Contrabass oboe Baroque composers. This apparently was an oboe-type instrument in the bassoon range. It had, nonetheless, a distinct tonal quality of its own. Richard Strauss states, in his edition of Hector Berlioz's "Treatise on Instrumentation", that its tone "...had not the slightest similarity with the low tones of the bassoon." Despite this distinction, the contrabass oboe never became popular or widely used, and few remain today. Contrabass oboe The contrabass oboe is a double reed woodwind instrument in the key of C or F, sounding two octaves or an octave and a fourth (respectively) lower than the standard oboe. Current research,
Wiener oboe played very expressively and blends well with other instruments." The Viennese oboe is (with the Viennese horn) perhaps the most distinctive member of the Vienna Philharmonic instrumentarium. The oboe in use in Vienna in the early and mid-19th century was originally a design called the Koch/Sellner oboe. In 1825 Viennese oboist and teacher Joseph Sellner wrote an oboe tutor ("Theoretische-praktische Oboeschule"), which included an illustrated fingering chart. The oboe associated with these materials was produced by Stefan Koch (1772–1828). This instrument was very well regarded in central Europe. In addition to a modernized mechanism with up to 13 keys, the