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Hunting oboe: a baroque alto oboe in F, used by Bach.
Appears as a part label in Bach’s cantatas, Passions and the Christmas Oratorio, usually for a pair of players. Bach notated it in more than one way, so editions vary; many modern ones write it like a cor anglais, in treble clef a fifth above the sound, and today it is often played on cor anglais.
A Baroque tenor oboe in F with a curved body and a flared bell, darker and rounder than the oboe d’amore. Bach used it in pairs for pastoral and mournful colors — the shepherds’ music of the Christmas Oratorio, several arias of the St Matthew Passion. In a modern piece it is a period-instrument choice; name the substitute (cor anglais) and keep the line between F3 and about G5.
Bach, Christmas Oratorio, BWV 248, the chorale that closes the second part (No. 23): the score includes staves labelled “Oboe d’amore” and “Oboe da caccia”, the pastoral oboes of that part.
Oboe da caccia is one of 1755 terms in the Gradus musical dictionary: the words, abbreviations and instrument names that appear in printed scores, plus the vocabulary composers use to talk about them.
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