Instrument Jokes

A violist and a cellist were standing on a sinking ship together.

"Help!" cried the cellist, "I can't swim!"

"Don't worry," said the violist, "just fake it."

At a concert hall one night, the stage manager comes across an oboe player and a viola player having a fight.

He breaks the fight up and asks what the fight was about.

The oboe player says, "He broke my reed! I was just about to play my big solo when he broke my reed!"

"Well?" says the stage manager to the viola player. "What do you say to that?"

In umbrage, the viola player replies, "He undid two of my strings but he won't tell me which ones!"

What is a chord?
→ Three violists playing in unison.

What is the best recording of the Walton viola concerto?
→ Music Minus One.

What is the difference between a viola and a trampoline?
→ You take off your shoes before you jump on the trampoline.

What is the difference between the first and last desk of a viola section?
→ Half a measure.

What is the difference between grapes and a viola?
→ You take off your shoes to stamp on grapes.

- Conductor: Again from measure 5, if you please.

- Voice from viola section: But Maestro, we have no measure numbers.

What is the difference between a chainsaw and a viola?
→ If you absolutely had to, you could use a chainsaw in a string quartet.

What do you call a person who plays the viola?
→ A violator.

What is the difference between the first and last desk of a viola section?
→ A semi-tone.

Why are violas so large?
→ It is an optical illusion. It's not that the violas are large, just that the viola player's heads are so small.

What do you call the folks who hang around the musicians at conservatories?
→ Violists.

What is the difference between a dog and a viola?
→ The dog knows when to stop scratching.

Why can't you hear a viola on a digital recording?
→ Recording technology has reached such an advanced level of development that all extraneous noise is eliminated.

What is the definition of a major seventh?
→ A violist playing octaves.

How is lightning like a violist's fingers?
→ Neither one strikes in the same place twice.

Which positions does a violist use?
→ First, third, and emergency.

Why are orchestra intermissions only twenty minutes long?
→ So the violists don't need to be retrained.

When a 16-inch viola and a 17-inch viola are dropped simultaneously from a 30-story building, which one hits the pavement first?
→ Who cares!

How do you get a viola section to play spiccato?
→ Write a whole note with "solo" above it.

What is the range of a tuba?
→ Twenty yards if you've got a good arm.

What's a tuba for?
→ 1 1/2 X 3 1/2.

There are two tubaplayers sitting in a car. Who's driving?
→ The policeman

- Tuba Player: Did you hear my last recital?

- Friend: I hope so.

How many tuba players does it take to change a light bulb?
→ Three: one to hold the bulb and two to drink until the room spins.

How do you fix a broken tuba?
→ With a "tuba glue."

How many lead trumpet players does it take to change a light bulb?
→ Fifty. One to do it and the others to stand around and say, "I could do that better."

What do lead trumpet players use for birth control?
→ Their personality.

What is the difference between a trumpet soloist and King Kong?
→ King Kong is more sensitive.

What's the difference between trumpet players and government bonds?
→ Government bonds eventually mature and earn money.

The best recording of the Haydn Trumpet Concerto is Music Minus One.

How do trumpet players traditionally greet each other?
→ "Hi. I'm better than you."

How do you know when a trumpet player is at your door?
→ The doorbell shrieks!

How do you make a trombone sound like a french horn?
→ Stick your hand in the bell and play lots of wrong notes.

How do you make a french horn sound like a trombone?
→ Take your hand out of the bell and lose all sense of taste.

How do you make a french horn sound like a trombone?
→ Take your hand out of the bell and miss all of the notes.

What's the definition of a gentleman?
→ Somone who knows how to play the trombone and doesn't.

What is the difference between a trombone and a trumpet?
→ A trombone will bend before it breaks.

There is a frog driving east and a trombonist walking west. What can be surmised from this?
→ The frog's probably on its way to a gig.

Orchestral trombonists count so much rest and play so many repeated figures that the sheep story also works.

Trombone: a slide whistle with delusions of granduer.

What is the difference between a saxophone and a chainsaw?
→ It's all in the grip.

What is the difference between a lawnmower and a soprano sax?
→ You can tune the lawnmower and the owner's neighbors don't mind if you don't return the sax when you borrow it.

What is the difference between a saxophone and a lawnmower?
→ Vibrato.

How many alto sax players does it take to change a light bulb?
→ Five. One to handle the bulb, and 4 to contemplate how David Sanborn would've done it.

If you were out in the woods, who would you trust for directions, an in-tune tenor sax player, an out-of-tune tenor sax player, or Santa Claus?
→ The out-of-tune sax player! You were hallucinating the other two.

How do you make a chainsaw sound like a bari-sax?
→ Add vibrato.

What's the definition of a gentleman?
→ One who knows how to play the saxophone, but doesn't!

How many sax players does it take to change a light bulb?
→ Sixty. One to change the bulb and fifty-nine to talk about how much better Michael Brecker would have done it.

Two musicians are walking down the street, and one says to the other, "Who was that piccolo I saw you with last night?" The other replies, "That was no piccolo, that was my fife."

How do you get 2 piccolos to play a perfect unison?
→ Shoot one.

A note left for a pianist from his wife:

Gone Chopin, (have Liszt), Bach in a Minuet