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Woodwinds · reed
Oboe
Learn the Oboe with a teacher who plays it. Most people are playing a tune they recognise in about 6 weeks, at 20 minutes a day.
A♯3-G6 · about 2.8 octaves
Oboe teachers
Nobody is listed for the Oboe just yet. Have a look at the other instruments, or come back soon: teachers join every week.
Browse all instrumentsHow a Oboe makes sound
Hover to watch it, tap to hear it
A Oboe sounds because a thin reed buzzes against the mouthpiece and sets a column of air vibrating. Your breath decides how loud, your fingers decide how long the column is, and the reed decides whether today is a good day.
A Oboe note lasts as long as you keep feeding it. You control the middle of every note, not only its beginning.
- Overtones you can hear
- 8
- Loudest overtone
- ×2
- Speaks in
- 35 ms
What learning the Oboe actually looks like
At 20 minutes a day. Short and daily beats long and occasional. That is not encouragement, it is one of the most replicated findings in how people learn physical skills.
Week one
You make a sound on purpose. It will not be a good sound. Everyone’s first one is bad, including your teacher’s.
About 6 weeks in
You play something another person can recognise. This is the moment most people say it stopped feeling like homework.
Around six months
You choose the next piece yourself, and you can hear what needs work without being told. The plateau usually lands somewhere near here. It is normal, it passes, and it is why having a teacher matters more now than it did in month one.
A year
You play with other people. That is the point of the whole thing, and it arrives sooner than almost anyone expects.
The honest specification
- Getting started
- ●●●●●
- The first month
- The messy middle
- ●●●●●
- Months three to nine, roughly
- How far it goes
- ●●●●●
- If you keep at it for years
- Can start from
- age 10
- Chords
- One note at a time
- Portable
- Fits on a bus
- Tuning
- You tune it before you play
- Practice volume
- 88 dB
- About as loud as conversation in a busy room.
- Recommended practice
- 20 minutes a day
