C5 Oboe Fingering
How to play C5 on the oboe: Left hand 1 · right hand 1.
Filled keys and holes in the diagram are the ones you press or cover, and a half-filled first hole is the half-hole. The two keys at the top are the octave keys — the first worked by the left thumb on the back of the instrument, the second by the side of the left index finger — and the clusters at the bottom are the pinky keys, five for the left pinky and three for the right.
Hear C5 and try the fingering
Pick an instrument and a note and the diagram updates instantly — filled keys are the ones you press. The same finder sits on every note page, pre-set to that note.
The C5 fingering, step by step
- Cover hole 1 with your left index finger.
- Cover hole 1 with your right index finger.
In short: left hand 1 · right hand 1.
About C5 on the oboe
The first octave is the oboe’s foundation: plain fingerings with no octave key and no half-hole, running from the full-length low B♭ up to the two-index-finger C5. Almost everything above is one of these fingerings plus a vent — an octave key or a rolled finger — so this register is worth learning exactly.
C5 is the top of the first octave — just the two index fingers, the simplest fingering in this part of the instrument. It is also a boundary: the very next note, C♯5, changes technique completely and becomes a half-hole note.
C5 is note 15 of the 32 in the full oboe fingering chart, sitting between B4 below it and C♯5 above it.
Like every fingering on this site, it was checked against the Woodwind Fingering Guide's basic oboe charts and the NoteAtlas oboe chart before publishing.
Practising C5
Low oboe notes fail from the reed and the air before they fail from the fingers. If this note is stuffy or will not start, soak the reed properly, check the pinky keys are sealing, and blow a slow, supported stream — do not bite the pitch up.
Questions about C5
What is the fingering for C5 on oboe?
Left hand 1 · right hand 1. C5 is a first octave note on the oboe. The full step-by-step is on this page, and you can hear the note with the Fingering Finder.
What does C5 sound like on an oboe?
Exactly C5 — the oboe is a non-transposing instrument in C, so written C5 sounds as concert C5. When your band director asks for a concert C5, this is the note you finger.
Is there an alternate fingering for C5?
For C5, the fingering above is the one to learn. It is the basic fingering both reference charts give for this note, and the one teachers expect to see.
Think this fingering is wrong? Report it — every report is checked against the source charts.