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Playing the G Ocarina as a Non-transposing Instrument (3) - What are the advantages and disadvantages to learning a G ocarina as if it were a C instrument? There are some excellent reasons why music educators have traditionally taught non-C instruments as if they were C instruments. Doing so puts the musical notes in a reader-friendly place on the musical staff, allows one to play a whole family of instruments with only one set of fingerings, and greatly facilitates the learning of other instruments, whatever their particular key. In the case of the ocarina, the comfortable vocal range (the C range) is by far the easiest place to find music, for it is the range of hymnbooks and most books of folksongs. Nevertheless, a complication arises if a guitarist and a G ocarina player (or a Bb trumpet player, for that matter) want to play together while reading from the same sheet of music. If they are to produce music and not noise, they must do one of three things. 1) The guitarist can simply pop on a capo to be in the same key as the ocarina player, 2) one of the two musicians must transpose the music to be in the same key as the other, or 3) one of the two must play by ear. (Actually, playing by ear is transposing, but the person doing it need not understand the theory involved.)