One other hobby of mine has been playing the oboe but I have not kept this up after 1969.
An oboe is an ill-wind that nobody blows good.
Conductors do not know how the oboe does its work, but they know what the oboe should contribute.
Every orchestra is different. Sometimes, you're blown away by a particular musician. If I'm playing the Brahms concerto, it's crucial to have a great oboe player, because we work in tandem.
And that unusual squawking sound is actually the mating call of the the rare...oh, it's just an oboe player.
What the hell is an oboe?
I remember once, when I started writing for the alto saxophone, a saxophonist told me to think of it as being like a cross between an oboe and a viola, but louder.
The oboe sounds like a clarinet with a cold.