Musette (oboe)

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Musette from 1834

A musette or Piccolooboe is on D, Eb, F, or G-tuned version of the oboe . It is a little shorter than a normal oboe, and its tuning is correspondingly higher.

description

The musette was a fashion instrument of the Baroque era and at that time existed in versions tuned to D and Eb, which were mainly made in Paris . Later the musette was largely forgotten, but in the 19th century a version tuned in G was made, which was used by the conductor Louis Antoine Jullien in his orchestra to imitate the sound of Scottish bagpipes. The Paris oboe maker Frédéric Triébert attempted to reintroduce the older E-flat musette in the 19th century, but was unsuccessful. In 1931, the Wilhelm Heckel company briefly produced a musette in Germany.

In the second half of the 20th century, interest in the musette increased again. It has been played by oboists Lothar Faber and Ernest Rombout , and modern composers such as Paolo Renosto and Bruno Maderna have used it in some of their works.

The musette is also used again in special orchestras for double reed instruments (Bandes de Hautbois).

Contemporary oboe manufacturers who also make musettes are F. Lorée and Marigaux from France (tuned in F) and Fratelli Patricola from Italy (tuned in E flat).

literature

Web links

  • Francis Firth: Small Oboes . Contrabass Digest Vol. 4, No. 123 (Mailing List) - Description of various Musette variants including literature references (accessed January 15, 2010)