And the winner is . . .

After much deliberation, headache, heartache, confusion, elation, frustration, and hopefulness I have made up my mind regarding my instrument debate.

I have picked the hautbois, better known as the oboe.

It goes against all of my logical thinking, but in the end I decided to go with my heart on this one. And my heart has been a pretty loud and steady champion of the oboe all along. Someone had mentioned passion to me along the way. I brushed it aside at first because the whole passion thing has NOT helped me at all in making up my mind about my career.

However in this case, I think I did make the choice with my heart and not my mind; I have followed my passion. While I do enjoy the clarinet it has not managed to make tears stream from my eyes at the sound of the first note.

This is a tremendous undertaking for someone as "old" as me. (Trust me on this one, those cats in the orchestras all started while their age was still a single digit number.) But for once I am confident that I have made the correct decision. And this is so important to me that I will not allow anything to interfere with it. Maybe that is why this decision had to come before the career one. Maybe that's why the career one just hasn't worked out yet. With this one out of the way (one week before school starts up again - how convenient!) I should hopefully have some brain power to attack the career one. And I think that I have picked up some skills that may prove useful with further decision making.

History of the decision:
Summer 2004: I hear "The Swan of Tuonela" (Sibelius) on the radio and fall in LOVE with the sound immediately. I discover it's an English horn, which is a big oboe. I have no idea at that point what an oboe sounds or looks like.
Fall 2004: My desire to actually play Classical and not just listen to it comes back REALLY strong. I pick up the clarinet I bought a couple of years ago and start to make squeaks, I mean sounds, on it. I go to a friend for pointers and he helps me some.
Late November: I set up trial clarinet lesson.
Dec. 9, 2004: On a whim, I decide to rent an oboe and give it a chance.
Dec. 11, 2004: Trial lesson on clarinet. Goes VERY well. Teacher is great and super friendly and says I sound like I've been playing for months. I am so encouraged I almost cancel my upcoming trial oboe lesson.
Dec. 15, 2004: Trial oboe lesson. I went in able to produce maybe 3 notes. Teacher is a bit serious and I'm not sure I will work well with him nor the instrument.
Dec. 16 through Jan. 09: Go back and forth on the oboe/clarinet debate 100000000 times.
Last Monday 1/10: Paquito's clarinet playing was inspirational to me throughout the concert. I was about to throw the towel on the oboe. But once the YOA came on stage and I heard the oboes I was mesmerized by them and started at the two oboists for the remainder of the concert.
Last Tuesday 1/11: Determined to finalize my decision before I went crazy, I decided to write an email to my clarinet teacher (the one I had a trial lesson with). After writing furiously and in a stressed fashion for 3 hours I came up with the email below. The clear winner appears to be the clarinet. But as soon as I hit the send button, I thought to myself "Ok, I am going to be an oboist". Isn't that weird? Though I could rationalize it on paper why the clarinet was the best choice it didn't make up for the joy I felt at playing my little "ducky" sounding oboe. Or for the joy I feel when I listen to orchestral music and the oboes or english horns come out to the forefront. Or my fanciful daydreams where I place myself in the middle of the orchestra and imagine me playing those parts. So indeed passion has won. Maybe this is a new chapter for me. Prior to this I think I've only made one other decision based on passion. :-)

My only regret is not having started this 10 years ago. Or 20 years ago. But as I mentioned above, I am alive and healthy. And this is a noble undertaking that I am very happy about and with God's blessing it will turn out well.

Here is the meat of my email to the clarinet teacher. I think writing this was cathartic experience. Somehow it helped me sort out all my thoughts and feelings.


Anyway, I write to you because I need some help in making my oboe vs. clarinet decision. This whole debate started in that I wanted to play orchestral music. I've loved Classical music all my life but for a variety of reasons I didn't get involved with formal instrumental lessons until I was out of college (I was a Music major at Columbia). By then I had figured I was already too old to ever get good enough to play in an orchestra so I picked the saxophone with hopes that I could play at least merengue.

However over the years my desire to play in an orchestra never waned and so I decided to revisit the concept. I figured that even at age 30 if I try hard enough I could get to that level some day. Certainly I won't be playing for the NY Philharmonic, but there are many amateur orchestras in this area. Since I have some woodwind background (though it's on sax) it seemed logical to stay within the same family. The clarinet seemed like the logical choice and that's why I purchased an instrument about a year ago. I tried to play it at home a bit and it didn't go very well so I didn't pick it up again for months.

Over the summer of 2004, while studying for a Physics final, I heard a haunting piece on the radio. It was Sibelius' "Swan of Tuonela". Never in my life had I heard a more beautiful sound. After doing research on the web I found out that the sound came from an English horn. So that's where the whole oboe thing emerged from. Prior to that I had never really enjoyed the sound of the oboe because I had only heard it in the context of Baroque music. But after hearing the English Horn I fell in love with it and thought that maybe I should play oboe instead. That was the beginning of the oboe/clarinet debate.

Since last seeing you I signed up for 4 trial oboe lessons at a school in Westchester. I'm playing on a rented instrument through the end of February. The first lesson was quite difficult but by the second one the teacher was impressed with how much better my sound and intonation had become. So I'm guessing that either instrument would be of similar difficulty for me.


Here are some of the things I've been thinking about and need some opinions on:

Sound: While I adore the sound of the English Horn (EH) above all other instruments, the smaller oboe is not as beautiful to me. I would say I definitely like the clarinet sound better than the regular oboe. But then again my oboe sound is still quite atrocious. This issue of sound is what is confusing my decision the most. A lot of my other concerns are more clear cut one way or another. I've spoken to some people who say that if it's the EH sound that I love that that's what I should play, but sound is not my only concern. My problem is that I love the sound of many instruments. I definitely love the clarinet sound as well. And I love the cello and piano sounds too. As well as the bassoon, french horn, and trombone. If I were to play every sound I love I'd be bad at all instruments! I need to focus on one.

Fingering Technique: I may have mentioned to you during our lesson that what was frustrating me about the clarinet were the open holes. I was getting SO many squeaks that I wanted to just cry. The oboe fingerings are much more comfortable for me so in that respect the oboe is more favorable. Another thing I've heard is that while the oboe is very difficult to produce a nice sound in, the parts written for oboe are not all that hard technically and that the clarinet parts are second only to the violin in their difficulty. Certainly the clarinet has a much bigger range. And since it is easier to get a satisfying sound on it I would imagine that the parts are indeed more difficult. Could you verify this for me?

Competition: Some days I think I just want to play whatever would make it easiest for me to get into a group. Sometimes I am afraid of the clarinet because it seems that sooooo many people play it and that I would have way more competition to deal with. Whereas most people run away from the oboe so maybe even if I am only decent, I might actually get picked due to need. What is your opinion on this? Am I going to have to be SUPER good to play anywhere as a clarinetist. I'm sure this is definitely the case for concertos. But how about just for regular ensemble playing? Will it be easier for me to get a spot as a oboist? Or am I going to have to be SUPER good regardless?

Repertoire: The oboe teacher was talking about how the oboe is so great because there's all this Baroque repertoire for it that isn't available for clarinet since the clarinet was invented later. I guess that comment could go either way. It's not that I don't like Bach and his contemporaries. I think the music is nice to listen to but I don't feel overly compelled to play it. My favorite era is definitely Romantic, with Classical as a second. So in terms of repertoire I think the clarinet is the winner (with the exception of some Romantic EH pieces like the Sibelius I mentioned above).

Reeds: Oboe reeds are an absolute nightmare to deal with. I'd heard all about it but didn't really appreciate it until I started trying to play. I sound completely different based on what reed I'm on. Some reeds don't respond in the higher register. Others make it difficult to stay in tune. I already cracked a reed lengthwise! Now I understand why everyone starts making their own reeds. But do I want to be spending time doing that? I'd rather be playing! I've watched some concerts on TV and observed how even professional oboists are frantically working on their reeds even in the middle of a performance. Though they always end up sounding beautiful once they come in, I'm not sure I want to deal with that kind of stress. Clarinet reeds come from a box even if only a couple of them turn out good. Clarinet is the definite winner here.

Embouchure/Breathing: The oboe embouchure takes some getting used to. Also, one can get light-headed if one doesn't let air out of the lungs frequently. I don't have that breathing problem on the clarinet. And while the embouchure is not exactly the same as a sax one, it's a bit similar. Clarinet wins here too.

Sax doubling: It seems that if I wanted to continue to play sax in the future the clarinet would be a more natural primary instrument.

Versatility: Clarinet wins hands down here. I could play many other types of music as a clarinetist: big band, latin jazz, klezmer, banda, etc. Just last night I went to the Paquito D'Rivera concert in carnegie hall and he played his clarinet on several pieces. Though one could also argue that if I wanted to play those types of musics I could just take out my saxophone.

Upkeep (Time and Money): An intermediate oboe is more expensive than an intermediate clarinet. Also the reeds are a lot more expensive and you go through them faster. I feel that the oboe will be more demanding of my time as well. I'm not implying that the clarinet is easy but it seems less jealous of your time. I put my oboe down for three days after I got sick and when I picked it up again I felt like I was starting over. I picked up my clarinet after not playing for a week, and I was able to go right back to where I was within minutes. Considering that I may be going to graduate school for the next few years (and maybe even starting a family during that time), is one instrument more convenient than the other in terms of practice time and money spent on its upkeep? I feel like the clarinet may have a slight edge here. If my practice time will be limited by other real world concerns, does it even make sense to try to pick up what is considered one of the hardest instruments (oboe)? However, it almost seems that maybe the oboe is very difficult to start on but then levels off whereas the clarinet is relatively easy to start on but becomes harder to keep up with as you advance. Like I feel that it will take you way longer to become an intermediate oboist than an intermediate clarinetist because of the issues with the sound, reeds, intonation and embouchure. However it would take you longer to go from intermediate to advanced on the clarinet than on the oboe due to technique. Is that true?

Solo vs ensemble: For some reason I am really afraid of solos and being in the spotlight. My biggest musical joy comes from being part of a group. I enjoy playing a smaller part that blends into something bigger. I've never liked to be the showcase. That's part of why I stopped playing sax. There was all this pressure to learn to improvise and do those solos and I was mentally blocked about it. Maybe it was just a confidence thing and once I'm good enough I'd lose the fear. It seems to me that as an oboist I'd have to come to the forefront of the orchestra more often than as a clarinetist. Is this true? Also English horn parts are not all that common in orchestral music. There are many concerto type pieces where the instrument is in the forefront. But in regular symphonies I would think that these players would be playing an oboe not an EH. Am I correct in this assumption? Or are there players out there who play ONLY the EH?

I have no idea what the orchestral world is really like which makes these issues hard for me to decide on. I am sure that getting good at any instrument will bring me infinite satisfaction. But I just don't want to look back from that point and say "Oh darn I should have taken up the other one instead".

Any advice would be very helpful to me!