I have to change back and forth between the baritone and the oboe and I don`t think it is fair. Has anyone been forced also?

be thankful you don`t have to march your oboe... haha... whoah if i had to march my bassoon i`d probably end up poking myself i the eye... double reeds are so delicate -__-`

i think it`d be fun learning a new instrument. just think of it as a new learning experience. playing two instruments is fun. i play clarinet and bassoon.

learn violin, you sit or stand, thats it.

Hm... Our high school doesn`t have marching bands I guess, but if they did, I`d have to do clarinet cause we own one and I played it 2 years ago, or flute or piccolo, but I don`t own either one. I saw a marching bassoon on google before! here`s the link ( http://www.annandave.org/Band%20Bassoon.JPG ) But I guess nobody would be allowed to march bassoon anyways.

There are some schools that allow their oboes to march. I honestly wasn`t interested in learning how, so I took up mellophone. It was fun learning a new instrument and I love playing the mellophone.
-Niles

I do pit ~ that way I still had the same amount of time to practice my oboe anyways. I absolutely ADORE the marimba now!!! lol

I play the oboe in my school symphony band and play the sax in marching. The fingerings are almost the same, and they are both woodwinds, so the switch i make isnt too big a deal. Switching from baritone to oboe must be hard....

Switching from oboe to any any brass instrument is not a good idea. The embochures are polar opposites and your tone quality will suck if you play both.

I played the clarinet first and switched to oboe. So when marching band season came along it wasn`t a big deal. I just played both. First period I play oboe, after school I play clarinet. I agree that switching from woodwind to brass is not the best idea.

Wow, you Americans must take marching band really seriously. I have never heard of one in a school in Canada, and the few marching bands we do have are just extra-curricular.

^i know... we HAVE GOT to start marching bands in canada... it`s so sad that we don`t have any... maybe i can start by asking my director to start a pep band next year.. =)

I used to march with my oboe. I`ve never broken a reed marching either. I could`ve played flute or something else, but I decided against it. My band director had never heard of it but he thought "Why not?" I had fun and didn`t have to compromise.

Yeah, I had to change instruments for marching too. Well sort of. I`m in 10th grade and I played the flute for one year in 6th grade. I didn`t like it very much at all and decided to switch to the bassoon. Why the bassoon? I have no idea. I can`t remember! But I did. And now in high school for marching band I have to go back to the flute and relearn how to play it every summer! I have no choice, everyone knows bassoons aren`t marching band instuments!
That`d be so wierd if they were tho! It would be sooo tiring to march around with it all day. It`d make your neck really soar!
But I know exactly how you feel!....o ya one more thing...BASSOONS ROCK!!!

My old highschool marching director didn`t like the idea of MALE flutists so the guys would have to switch to other instruments and usually stayed switched. I almost ended up on the Tuba, but moved away from that horrid place before summer practice started.

If you want to continue playing Oboe and not baritone there is no reason the director can deny you that. He may be in need of more horn players. It would be more logical for you to switch to flute or piccolo as the emouchure won`t kill your Oboe embouchure and the fingering are similar.

I didn`t even know that it was possible for oboes to play and march at the same time. Shows what I know, but then again, there have never been any in my school band.

I play french horn and I`ve gone through the same kind of thing as you oboists. When I got tired of transposing sax parts (after 2 years) I learned how to play the trumpet and have since moved to the trombone. It really stinks that oboes and horns aren`t really marching instruments so we have to do something else.

(The oboe and bassoon in the grade 11-12 band just do flag squad instead.)