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Being a tuba player, I also like to dabble on a couple other instruments: trombone and synth/keyboard. My synth/keyboard "skills" are meager at best, but it's great fun to create/shape sounds and play simple chords, tunes and whatnot. Trombone is somewhere between tuba and synth for me; I could sit in with most college & community bands and do a decent job on the 2nd or 3rd part, as long as I've been practicing.

What other instruments do some of you play on, mostly for fun

Euphonium.
Alphorn.

Well, instruments I've played in public more than once within the last 10 years ... various saxophones, electric & upright bass, accordion. Started with recorders, band instruments with flute and the clarinet family, but not in public within the 10 year limit, and can sort of play guitar, ukulele, mandolin & viola, but not to even my low performance standards, that's more for home study purposes - guitar particularly, because of its combination of chordal harmony and rhythm, and now I'm getting interested in the same way with the ukulele. I can conceive and convey a rhythmic interpretation, with a guitar or ukulele in my hands. The guitar is a cheap old thing strung with high tension nylon strings and played with a pick, and the ukulele is a very cheap soprano, also played with a pick - both pretty near ideal for my purposes.

Most other winds, but more often than not, double reeds. Most recent paying work has been pit gigs on oboe/cor anglais. Director of my primary group gave me the heads-up last week that he'll be programming Reed's Russian Christmas Music for the December concert. Tour de force for cor.

The Boss will have me drag out the Conn 28D (cor français) when we're short on horns and he doesn't have anything on the menu needing oboe color.

I used to play (and be confident playing) a lot of stuff. I played trumpet, baritone, Bb tuba, soprano and bass clarinet, French horn, and bass guitar in high school. After that it got weirder- I bought bass and contrabass trumpets, a contrabass trombone, tenor and bass trombones, various tubas, a cimbasso, and always felt saucy when I picked up an alto trombone. I still have my bass trombone, 2 euphs, 2 old Eb tubas, and the mini cimbasso. I stopped seriously playing bass trombone, the nicest instrument I own and probably the one I identified with most, due to physical issues.


Hell, I haven't even played in a group of any size since about fall 2014. I pick up the chimp once or twice a week, the tubas and euph once or twice a month, and the chainsaw noticeably less than that. I think the second valve is frozen. Oh well...

Horn, flute, and trumpet tend to be the three most frequent ones I play on for church gigs that are not tuba.

Made most of my money over the years on bass guitar, but just retired from it. Now mostly Eb tuba, and occasional euphonium, trombone, and bass clarinet.

When not playing my Eb or French C Tuba I do a lot of playing on Saxhorn basse, Ophicleide, valve and slide trombone and tenor guitar. Flattop, archtop, electric and resonator and yes, a tenor banjo as well. Six-string reso (blues) guitar sometimes and I know how to use piano and accordion

British baritone in a band that needed me more there than on tuba while the regular baritone player was on sabbatical.

Bass trombonist originally, majored in music and taught low brass when I was younger. Became an author and disability advocate but have been getting back into playing this year (probably a mid life crisis thing). In addition to my bass trombone (which I've been playing in a local historical heritage band), I've acquired a Schiller oval baritone (for sale, if anyone's looking for such a thing!) and a Wessex tornister euphonium, which is just a ridiculous amount of fun to play. Most of all, I've been learning the ophicleide, which is challenging and very cool, unless perhaps you're one of my neighbors.

Besides Tuba, Euphonium (was my primary MOS in the Army Reserve Band), Bass and Tenor trombone, Electric Bass guitar, and Guitar, as well as Piano (my first instrument).

Euphonium, bass trombone.
Played string bass and electric bass on jazz gigs until the arthritis in my fingers got too bad.

A beautiful late 19th century 6’11” Henry Miller & Sons art case grand piano, fully restored 15 years ago. Synth, Euphonium, and some Electric Guitar!

Bass drum

When the regular Bass Drummer can't make a parade gig I take it.
Mine is a huge old wooden monster from the 1930s, so I made a cart for it from a jogging stroller, works pretty well.

I have been trying to learn Bass Guitar, C French Tuba, serpent, and ophicleide for many years...

bloke wrote:... She wanted to play the Sibelius "Swan of Tuonela" ...

Ah, yes. Much appreciation here, Swan is not so much a test of pure virtuosity as it is demanding of control and endurance. Is your daughter playing professionally now? My oboe mentor was an alumnus of one of those aforementioned conservatories and played with a big-city major for several years, only to - frankly - crack under the pressure. I was crushed, I so looked up to him and still do. Anyway, you guys think tuba at that level is bad, oboe is furiously competitive if not outright cutthroat.

Early on I dabbled (per thread theme) with reed making, but it is a very skilled art into itself. I was out of double reeds for a couple of decades, and on reentering figured by the time I invested in a full workshop, I could pay somebody for their artistry for the rest of my life. I have a good reed guy now, one of the rare ones who never sends an unplayable reed, but he's been "discovered" and sometimes gets backed up 5 or 6 weeks.

Doubtful I'll ever have the opportunity to play the Sibelius with an orchestra, but I have supporters in my current wind group who are trying to convince the director to program the wind arrangement of the 2nd movement of Dvořák's 9th, also a significant feature work for EH. But I'll be happy with Russian Christmas for the time being.

Oddly enough, tuba is one of the instruments on which I dabble. My main instrument is trombone. I doubled on euphonium for a while, but now I'm only dabbling on that, too. Just not many opportunities to branch away from trombone...

Other than tuba I also play euphonium, bass trombone (new to me), guitar, bass(fretted, no good at upright), ukulele, melodica, keyboard(badly). Now hopefully one day one of my instruments can pay the bills.

bloke wrote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9Pp8xAtww4

6:25 is just about the best use of French horns I've ever heard (not a fan normally...).

Euphonium, trombone, piano, and organ are the instruments that I play well other than my tuba, but of course nothing can ever separate me from my horn for too long.