The Ganassi is a modern instrument based a medieval type of recorder. It differs from the more well-known Baroque style recorders in several ways. Baroque type instruments that are made today are generally in 3 sections that pull apart and the lower 2 finger holes have doubled holes; the Ganassi type is generally in two sections with no doubled finger holes. The Ganassi has a cylindrical bore and the Baroque style instruments have a conical bore (tapering in towards the bottom end). The Ganassi's bore has a flare at the bell which positions the high harmonics to allow for a larger register than many of the other medieval type recorders with typically small ranges. It is comparable with the Baroque instruments range of 2 and 1/2 octaves. The larger finger holes of the Ganassi are ideal for partial venting. This allows for rapid and slow crescendo and diminuendo of each note which cannot be done with the embouchure in recorders. This type of slide fingering for dynamic control can be a little more difficult to manage with the smaller holes of Baroque recorders. Also the Ganassi characteristically has a strong low register and a flexible more powerful sound than the Baroque type recorders.

The late recorder maker Fred Morgan researched and developed the Ganassi type in 1975. Frans Bruggen was the first to use his modern Ganassi type. Since then it has become a very successful recorder model, both for its use in a very specialist early repertoire and in the modern literature.

Fred Morgan was initially inspired by the capabilities of a recorder described in 1535 by Sylvestro Ganassi in Vienna in his book Opera Intitulata Fontegara - A Treatise on the Art of Playing the Recorder and of Free Ornamentation. Morgan began to search for a surviving medieval instrument that would play the fingerings described by Ganassi with a range of two and a half octaves. This led to the discovery of a recorder in a museum in Vienna that worked with similar fingerings. This instrument provided some good insight and the superficial exterior resemblance was used for the new Ganassi. Morgan based the bore dimensions on some experimentation that another recorder maker, Bob Marvin, from the United States had published. Importantly, these dimensions give the instrument its wide range. The Ganassi recorder was never meant to be a replica of a museum piece. I think of it as a contemporary instrument inspired by the possibilities of Ganassi's intriguing treatise which shows how to improvise ('make divisions'), lists various fingerings and also mentions the use of dynamics on a recorder type instrument.