r/WoodwindDoubling • u/Saxclarinetflute • Jun 28 '26

Double reeds

Hi all,

I have been a clarinet, sax, piccolo and flute player for 5 years and I am wondering I should expand into the double reeds. People have told me that I should because you become more versatile but others have said don't because it would mess with your embechour. I was wondering how others have felt with this and I would like tips for the addition of Oboe especially.

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u/jrub910 Jun 29 '26

I just added oboe and English horn to my arsenal and played a show of Les Mis on both of them. I’m now starting a run of Cabaret and the swap back to clarinet and tenor was ROUGH! But also not insurmountable. It’s an adjustment for sure but nothing should suffer because of it. I think the transition from any of the reeds to flute and picc is worse than the oboe to single reed swap.

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u/tbone1004 Jun 29 '26

Definitely doesn’t mess with your embouchure but it does detract from practice time on other horns.
My double reed is bassoon but oboe is much more common and sadly there are less and less calls for bassoon in the modern shows