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,
Reed (mouthpiece) After the cane is split, the pieces will be gouged in a gouging machine to remove many cane layers to drastically decrease the thickness. This eases the process of scraping for the reed-maker and helps to maintain sharper knives. Reed makers not only masterfully learn to make reeds, but also learn how to sharpen knives with great mastery. Finally, the gouged pieces of cane soaked and "shaped" on a shaper with razor blades and allowed to dry before the final steps. The shaped piece of cane is then re-soaked and tied onto a "staple" for oboe reeds and formed on