Beware the rental oboe.
Despite great efforts on our behalf by our wonderful teacher, we continue to have issues with the oboe on an almost daily basis.
This is oboe #2. We switched soon after starting private instruction – after playing oboe #1, our teacher started shaking his head and going “oh dear….”
Oboe #2 is a Winston 210 which had seen a lot of use. It has a left-hand F key which Opie is using to good effect.
Our teacher has sanded most of the pads, replaced some cork, added tape to the joint, and adjusted the screws every week. But the oboe continues to rebel. And it’s so hard isolate the problem when you are a beginning player (Opie) or don’t know anything about the oboe (me). Is the problem is the oboe, as Opie thinks? Or is it the reed, or the player? I alternate my thoughts between these two, and also start checking out new oboe prices – but would that actually fix anything? I’m still unsure.
Today I recorded Opie playing some of her pieces including the problems she was having with notes not coming out, in hopes that it will help our weekly diagnosis sessions.
In the meantime, we often amuse ourselves reading about other people’s challenges with oboes.
This blog entry is a favorite:
http://www.proneoboe.com/2013/10/the-oboe-is-not-your-friend.html
And we love this video for the title alone: “Why would anyone want to play the oboe?”
