Octavia Melody

Octavia is the fan-given name of a background Earth pony who appears in The Best Night Ever and Sweet and Elite. She has a dark gray mane and tail, a light gray coat and light purple eyes, with the same eye design as Rarity, the spa ponies, and several background ponies, except for the iris. Her cutie mark is a purple treble clef, though the cello is actually a bass instrument and would thus be notated with a bass clef in any written music.

Development
While the show does not specifically identify Octavia's instrument, the trading card states that it is a cello. William Anderson, the show's composer, has relayed to Equestria Daily that the music playing at the garden party in Sweet and Elite features a harp, two violins, and a cello, which pegs Octavia as a cellist. The show's director, Jayson Thiessen, figures the instrument is a cello as it's "more sophisticated and appropriate for the gala".

Appearances
She plays a cello as part of a four-pony musical ensemble at the Grand Galloping Gala in the episode The Best Night Ever. She retains an apparent calm dignified expression when in costume; except when Pinkie Pie disturbs her. At Pinkie's request, the orchestra plays the Pony Pokey. Octavia eventually falls over when Pinkie tries to make her play faster.

Octavia appears briefly in Sweet and Elite in the garden party scene, playing with a mostly-different musical ensemble.

Re-use of character model
Octavia's character design is reused with a different color scheme in Luna Eclipsed. Her coat is yellow, her mane and tail are dark blue, and her eyes are light blue. She has the same treble clef cutie mark as Octavia, except that hers is light blue instead of pink. She plays the fiddle in a pose similar to the one used in The Best Night Ever, though her hooves are slightly altered, grasping the bow and neck of the instrument with the hooves instead of the fetlocks, or "wrists". The rest of the band similarly uses the designs and poses from The Best Night Ever, with different color schemes.

In other media
Octavia, along with a host of characters from the show, appears on the Comic Con 2011 promotional poster. She is wearing her collar and bow tie and holding her cello and its bow.

A Flash image of Octavia holding her cello and its bow was added to the Hasbro website's Card Creator game around January 25, 2012, named "MLP_CharV_WhomeverThisIs.swf". The file was included with the same name when the game was added to the Hubworld website around February 2, 2012.

Base collectable trading card #27 of 84 is DJ Pon-3 & Octavia, with the description "DJ Pon-3 and Octavia may both be at the top of their musical games, but their careers are very, very different! You can find Octavia at garden parties and galas performing prim and proper classical music on her cello. On the other hoof, DJ Pon-3 feels at home behind her turntable, laying down sick beats and wearing her trademark sunglasses. Are these two bitter rivals, or are they long time friends? Will they ever perform a duet? Only time will tell!"

WeLoveFine.com carries T-shirts and other merchandise of Octavia, always wearing her collar and bow tie and holding her cello and its bow. One of the T-shirt designs, released prior to the trading card, refers to her as "Octavia".

Gallery

 * Octavia image gallery