In the 1990's our school had two horrible bassoons. in 2000 my piano teacher, then the head of music bought a nice $7000 Fox/Renard and then our bassoonist (as in one in a school of 1000) graduated. Apparently the old head of Music comined the best bits of the two old basssoons (depressing I know) Now the new director has found a bassoon and all we know is that its in pretty bad shape. Should I service the combined (or not-no-one knows)?

No-one in Sydney dares to rent bassoons, so I think this is my only choice

Do you mean, should you pay for someone to service it for you? I think you should take it somewhere and get them to give you a quote on how much it would cost. I mean, a full service for a clarinet can come to a good £200 (in the uk), so for something as big as a bassoon it could come to more. I think it really depends on how much it costs - find how much you'd pay, think about how much you'll be using the bassoon and how long you'll be using it for... if it's just a year or two then you might aswel, but if it's a long term investment then i'd just save up for a decent instrument. Servicing instruments is fine as long as they're not in a really dire state to begin with. But generally a rubbish instrument stays a rubbish instrument whether you service it or not.

Well my SYO conductor's (for violin)husband, John Cran was the Sydney Symphony Orchestra Principal Bassoonist for more than 20 years. He knows Peter Walmsley who is the father of Barry Walmsley, our Music Director. Mr, Cran said he'd service the bassoon by december so...

What, he'll do it for free? In that case, might aswel go for it.