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Woodwinds
The modern symphony orchestra contains four distinct families of woodwind instruments: Flutes, Oboes (incuding its close relative, the English horn), Clarinets, and Bassoons.
Classification
Taken together, the woodwinds are a motley group of instruments, and the term is almost a misnomer. Not all are made of wood; flutes and saxophones are usually made of metal. Sound generation is also different among these instruments: Flutes are "edge-tone" instruments, with the player blowing air against against a sharp edge to produce air vibrations in the pipe, whereas clarinets, saxophones, oboes, and bassoons are "reed" instruments, with the player blowing against a thin "tongue" of cane wood to produce air vibrations. And reed instruments can be either "single-reed," in which the reed beats against a solid surface, as in the saxophones and clarinets, or "double-reed," in which two reeds beat against each other, as in the oboes and basoons. In addition, woodwinds can be classified according to whether the air passage (the "bore" of the instrument) is cylindrical or conical. Conical-bore instruments include those in the saxophone, oboe, and bassoon families; cylindrical-bore instruments include clarinets and bagpipes.
Development
Early woodwind instruments included the shawm, the curtal, and the racket. These instruments wereharsh in tone, and quite difficult to play in tune. In the mid-17th century, Jean Hotteterre and Michel Danican Philidor designed and produced different instruments that were more refined and flexible than their predecessors. These new instruments included the transverse flute and the three-section recorder. The oboe was created as a redesigned shawm, and the bassoon as a redesigned curtal.
Key Systems
"Key systems" are used in all of the woodwind instruments to open and close holes on their sides. Although various key systems were used as far back as the 1500s, the modern systems were developed in the first half of the nineteenth century. By that time, there had developed a concensus that the left hand should always be placed nearest to the instrument mouthpiece (before that, players differed in how they held their instruments, and the tone-holes and keys were designed to be accessible from both sides).
Links to Instrument Families
Bassoon Information
Clarinet Family Information
Flute Family Information
Oboe Family Information
Recorder Information
Saxophone Family Information
Information Sources
Information on this page was derived from the following sources:
Kruckenberg, Sven (1993): The Symphony Orchestra and its Instruments. Gothenburg, Sweden: AB Nordbok (Crescent Books edition distributed by Random House).
Wade-Matthews, Max (2000): The World Encyclopedia of Musical Instruments. London, UK and New York, NY: Lorenz Books.
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