Sound production on a "coaxial saxophone".

Sound production on a "coaxial saxophone" is investigated experimentally. The coaxial saxophone is a variant of the cylindrical saxophone made up of two tubes mounted in parallel, which can be seen as a low-frequency analogy of a truncated conical resonator with a mouthpiece. Initially developed for the purposes of theoretical analysis, an experimental verification of the analogy between conical and cylindrical saxophones has never been reported. The present paper explains why the volume of the cylindrical saxophone mouthpiece limits the achievement of a good playability. To limit the mouthpiece volume, a coaxial alignment of pipes is proposed and a prototype of coaxial saxophone is built. An impedance model of coaxial resonator is proposed and validated by comparison with experimental data. Sound production is also studied through experiments with a blowing machine. The playability of the prototype is then assessed and proven for several values of the blowing pressure, of the embouchure parameter, and of the instrument's geometrical parameters.