You should start your own mouth piece company. Invest in a 3D Printer and build custom pieces. You could make your money back in no time and be into profit. Just a thought!👀
Yeah thanks, I've had a 3d printer for a few years now actually!
Amaing job done. I don't want to reduce all the editing and efforts of making it to the end cost, but how much is it worth it!? Considering you invest two complete days of work, besides the editing time etc
Glad you like the video! Yeah I was never planning to sell this piece, for that many hours into it that would have to be like a $1500 mouthpiece or something like that which is crazy, I'm currently designing new techniques and equipment that will let me make them by hand in a much more efficent way
Hey I really like this video of making Saxophone Mouthpiece. Do you have a contact info for potential customers? Or links ? Thanks again
Hi Fred, if you have any questions you can reach out at
spencermusic44@gmail.com
SOUNDS THICC
Quite fortuitously I came across your most interesting and informative video on making a mouthpiece by hand. You are for sure a super proficient craftsman as the excellent illustrations of the most beautiful mouthpieces pictured by you quite unequivocally prove. I live in a so called developing country and due to some sort of hatred for all things western, western music and instruments are considered taboo. Regardless, I have been actively engaged in the refurbishing of all woodwinds for some fifty three years and have been making mouthpieces by hand for some fifteen years. I have been searching and searching and searching for information related to the very large chamber, concave side walls , no baffle vintage type tenor mouthpieces. I was able to obtain a totally damaged Conn Eagle of the type I am interested but cannot measure the critical sizes due to the damage. I was able though to measure the bore size at 17mm, the chamber at 21mm. I would like to know just how the chamber tapers towards the tip end,if it does indeed taper. As a super professional craftsman you must surely be familiar with the dimensions so desperately needed by me to make a replica. I do not have video facilities but if interested I could gladly send you photos of the stages in making my mouthpieces if you would give me your email id. I shall be looking forward to a communication from you and hope that you will be able to help me out , wishing you the very best and thanking you.
Hi Vivian thanks so much for the kind words! As for the piece you mentioned, I don't have any experience with, so I'm not sure I can help you find those dimensions. Careful measurements with some calipers would be my only thought to find what kind of taper the chamber has. Maybe if you measure the chamber at both extreme ends of the taper and set the distances between those measurements relative to the tip of the mouthpiece, you might be able to calculate the amount of taper. Kind of the way I'm measuring my piece around 2:40 in the video. Not sure if that helps but It's the ony thing that comes to mind at the moment. You can DM me on instagram if need be (same name as the youtube channel)
@@spencerbrodhead Thank you Mr Spencer for your so prompt reply. Naturally I was disappointed by your not being able to provide the dimensions so desperately required. To make things easier for you, hopefully, I would be totally gratified to receive dimensions for any very large chamber tenor mouthpiece not necessarily those related to the Conn Eagle. I have written to all manufacturers the world over for the required information and though most have been kind enough to at least reply no one, but no one, but no one totally incredibly has the faintest idea of just what those dimensions could be or should be or are in fact. Just one kind person , the Syos Lady informed me that the chamber size is indeed 21 mm dia but understandably did not or could not reveal any more information as she is in the manufacturing business and the information sought means so much money for her.I regret giving the impression that I required the dimensions for the Conn Eagle. I would appreciate the dimensions for any vintage type very large chamber tenor mouthpiece. I assume that you are located in a first world country and I had this impression that just about any information would be just a key pad away but it seems that we over here are in just as bad a situation as far as trying to obtain information. The words I have used are not any sort of kind words but merely the most appropriate to describe your super craftsmanship judging from the jewel like pieces that you have worked on. I have given many mouthpiece builders across the world my technique for building the most advanced mouthpieces using nothing but hand tools and one builder has produced a video using my technique, though he has taken the liberty of using machine tools, If interested you could view the video titled Making a Clarinet Mouthpiece the Vivian Astridge way. Thank you and the very best to you, Sir.
@@vivianastridge2167 Yep I would agree with the information you already have, between 17-21 mm would be considered large chamber (larger than the bore), I can't think of any piece I've seen larger than 21 mm, If this is the case with the conn eagle I wouldn't know. Do you have this mouthpiece to measure?
@@spencerbrodhead Thank you Mr Spencer Brodhead for your continuing interest in the subject of the large chamber mouthpiece. Yes I do have the original ConnEagle large chamber tenor piece. Yes I have measured the chamber and it comes out as 21mm diameter. Syos confirms that this is the largest chamber possible and they do indeed make just such a piece. I had intended to purchase one such but the price would require me to go on a total fast for about four to six months. I have been for several years trying to obtain more dimensions of this Conn Eagle but no one is either interested or is willing to make the effort to help me. I have detailed dimensions for the Melody C model of the Conn Eagle and this has a chamber of 19.5mm diameter which dimension extends right up to the tip end. I am interested and in fact in dire need of a mouthpiece with the original dimensions which my piece does not have as it seems to have been tampered with both as to table angle, tip opening and facing. I have made many pieces according to my own design but who am I against Conn? I just cannot tolerate the harsh edgy sound of modern pieces as I am from a different generation having well past my ninth decade but as yet in some sort of playing form!
What would please me the most would be the dimensions of the original Adolphe Sax Tenor Mouthpiece. The patent drawing is nothing more than an artists impression and is useless for my purpose.The University of Connecticut has done some fantastic research into replicating the original saxophone mouthpiece and their effort and product may be viewed on TH-cam. But as with most knowledgeable sources UConn has no interest in pampering to some obscure nonagenarian in some shit hole country. To be precisely specific all that I require is the size of the circular chamber as it extends to the tip end. Also important would be the facing length and type and tip opening. It would seem strange indeed that having spent so much time, effort and money in researching Sax’s original tenor mouthpiece and in fact building and using several in all sizes UConn did not consider- it worthwhile to commercialize on their work not did they make public their design though the related video has many views of the mouthpieces from different angles and of course a brilliant demonstration using replica mouthpieces on original saxophones in a quartet. Thank you again, Sir for your reply and all the very best to you.
@@spencerbrodhead I had written to Dr Caravan requesting information related to the original Sax mouthpiece that his current models are based on. He kindly replied that he did not have any information and yet confirmed that his current models are indeed based upon the design of the original Sax mouthpiece. If you could kindly help me out by providing a contact email to the University of Connecticut and the Manhattan College I could address my enquiries directly to these institutions as they have the original Sax mouthpieces from which they have derived their replicas. I am providing my email id so please do try and help me out or direct me to some source or person who could provide the information required. Wishing you the very best and thanking you. vivianastridge@gmail.com