Hello all!
I'm a woodwind instrument repair technician and I plan on using this blog to post pictures and information on various instruments that I restore throughout the restoration process. The first instrument I plan on chronicling here will be an EEb contrabass sarrusophone made by the Conn company. I have a contrabass sarrusophone pictured here so you have an idea of what the instruments looks like. It can played with a double reed, a single reed mouthpiece, or even a brass mouthpiece, though the double reed varient is the most popular. It is essentially a metal bassoon with a fingering system similar to the saxophone and was originally developed to replace the contrabassoon for outdoor military band situations where the wood contrabassoon could be easily damaged and wouldn't project as well as the other brass made instruments. The sarrusophone came in many sizes; Eb sopranino, Bb soprano, Eb alto, Bb tenor, Eb baritone, Bb bass, EEb contrabass, CC contrabass, and BBb contrabass, with the contrabass sizes being the most popular.
Pictures and updates of the sarrusophone to be restored coming in a few days.
-Scott
