Engineering:Flugelhorn

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The flugelhorn (/ˈfluːɡəlhɔːrn/, also fluegelhorn, flugel horn; from German, Flügelhorn) is a high brass instrument similar to the trumpet and cornet, but with the wider conical bore of a bugle producing a darker, mellower sound.[1] Like trumpets and cornets, most flugelhorns are pitched in 9-foot (9′) B♭, though some are in 8′ C.[2] It is a type of valved bugle, developed in Germany in the early 19th century from earlier traditional valveless bugles, and to replace the keyed bugle. Flugelhorns usually have piston valves in North America, France, Britain, and Commonwealth countries, and rotary valves in central and eastern Europe.

History

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The German word Flügel means wing or flank in English. In early 18th century Germany, a ducal hunt leader known as a Flügelmeister used a Flügelhorn to direct his wing of the hunting party. It was originally a form of signal horn called a Halbmond (lit. half-moon), a large, semicircular brass or silver valveless horn with a conical bore.[3] Military use dates from the Seven Years' War, during which the instrument was employed as a predecessor of the bugle.[4]

The first version of a valved bugle was sold in Berlin in 1828 by Heinrich Stölzel, inventor of the first piston valves.[5] Those early valved instruments were built to replace the keyed bugle, and retained its red brass or copper bell construction. The valved bugles also provided the Paris-based instrument maker Adolphe Sax, creator of the saxophone, with the inspiration for his saxhorn family of instruments, including the B♭ soprano size which served as the model for the modern piston-valve flugelhorn.[4][6]

A compact version of the rotary valve flugelhorn is the oval shaped kuhlohorn in B♭ developed in the late 1890s by Johannes Kuhlo. Kuhlo and his father Eduard Kuhlo founded the Posaunenchor movement, which introduced a brass choir to German Protestant churches. The kuhlohorn provided a softer soprano, closer to the human voice than the trumpet.[7]

Construction

Lua error in Module:Multiple_image at line 163: attempt to perform arithmetic on local 'totalwidth' (a nil value). The flugelhorn is generally pitched in B♭, like most trumpets and cornets. It usually has three piston valves, though instruments made in central and eastern Europe are built with rotary valves. Some modern flugelhorns feature a fourth valve that lowers the pitch by a perfect fourth, like the fourth valve on most euphoniums, tubas, and piccolo trumpets. This adds a useful low range that, coupled with the flugelhorn's darker sound, extends the instrument's capabilities.[8]

The flugelhorn is distinguished from both the cornet and trumpet by its wider conical bore, which undergoes conical expansion for a longer proportion of its tubing. The flugelhorn's (necessarily cylindrical) valves are mounted directly onto the leadpipe a short distance from the mouthpiece receiver, leaving a much longer proportion of its length to gradually expand into the bell flare. On the trumpet and cornet, the leadpipe is much longer, and the valves are mounted after the first bow, resulting in a higher proportion of cylindrical bore tubing.[8]

The internal profile of a flugelhorn mouthpiece is more deeply conical than trumpet and cornet mouthpieces, which are shaped more like a cup, but less conical than a horn mouthpiece.

A bass flugelhorn in C, called a fiscorn, is used in pairs in the cobla bands of Catalonia, that provide music for sardana dancers.[9]

Performance

The valves on the flugelhorn give it the same facility and agility as the cornet or trumpet, but it can be more difficult to control in the high register from approximately written G5, where in general it locks onto notes less easily.[citation needed] It employs the same fingering system, so its similarity in size means it can be played by trumpet and cornet players, with some adjustment to breath and embouchure.

The flugelhorn is used frequently in jazz and popular music. It figured prominently in many of Burt Bacharach's 1960s pop song arrangements, and had a solo role in Bert Kaempfert's 1962 recording of "That Happy Feeling".

The flugelhorn is found in the Dutch and Belgian Fanfareorkesten (lit. fanfare orchestras). The flugelhorns have a significant role in these orchestras, often 10 to 20 in number. They are pitched in B♭ and occasionally add an E♭ solo part, although it is often played on an E♭ trumpet or cornet.

Flugelhorns have occasionally been used as the alto or low soprano voice in a drum and bugle corps, and it is also a standard member of the British brass band. The 1996 British film Brassed Off features a flugelhorn performance of the Adagio from Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez as a pivotal plot device.[10] The solo was played by Paul Hughes.[11]

Timbre

File:Short flugelhorn excerpt.ogg File:Trumpet playing short excerpt for comparison with flugelhorn.ogg

The timbre of the flugelhorn is softer than the trumpet or cornet. Its wide conical bore dampens the higher frequency partials in the sound to produce a mellow, more rounded tone quality compared to instruments with a cylindrical bore at the same pitch.[12] The sound of the flugelhorn has been described as halfway between a trumpet and a horn, whereas the cornet's sound is halfway between a trumpet and a flugelhorn.[13]

Notable players

Joe Bishop, as a member of the Woody Herman band in 1936, was one of the earliest jazz musicians to use the flugelhorn. Shorty Rogers and Kenny Baker began playing it in the early 1950s, and Clark Terry used it in Duke Ellington's orchestra in the mid-1950s. Chet Baker recorded several albums on the instrument in the 1950s and 1960s. Miles Davis further popularized the instrument in jazz on his early albums Miles Ahead and Sketches of Spain, both arranged by Gil Evans.[3]

While most jazz flugelhorn players use the instrument as an auxiliary to the trumpet, in the 1970s Chuck Mangione gave up playing the trumpet and concentrated on the flugelhorn alone, notably on his jazz-pop hit song "Feels So Good" (1978).[14]

Pop flugelhorn players include Probyn Gregory (Brian Wilson Band), Ronnie Wilson of The Gap Band, Rick Braun, Mic Gillette, Jeff Oster, Zach Condon of the band Beirut, Scott Spillane of the band Neutral Milk Hotel, Terry Kirkman of the band The Association, Annie Chappell and Rashawn Ross of the Dave Matthews Band. Marvin Stamm played the flugelhorn solo on "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" by Paul and Linda McCartney.[15]

Classical flugelhorn players include Sergei Nakariakov and Kirill Soldatov.[16]

Repertoire

The flugelhorn appears occasionally in orchestral music. Works with flugelhorn include Igor Stravinsky's Threni (1957),[17] Ralph Vaughan Williams's Symphony No. 9 (1958),[18] and Michael Tippett's Symphony No. 3 (1972).[19] The flugelhorn is often used for the post horn solo in Mahler's Symphony No. 3 (1898),[20] and for the soprano flicorni called for in the fourth movement of Ottorino Respighi's Pini di Roma (1924), intended to be played on replicas of the buccine from Ancient Rome.[21]

Contemporary trumpet concertos sometimes require the player to double on flugelhorn. In H. K. Gruber's trumpet concerto Busking (2007), the soloist is directed to play a flugelhorn for the slow second movement.[21][22]

References

  1. ↑ Yurochko 1993, p. 182.
  2. ↑ "Flügelhorn". Encyclopaedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/art/flugelhorn. Retrieved 2 September 2018. 
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Koehler 2014, p. 55.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Baines, Anthony; Herbert, Trevor (2001). "Flugelhorn". Grove Music Online (8th ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.09887. 
  5. ↑ Baines 1976, p. 230.
  6. ↑ "Flugelhorn (Contralto Saxhorn) - Adolphe Edouard Sax (1859-1945)". https://artsandculture.google.com/asset/flugelhorn-contralto-saxhorn-adolphe-edouard-sax-1859-1945/zwHxMZYvul94ig. 
  7. ↑ Herbert, Myers & Wallace 2019, p. 239, Kuhlohorn.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 Herbert, Myers & Wallace 2019, p. 177, Flugelhorn.
  9. ↑ Herbert, Myers & Wallace 2019, p. 174, Fiscorn.
  10. ↑ Watkins, Jack (24 April 2017). "How we made Brassed Off". The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/film/2017/apr/24/how-we-made-brassed-off-tara-fitzgerald-stephen-tompkinson-interview. 
  11. ↑ "Brassed Off (1996)". https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115744/soundtrack. 
  12. ↑ Herbert, Myers & Wallace 2019, pp. 401–402, "Timbre".
  13. ↑ Forsyth 1914, p. 165.
  14. ↑ Sweeting, Adam (5 August 2025). "Chuck Mangione obituary". The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/music/2025/aug/05/chuck-mangione-obituary. 
  15. ↑ "Uncle Albert - Admiral Halsey by Paul McCartney". https://www.songfacts.com/facts/paul-mccartney/uncle-albert-admiral-halsey. 
  16. ↑ "A. Vivaldi Double Cello Concerto g-moll (arr. for 2 flugelhorns)". 9 April 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quWNwBvF1hU. 
  17. ↑ "From The Turntable – Stravinsky: Threni". The Harvard Crimson. 13 January 1960. https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1960/1/13/stravinsky-threni-pcolumbia-symphony-orchestra-schola/. 
  18. ↑ Stumpf II, Robert. "CD Review: Leopold Stokowski Conducts New Music". http://www.classical.net/music/recs/reviews/c/cal00539a.php. 
  19. ↑ Clements, Andrew (28 February 2019). "Tippett: Symphonies Nos 3 & 4; Symphony in B flat review | Andrew Clements's classical CD of the week". https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/feb/28/tippett-symphonies-nos-3-4-symphony-in-b-flat-review-crisp-sinewy-revival. 
  20. ↑ Mahler, Gustav (1898). "Symphony No. 3, GMW 31". Josef Weinberger. https://imslp.org/wiki/Symphony_No.3_(Mahler,_Gustav). 
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 Herbert, Myers & Wallace 2019, pp. 176–177, Flugelhorn.
  22. ↑ "BIS Records - HK Gruber - Busking". https://bis.se/composer/gruber-hk-heinz-karl/hk-gruber-busking. 

Bibliography



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