violins: the magikarp of instruments, after years living with terrible squeaky, teeth-grinding scrapy music you will be blessed with a powerhouse of emotion that is still somehow overrated
violas: awkward teenager of the strings, but when bold enough to speak actually sounds rather lovely
cello: beautiful bastards who are much smoother than their owners
bass: big daddy who seems tough but needs the most looking after
flute: levelled up recorder who sacrificed tone for range
piccolo: steam train whistle on speed
oboe: so high maintenance that from what I gather if you start using a different toothpaste the reed might complain
cor anglais: the soul of a goose is trapped inside every one
clarinet: two modes – pompous rooty-tooty or slutty jazzman
bass clarinet: loveable foghorn
bassoon: old gentleman fart machine
contrabassoon: old elephant fart machine
horn: sound can vary from anything between ‘love incarnate’ to ‘surprised cow’
trumpet: used and abused by large egos everywhere, personalities include ‘royal announcer’, ‘moody parisian drinking in a jazz bar in Budapest’ and ‘imperial parp parp’
trombone: chill enough most of the time but secretly relishes going from 1 – 100 with 0 warning and scaring the everloving Jesus out of everyone
bass trombone: like a great dane needs a strong, patient handler
tuba: like a really big, heavy, noisy four year old who sits on your knee for the whole of rehearsal
harp: the musicalisation of an impressionist painting, beautiful but too much time, effort and money are involved for most people
piano: most people’s gateway drug into music
timpani: ‘the shower in a friends house’ at first glance looks simple enough to use, but upon closer inspection complex set up is required to use them effectively.
percussion: like ordering a mystery bag online, you’re provided with a bunch of things you probably will never use or don’t know how to use. If you’re lucky you might get a triangle.
(not intended to be a complete list
tag yourselves, I’m imperial parp parp