The Glissotar - played by Linsey Pollak

The inventor of The Glissotar, Dániel Váczi, contacted me 10 months ago asking if I would like to borrow a Glissotar and make a video of me playing it. Here is that video. I've not had many hours experience playing this instrument so cannot do justice to the incredible range of possibilities that it offers.
The Glissotar has a conical bore and a single reed (it can use a soprano sax mouthpiece). The unique development is that instead of tone holes it uses a longitudinal slot along the bore of the instrument. The two sides of that slot are covered with magnetic foil that attracts a magnetised ribbon on top. You can push down the ribbon anywhere along the bore and it will seal the slot perfectly, so you can produce any note in the pitch continuum. One needs to approach it quite differently to the way one would play a soprano sax for example.
- Linsey Pollak August 2024
for more information on the Glissotar: glissonic.com

[@pavelsurkov2853]

Thanks a lot. One of the few examples of melodic playing.

[@MrStarbit]

This type of instrument has been around since at least 1996 (probably a lot longer) where bart hopkin published it in his book "musical instrument design". It was part of a family of instruments he called the moe consisting of the moe sax, the moe flute and the moe mem.

[@DynamixWarePro]

This Glissotar basically is like a modern version of an old 1920s slide soprano saxophone which was a soprano saxophone with a long slit in it and you changed notes by putting your fingers on the leather strap that had holes in it. If you haven't seen it, look up "Unheard of Instruments in the Saxophone Family" by The United States Army Field Band and go to 7:11 on that video and you can see his King C slide soprano sax.

[@MrStarbit]

​@DynamixWarePro some other amazing instruments in that video as well I must say!

[@kjodwex]

Beautiful.

[@DonQuiKong]

What a beautiful location for the video.

[@Francois_Dupont]

right by the bread oven?

[@glissonic6830]

Beautiful, thank you for sharing!

[@jmkqfnvyl87]

Nice 😊

[@peterfuchs7822]

Thanks Linsey, nice sound . And how is that pizza oven going? Cheers

[@moonants]

need to make one - using fridge magnets...