How do you describe the sound of an oboe? "Bright and unique", says one writer; "strong" and "easy to pick out" says another. Elsewhere, the sound is described as "beautiful, sweet, haunting" (listen for yourself there and elsewhere and see if you agree). Some of these writers attribute the oboe's "haunting" quality to its descent from "pastoral" instruments such as the shawm, and while I'm as reluctant to subscribe to this sort of romanticized pastoralism as I am to resort to indescribing it as "indescribable", I'm not convinced I can do any better.
However, I do know why the sound of the oboe is particularly magical for me. It goes back to my school Carol Services (which were, essentially, over-produced talent shows for the sort of schoolchildren whom
The CCO's oboeist, a lovely young man called James, laughed at me when I confessed that his solo part in "Gabriel's Oboe" always brought tears to my eyes, and I laughed it off as one does. I don't know to which Gabriel the title refers, but my mind made its usual associative connections. We may have been jostling for space in a room that was bright and heavy with light and heat, over-decorated with enormous glittering baubles and tinsel; but for a few moments, every ear in the room was focused on that single melody -- the sole star visible in a dark sky, a clear annunciation.