the.com/bassoon
The orchestra's awkward giant, hiding a velvet voice inside nine feet of folded plumbing.
means A large, low-pitched double-reed woodwind instrument whose long tube is bent back on itself, producing a rich, reedy bass voice in the orchestra.
from Borrowed from French 'basson,' which comes from Italian 'bassone' — literally 'big bass,' the suffix '-one' meaning 'large,' built on 'basso' (low), from Late Latin 'bassus' (low, short). So the name simply means 'the big low one,' a fitting tag for that folded giant. The Italians also called it 'fagotto' — 'bundle of sticks' — supposedly because the folded tubing resembled a bound faggot of firewood, which is why German keeps 'Fagott' to this day.
- Tube length
- Over eight feet of wood, bent in half
- Reed cost
- Players often carve their own to survive
- Famous solo
- Opens Stravinsky's riot-causing Rite of Spring
- Nickname
- The clown of the orchestra
- Key count
- Around two dozen keys to wrangle
hummel's bassoon concerto — composed 1805, one of the most performed classical bassoon concertos
jean-yves thibaudet bassoon — principal bassoon of berlin philharmonic since 2015, grammy winner
stravinsky rite of spring — opens with famous solo bassoon melody in 1913 paris premiere