"The oboe is made of wood, like the clarinet, but is slightly smaller and it doesn't have a mouthpiece. In the end of the oboe you will find an interesting looking wooden reed. It is actually two pieces of wood wrapped together. (If you look at the bottom end of the reed and you can see the tread that is wrapped around the two pieces of the reed to hold it together.)"

"I'm told," said the piano, "that it takes a lot of practice to blow through that small double-reed and make it sound good."

"The oboe has another cousin that also has a double-reed but is a little larger. This instrument is called the English horn."

"Little Violin, listen carefully to the oboe. She is a VERY important instrument. Frequently she gets to play solo passages, but even before that she helps the orchestra tune. Before the orchestra plays its first piece, all the instruments get quiet and the oboe plays a note. Then family by family the other instruments play along on the same pitch. If their pitch doesn't match the oboe, they make slight changes to the tension of their strings or the length of their tubes to make sure the pitches do match. Then when all the instruments play, they will sound good together."