Manual for students of music academies for instumentology and instrumentation /orchestration courses. It contains descriptions of sonic properties, timbral characteristics, and technical aspects of particular instruments or types of instruments, including strings, woodwinds, brass, percussion, and plucked instruments. The author describes the issues of orchestral scores, combining instruments, and writing for a choir and small instrumental ensembles in popular music. The textbook contains many musical examples, mainly from 19th- and 20th-century compositions.