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Comment by mauvehaus | Hacker News Reader

This seems like a lot of effort to go to to avoid buying a trombone.

(Former HS trombone player. Go ahead with the jokes, I love them because I've lived them)

There have been a couple types of slide saxes made but for whatever reason they haven't really caught on..

This one has keys that are actuated by the slide: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJU9Rm-KviI (The last third of the video has a narrative in French describing the instrument, photobombed by a set of four serpents hanging on the wall behind the speaker. A serpent is a instrument that is sort of the opposite of a slide sax: it combines a brass-style mouthpiece with woodwind-like fingerholes).

This one looks mechanically simpler but it's not conical bore like a real saxophone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjnrM3GZMS8

The infinitone appears to be more like a dynamically scaled instrument, unlike the trombone, which is influenced by electronic instruments such as the Kaossilator and Cosmovox.

Playing a trombone usually does not mean playing microtones in tune.

Imagine a greater-than-twelve-tone chromatic scale.

Or go listen to some Harry Partch. Partch's compositions sound to me more like gamelan than someone noodling on a trombone.

https://www.harrypartch.com/bio

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQGvmaH-ce0

Partch is a good recommendation -- with a fairly large focus on microtonal percussion -- but you do dismiss the trained trombonists who actually train and perform microtonal works. It isn't necessary to disparage a viable microtonal instrument to make your point.

As a current semi-pro trombonist, I had the same reaction.

Relevant aside: Alan Kaplan has been recording Jacob Collier transcriptions for his YouTube channel. Check out “Moon River”.

As soon as I got a few lines in I was like,

"So, a trombone... with extra steps"

(Also if you want to slide, any fretless instrument is good! )

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