es are all possible for an oboe player. A modern day oboe player is Joseph Robinson who plays in the New York Philharmonic. The English horn is a double reed woodwind instrument. It has a range of an E to an A 2 octaves above middle C. The English horn is built in the key of F. Near the end of the eighteenth century the English horn came about from the “hunting oboe”. Despite its name the English horn is not at all English. This happened most likely due to a mistranslation of the french. The Vienna classicists rarely used the English horn, but it gained general acceptance with Berlioz and Wagner. A Modern English Horn’s timbre is clearly distinguishable from the lighter timbre of the oboe. The instrument originally had an angular shape, but the straight form took over quickly. It is larger then an oboe, the mouthpiece is extended with a slightly bent metal crook that holds the reed. An English horn reed is thicker then an oboe, and there is a greater stream of air required. The third oboist of the orchestra usually plays the English horn. It’s a transposing instrument whose part in the score is written a fifth higher then it sounds. So when an oboist switches to an English horn, the fingering corresponds to the notes on the page, as it does on the oboe, but the notes are actually produced are a fifth lower. A modern day English horn player is Thomas Stacy who plays in the New York Philharmonic. The bassoon is a double reed woodwind instrument. It has a range of a B flat 2 octaves bellow middle C in bass clef to E flat two octaves above middle C in treble clef. The bassoon is built in the key of C an octave lower then the oboe. The bassoon has a 9’6’’ long, conical bore which curves around a “U” tube at the bottom and goes back up. The top of the instrument projects above the players’ head; to project the sound up out of the orchestra. The bassoon is a rel...
