PASIC 2003
Select your interest:
Page One: Health and Wellness; playing posture.
Page Two: Best of Show.
Page Three: New developments in mallet instruments.
Page Four: Miscellaneous instrument photos.
MalletJack
With all our attention to great instruments, great repertoire, and great players, more mundane accessories can get lost in the bunch. But this device is really important.
If you're a teacher with students of various heights, or if you work at an institution with students of various heights, you're cheating them--and most likely injuring them, too--if you don't provide them with an effective way to adjust the instruments to their own bodies. As the previous page demonstrated, there is no such thing as successful compensation for improper instrument height. The instrument must be raised or lowered to match the player. Wood blocks are too primitive and don't provide fine enough control. And adjustable height instruments often don't go high enough and/or are such a pain to adjust that their heights are generally set and forgotten.
The MalletJack addresses all these issues. Its range is from zero to ten inches. Its hand cranks with handy measuring indications are easy and quick to use. Handles are intelligently placed. The plastic parts are black all the way through, to hide scuffs. The fact that the MalletJack also protects instruments to some extent from damage in transit is a small plus as well.
The cost is a little under one-thousand dollars. That's reasonable given the materials and the construction costs.
I met the guys who build this thing. They're friendly, accessible, and from what I can tell highly conscientious. (Please email me your experiences on this.) Please note that I'm not an endorser in any way. I've been paid nothing to say this, and I've had no conversations with anyone about putting up this page. I'm just expressing my own thoughts here.
You can contact the MalletJack people via their website, www.malletjack.com.
Now it's on to:
Page Three: New developments in mallet instruments.