Nero really didn't play the fiddle when Rome burned. What instrument was he known to play, and even allowed public ribbing about his playing it? As usual, please post a source for your answer.

This source indicates he played the lyre, however other sites mention bagpipes,and the organ.

http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/w/x/wxk116/muse/lyre.htm

Suetonius, a contemporary of Nero's certainly implies that it was the lyre, commenting on how Nero liked to sing while playing.

"Viewing the conflagration from the tower of Maecenas and exulting, as he said, in "the beauty of the flames," he sang the whole of the "Sack of Ilium," in his regular stage costume."

" He placed the sacred crowns in his bed-chambers around the couches, as well as statues representing him in the guise of a lyre-player; and he had a coin too struck with the same device."

One verse about him, in both Greek and Latin, was "While our ruler his lyre doth twang and the Parthian his bowstring,
Paean-singer our prince shall be, and Far-darter our foe."

"Towards the end of his life, in fact, he had publicly vowed that if he retained his power, he would at the games in celebration of his victory give a performance on the water-organ, the flute, and the bagpipes, and that on the last day he would appear as an actor and dance "Vergil's Turnus." - www.ukans.edu/history

Good job, SR!