It has been almost a month since I constructed a playable ceramic instrument but that doesn’t mean that I haven’t been thinking (and sketching) about it. For over a year, every instrument that I constructed was purely pinch-pot-handmade…and now I am discovering new possibilities with pieces and parts that are wheel thrown. Case in point: 
the two mugs pictured include horn-like appendages but they do not play, but the whimsy of MugPhlutes is still there, lurking just beneath the surface. These are more like steins than mugs, but they open the door for a musical instrument genre of semi-utilitarian sculptural pieces. These two were designed to rest either vertically (for function) but to appear more sculptural when setting horizontally.
To avoid breaking a record for consecutive months of instrument building, there shall be an ocarina forthcoming soon, even if it is very small…we can’t commit MugPhlute heresy, now can we?
Tags: mug, MugPhlute, stoneware, wheel-thrown
