Archives and past articles from the Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News, and Philly. The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor clefs, and occasionally the treble. Vista Remote Desktop Can T Connect there. YAM-CLP340.jpg' alt='Yamaha Piano Serial Numbers Beginning With B' title='Yamaha Piano Serial Numbers Beginning With B' />Bassoon Wikipedia. The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor clefs, and occasionally the treble. Appearing in its modern form in the 1. The bassoon is a non transposing instrument known for its distinctive tone colour, wide range, variety of character and agility. Listeners often compare its warm, dark, reedy timbre to that of a male baritone voice. Someone who plays the bassoon is called a bassoonist. EtymologyeditThe word bassoon comes from French basson and from Italian bassone basso with the augmentative suffix one. However, the Italian name for the same instrument is fagotto and in Spanish it is fagot. Fagot is a germanic word which means bundle of sticks. P/B0007RJAXE.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg' alt='Yamaha Piano Serial Numbers Beginning With B' title='Yamaha Piano Serial Numbers Beginning With B' />A1 B1C5 D5G5The range of the bassoon begins at B1 the first one below the bass staff and extends upward over three octaves, roughly to the G above the treble staff G5. Higher notes are possible but difficult to produce, and rarely called for orchestral and concert band parts rarely go higher than C5 or D5. Even Stravinskys famously difficult opening solo in The Rite of Spring only ascends to D5. A1 is possible with a special extension to the instrumentsee Extended techniques below. ConstructioneditThe bassoon disassembles into six main pieces, including the reed. The bell 6, extending upward the bass joint or long joint 5, connecting the bell and the boot the boot or butt 4, at the bottom of the instrument and folding over on itself the wing joint or tenor joint 3, which extends from boot to bocal and the bocal or crook 2, a crooked metal tube that attaches the wing joint to a reed 1  listen helpinfo. Bassoons are double reed instruments like the oboe. A modern beginners bassoon is generally made of maple, with medium hardness types such as sycamore maple and sugar maple preferred. Less expensive models are also made of materials such as polypropylene and ebonite, primarily for student and outdoor use metal bassoons were made in the past but have not been produced by any major manufacturer since 1. The bore of the bassoon is conical, like that of the oboe and the saxophone, and the two adjoining bores of the boot joint are connected at the bottom of the instrument with a U shaped metal connector. Both bore and tone holes are precision machined, and each instrument is finished by hand for proper tuning. The walls of the bassoon are thicker at various points along the bore here, the tone holes are drilled at an angle to the axis of the bore, which reduces the distance between the holes on the exterior. This ensures coverage by the fingers of the average adult hand. Wooden instruments are lined with hard rubber along the interior of the wing and boot joints to prevent damage from moisture wooden instruments are also stained and varnished. The end of the bell is usually fitted with a ring, either of metal, plastic or ivory. The joints between sections consist of a tenon fitting into a socket the tenons are wrapped in either cork or string as a seal against air leaks. The bocal connects the reed to the rest of the instrument and is inserted into a socket at the top of the wing joint. Bocals come in many different lengths and styles, depending on the desired tuning and playing characteristics. Folded upon itself, the bassoon stands 1. Playing is facilitated by doubling the tube back on itself and by closing the distance between the widely spaced holes with a complex system of key work, which extends throughout nearly the entire length of the instrument. There are also short reach bassoons made for the benefit of young or petite players. DevelopmenteditEarly historyeditMusic historians generally consider the dulcian to be the forerunner of the modern bassoon,5 as the two instruments share many characteristics a double reed fitted to a metal crook, obliquely drilled tone holes and a conical bore that doubles back on itself. The origins of the dulcian are obscure, but by the mid 1. A full consort of dulcians was a rarity its primary function seems to have been to provide the bass in the typical wind band of the time, either loud shawms or soft recorders, indicating a remarkable ability to vary dynamics to suit the need. Otherwise, dulcian technique was rather primitive, with eight finger holes and two keys, indicating that it could play in only a limited number of key signatures. The dulcian came to be known as fagotto in Italy. However, the usual etymology that equates fagotto with bundle of sticks is somewhat misleading, as the latter term did not come into general use until later. Some think it may resemble the Roman Fasces, a standard of bound sticks with an ax. A further discrepancy lies in the fact that the dulcian was carved out of a single block of woodin other words, a single stick and not a bundle. Circumstantial evidence indicates that the baroque bassoon was a newly invented instrument, rather than a simple modification of the old dulcian. The dulcian was not immediately supplanted, but continued to be used well into the 1. Bach and others. The man most likely responsible for developing the true bassoon was Martin Hotteterre d. Some historians believe that sometime in the 1. Hotteterre conceived the bassoon in four sections bell, bass joint, boot and wing joint, an arrangement that allowed greater accuracy in machining the bore compared to the one piece dulcian. He also extended the compass down to B by adding two keys. An alternate view maintains Hotteterre was one of several craftsmen responsible for the development of the early bassoon. These may have included additional members of the Hotteterre family, as well as other French makers active around the same time. No original French bassoon from this period survives, but if it did, it would most likely resemble the earliest extant bassoons of Johann Christoph Denner and Richard Haka from the 1. Sometime around 1. G was added, and it was for this type of instrument that composers such as Antonio Vivaldi, Bach, and Georg Philipp Telemann wrote their demanding music. A fifth key, for the low E, was added during the first half of the 1. Notable makers of the 4 key and 5 key baroque bassoon include J. H. Eichentopf c. J. Poerschmann 1. Thomas Stanesby, Jr. G. H. Scherer 1. Prudent Thieriot 1. Modern historyeditIncreasing demands on capabilities of instruments and players in the 1. Increased sophistication, both in manufacturing techniques and acoustical knowledge, made possible great improvements in the instruments playability. The modern bassoon exists in two distinct primary forms, the Buffet system and the Heckel system. Most of the world plays the Heckel system, while the Buffet system is primarily played in France, Belgium, and parts of Latin America. A number of other types of bassoons have been constructed by various instrument makers, such as the rare Galandronome. Heckel German systemeditHeckel system bassoon from 1. The design of the modern bassoon owes a great deal to the performer, teacher, and composer Carl Almenrder. Assisted by the German acoustic researcher Gottfried Weber, he developed the 1. Almenrders improvements to the bassoon began with an 1. Subsequent articles further developed his ideas. His employment at Schott gave him the freedom to construct and test instruments according to these new designs, and he published the results in Caecilia, Schotts house journal.