do they exist?

someone should make an octo-contrabassoon
for fun

don't know about those (and yeh, an octocontrabassoon would be the coolest thing ever!) but i have heard of the teneroon and the mini bassoon!

the doublebasscontraoctave bassoon..... while we're at it

What's with the contrabass oboe (http://www.contrabass.com/pages/cboboe.html)

Can't look at the contrabass oboe, but that contrabassophone looks rather interesting.

Yup tenoroons exist mainly for small children learning the bassoon (yes someone's going to come along and say it's a real pro instrument but hey...) but I don't think the bassoon name actually comes from the fact it's bass. What the hey the Germans think we're fagotts! (which means a "bundle of sticks"...)

Here i'd never actually heard of the tenoroon until i looked on the howarths website. Here we play on mini bassoons (they are so cute it's unbelieveable) for kids to learn on, though i think they've stopped making them. Didn't know it means bundle of sticks, guess you learn something new every day! Don't know if it's called bassoon because of bass, but either way i think bassoon is quite appropriate. don't know why *shrugs*

Maybe you're holding it wrong, it's not supposed to be that difficult. if you're doing it right, then... well... you'll get used to it :p

I think your'e right

Then again I'm only eleven. Maybe I should play baritoon or mezzo-tenoroon?

Ah, that could be why you're having difficulties then. I didn't start playing until four years ago, when I was 14, and i'm quite tall so I didn't have any problem. But often younger players find it hard to play, partially because the bassoon can be taller than them, and sometimes they can't use a hand rest and can't reach the speaker keys because their hands aren't big enough. So yeh don't worry, you'll grow into it. What kind of support are you using? You've got to make sure that the reed doesn't sit too high otherwise the reed will go into your mouth at a funny angle, which could then mess up your tuning and other boring stuff like that. Find a higher chair

I think the chair was a bit wierd. What kinds of support are there? I used a seat strap and I know Bassoons in Military Bands use neck straps...

I can't imagine how people march & play bassoon.

Also it's really interesting how bassoon can sound like a demented oboe cross saxophone or it can sound more like an English Horn.

There are loads of different ways to support the bassoon. There's the neck strap, seat strap (my personal fave), you can put a cup on the bottom of your bassoon and use a spike. I've heard of a leg rest you can use.
Military bands don't really have much choice but to use neck straps. I don't know about anywhere else, but here we don't have bassoons in military bands (the bassoonists play cymbals or bass drum instead) because it's actually really dangerous to march with a oboe or bassoon. Imagine if you get knocked, the reed could do some serious damage.
It's nice that you recognise that the bassoon is so versatile. Though the farting noise isn't exactly something to boast about as a beginner, hehe.

Where exactly did i boast? (Grr)

It was on a recording of Portsmouth for piccolo + bass oon that i heard the farting noise.

I don't really like contrabassoons-they're not really bright, they sound somewhat muted (what lovely grammar)