Hi ajschn, you beat me to it…while i was reading the thread, my first reaction was…isn’t playing the didgeridoo also quite difficult? I’ve heard that it takes a lot of skill and practising to be able to breathe in and out at the same time.
See… I should have played the Tuba… Ommm <pause for french horns to pah pah> Ommm… 
Well do I remember the cracked notes, the unholy cat-strangling squeals and the look of sheer pain on my tutor’s face… and all these years I never realised that it may just have been something more than my complete lack of musical ability.
[aside]
I was involved with a brass band for a while… my brother played the cornet, my mother played the E flat euphonium, and they gave me a stick and got me to march in front. 
[/aside]
Mine sounds like a wounded duck. Oh dear, perhaps we are back to the complete lack of ability theory again.
ajschn, I read that the didgeridoo was difficult, but it was completely false (I read it in TMNT RPG world book, where I assume you read it too since I was not able to find any other information regarding its difficulty elsewhere). The circular breathing technique, though slightly more difficult than normal breathing is actually quite common in most wind instruments that have resistance (not the flute). The didgeridoo is actually pretty close to playing a tuba with basically two notes (a high note and a low note) played rhythmically. Not too surprising, I played one before and was taught the rudiments from a friend. It really is quite easy overall. If you can buzz your lips from the side of your mouth (it uses a non-western embouchure) and can breath in through your nose while puching air out of your mouth (that is all circular breathing is) then you won’t have a problem with that instrument.
I still think the french horn is significantly more difficult to produce a decent tone on and the repertoire for a piano is significantly more difficult than anything else.
HUGS!
Sqrl
So, SqrlCub, I’ve been reading with interest your knowledgeable posts in this thread. What instrument(s) would you nominate for the following categories?
[ul][li]Instrument that is most difficult to learn because it’s expensive and/or hard to acquire.[/li][li]Instrument that is most difficult to learn, if all you want to do is, starting from scratch, to play an easily recognizable tune.[/li]Instrument that is most difficult to learn, if you want to excel.[/ul]
Hey Arnold (and I don’t mean the cartoon), I will go through each of your steps.
- Instrument that is most difficult to learn because it’s expensive and/or hard to acquire.
The theorbo would fall into this category. A cheap one will cost at least $3000 and has to be made by a luthier. It also has all the complexity of the lute and harp simultaneously. I own a lute and although it is not too difficult to play, it took a lot of adjusting of my guitar technique to play it without it buzzing. My lute is an 8 course lute and has 15 strings. A theorbo Will have anywhere from 12-15 courses typically so it will have anywhere from 23-29 strings normally. It is essentially a lute with a harp attachment similar to a harp guitar for those of you who know that instrument. I would love to go back to school and earn a master’s in theorbo performance. It is quite a wonderful instrument.
- Instrument that is most difficult to learn, if all you want to do is, starting from scratch, to play an easily recognizable tune.
I would really say the french horn will fall into this category simply because I have never heard a beginner play any recognizable melodies from it for at least the first few years. When I was taking brass pedagogy, I had to learn the rudiments of the french horn. I could play all of the other brass instruments alright. I could site read fairly easily on the trumpet, trombone, tuba, and euphonium and get the music to sound in tune from a relatively low pitch to a fairly high pitch as appropriate to the instrument. The french horn was a completely different story. Only one person in my class could play it and he was a trumpet major. FTR, most of the other people in the class were either woodwinds or string majors (like me). Oh, and he couldn’t even play it well. Most schools nowadays, don’t teach the french horn until high school. I have heard of a few people who learn the french horn in middle/junior school but that is exceptionally rare. The keying wasn’t the problem. It was really the mouthpiece and the embouchure required. It was so small and tight that any variation at all would make it go horribly out of tune and then just sound like some screeching honking sound. It was quite awful.
- Instrument that is most difficult to learn, if you want to excel.
I addressed this already. The piano is the most difficult to learn if you want to excel because the pianist profession is so incredibly competitive that you are out of the running if you don’t start before the age of 5 or 6. The technique is simple initially but it progresses so quickly with difficutly, speed, stretches, and changes that if you don’t have the knack for it you will be completely out of the running as a concert pianist if you have not had all the prior years of practice and experience. I can give an example. I had a friend from San Antonio who at the time I thought was a wonderful classical pianist. She is actually very talented and can site read pretty much everything sat in front of her and play quite effectively and well. She started playing when she was 3 years old and won several competitions in her earlier years. As of now, she is 25, she will probably never be able to be a classical concert pianist because she just doesn’t put enough practice in. She used to, I assume she still does, practice from 1-4 hours a day. That for most other instruments is a lot; however, a married set of pianists from Moscow (I forget their names now) used to practice 8-12 hours a day. The technical ability that they had far outshined her technical ability. Even though she plays quite expressively and rarely makes any mistakes, a single mistake will take you out of the running as a classical pianist. My choir teacher, who in himself is a quite fine pianist, got into his symphony job because the last pianist got lost in a passage that was being directed by a new conductor. He was reading and transcribing the full score at one time (24 staves of music simultaneously), and asked the conductor where he was since the conductor wasn’t being clear. He was fired that evening and my choir teacher was brought in. That type of issue doesn’t come up with harpists because there aren’t very many decent harpists to replace you out there. It rarely comes up with percussionists because there aren’t a lot of talented percussionists out there. It still doesn’t come up with the stringed instruments (violins, violas, cellos and basses) because their sheer number tends to hide flaws. I have had the displeasure of conducting a talented amatuer symphony from the beginning. At first the strings all played horribly out of tune then over time it got better. I have been to symphony rehearsals as a singer and with the professional symphony experienced exactly the same thing. It was awful. The difference between the professional and amateur symphony was the professional symphony quickly corrected their mistakes and were playing in tune at the end of the night whereas the amateur symphony took about 4 rehearsals. From other conductors and composers that I have talked to, this is a common experience at even the highest level of string professionals.
Oh, the piano’s music tends to be easier to read right off because their is only one place to play any given note. That is really why strings tend to site read rather poorly. I know this from experience and from being a string player. This is not to fool anyone into thinking that the strings are harder to excel at on a professional level. There just isn’t the same level of competition as there is with the piano. The competition really makes the biggest difference.
HUGS!
Sqrl