Musickal Oddities

Jessica Duchen has a photo up of one of the more bizarre, not to say alarming, musical instruments I've ever seen, the Vuillaume Octobasse. (In the pic, she's standing in front of it - the damn thing is 13 feet tall. Here is an Octobasse Home Page that has another photo giving you an idea of the size of the thing.)

Jessica recollects that the instrument was built by Jean Phillipe Vuillaume to the specifications of Hector Berlioz. Wikipedia agrees.

Personally, it seems to me that the thing more probably was put together by the Borg. I wouldn't touch it, for fear of being assimilated into their string section.

I can see it now. "Double stopping is futile...."