Bugle

The bugle is a member of the brass (Hornbostel–Sachs 423.1). Listen to 2 recordings and learn how it makes its sound.

Listen to the bugle

Attention (Full bugle section)

0:07Public domainby USN BandWikimedia Commons

0:07

Bugle Call, 1st Bersaglieri Regiment (Italian Army)

0:05Public domainby Bandmaster of the 1st Bersaglieri Regiment…Wikimedia Commons

0:05

Tip: press play to see the sound's live frequency spectrum in blue over the waveform.

How the bugle makes its sound

In the Hornbostel–Sachs system, which classifies instruments by how they produce sound, the bugle belongs to the brass (lip-vibrated aerophones): the player's buzzing lips set the air column vibrating – trumpets, horns, trombones, tubas and the didgeridoo.

More broadly it is one of the aerophones (wind instruments), where sound comes from vibrating air.

Its timbre – the colour that lets you tell it apart from other instruments playing the same note – comes from the mix of overtones its body and resonator emphasise.

From Wikipedia

Clarion is a name for a high-pitched trumpet used in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. It is also a name for a 4' organ reed stop that produces a high-pitched or clarion-like sound on a pipe organ in the clarion trumpet's range of notes.

The word clarion has changed meanings over centuries and across languages. Today, in modern French clairon refers to the bugle, while in Italy chiarina refers to modern trumpets of historic design, made from bent tubing and without valves, similar to the natural trumpet. Resembling these instruments is the modern fanfare trumpet, like the chiarina or natural trumpet, but with the option of using valves.