Must be a question of taste. Me, I'm much more of a plucking and strumming than an otherworldly mystical fluttering fan.

As for least favourite instruments, I can't stand the vibraphone. Especially with the (shhh) 'motor on'. Even the phrase makes me wince - as if someone had mentioned (shhh again) 'fingernails on a blackboard' ...

...So what about a modern wooden Boehm flute? 

Regarding the saxophone in Pictures, there is a glissando written for the last two notes but not the first two. But it is seldom heard because of how it lies on the instrument. One odd thing is that Ravel expected the second oboe to play it, which is why the instrument isn't heard elsewhere in the piece. I bet that never happens now. Renowned orchestrator that he was, Ravel didn't fully understand the range of the saxophone and he gets it wrong in Bolero. He calls for a sopranino(?) sax to get the very highest notes when the soprano can manage it.

I have to cast a vote in favour of both the ocarina and vibraphone since I've, er, played both in concert. I can see where Aaron's coming from though: the piccolo and larger flutes seem to have much more going for them. Same with the oboe - cor anglais and heckelphone are much more inviting.

Gavin Bryars was once asked to write an oboe concerto - he's not keen on the oboe either, but he discovered that the bloke who asked him possessed a heckelphone - a heckelphone concerto was the result. A wonderful instrument ! There's a solo in The Planets and also a rather good Hindemith trio with viola and piano . . .

Bryn, your reference to the bowed cymbal player reminded me of a gentleman whose wood-block performances seem designed to create an allergy . . . I'll wager we're thinking of the same chappie ?

Thinking of pieces featuring unusual instruments, there is a version of Radulescu's Outer Time for 42 spectrally tuned Thai gongs (has to be explained gently to the composer why this work perhaps doesn't get performed that often). Never heard it, but would love to.

Good point - should post it there instead - the idea of 42 such gongs sounds entrancing.

t-i-n, yes that's a very good piece. And I seem to recall that the reason GB featured the pan pipes is that a troupe of Peruvian street musicians habitually stationed themselves outside IRCAM, where the electronics were realised. And fair enough; although how much more appealing, to my ears, would the piece have been had IRCAM somehow been transported to Tokyo, say, and we were dealing with the shakuhachi...