Trombone (French and  Italian: trombone, German: Posaune): A brass aerophone with a cup-shaped mouthpiece and predominantly cylindrical bore. In its most familiar form it is the tenor-baritone counterpart of the orchestral trumpet but it is characterized by a telescopic slide with which the player varies the length of the tube (except in the valve trombone): hence the term 'slide trombone' (French: Trombone coulisse, German: Zugposaune, Italian: trombone a tiro; French and English up to the 18th century, saqueboute, sackbut). Both the Italian and German name for trombone are derived from term for trumpet: Trombone (large trumpet) from the Italian tromba (trumpet), and Posaune from the Buzune, derived in turn from the French buisine (straight trumpet). The etymology of saqueboute whence English 'sackbut', 'sagbut', 'shagbolt' etc.) is not certain but is probably from Old French sacquer. 'to draw out' (e.g. a sword), though a Spanish derivation, sacabuche, 'draw out the innards', has also been suggested.

Slide Trombone

The structure of a slide trombone has two parallel inner tubers of the slide are connected at their upper ends by a cross-stay. The mouthpiece is inserted into the top of one tube; the bell joint fits on to the top of the other, the tube being either tapered externally or attached to the bell by means of a threaded collar. Over the stationary inner tubes runs the slide proper, which consists of two tubes joined at the bottom by a U-bow (with a water key for releasing condensed moisture) and at the top by a second cross-stay, which the player grasps loosely with the right hand. Friction is minimised by thickening the inner tubes slightly at their lower ends to provide running surfaces for the outer slide. Formerly these short sleeves or 'stockings' were of a different metal from that of the slide; in modern manufacture they are formed integrally with the inner tubes, which are of nickel alloy, or are omitted altogether, as the inner tubes can now be made of alloys producing much smaller frictional forces the bore of the instrument is cylindrical for about two thirds of its length and expands gradually through the bell. The bore is usually between 12*3 mm and 13*8 mm in diameter, though in bass trombones it may exceed 14 mm. The bell ranges from about 17*8 cm across in a tenor trombone to about 24-6 cm in a bass. The U-bend of the bell joint is usually fitted with a tuning-slide and may include a counter-balance. The slide technique is based on seven positions that lower the pitch of the harmonic series progressively by semitones: the 1st (highest) position is with the slide fully retracted, the 7th (lowest) with it fully extended.

The distance between adjacent positions increases as the slide is extended On the tenor trombone, for instance, from 1st to 2nd position is about 8 cm, from 6th to 7th position about 12 cm. The length of the slide is determined by the extension required to fill in the interval between the 3rd and 2nd harmonics (f and Bb on the tenor trombone). The modern trombone stands in 9' Bb' (total length of tubing. with the slide retracted, 9 feet) and is made in two principal forms: the simple trombone in Bb; and the Bb/F trombone, which incorporates in the bell joint an 'F attachment' to lower the pitch of the instrument by a 4th to 12' F. (A widely used variant of the Bb/F trombone is the Bb/F/E trombone, which has two attachments to lower the pitch to F' or to E'; fig. 1c.) The practice of using Bb and Bb/F trombones has almost done away with what survived in the 20th century of the ancient use of three different sizes of slide trombone: alto, tenor and bass. The Bb trombone, however, is still often called a 'tenor trombone'. Wide-bore models of the Bb/F trombone are often termed 'bass trombone', and are used for the lowest of the three Trombone parts that have normally been written in orchestral and band music. The trombone is a non-transposing instrument; the tenor trombone is termed Bb because its natural series of harmonics is on Bb'.

Trombone History to 1750

The trombone appeared after the mid-15th century, evidently as an advance on the Renaissance slide trumpet, and was possibly first produced by Flemish makers who supplied wind instruments to the court of Burgundy. The first reliable depiction of the instrument occurs. just before 1490, in Italian church painting. Olivier de la Marche's Mèmoires (1488) contain an earlier written reference to a trompette-saicqueboute used by one of the haut menestrels in a motet played at the wedding of the Duke of Burgundy with Margaret of York at Bruges in 1468. 'Sackbut', used in that context to qualify 'trumpet', stands on its own in Tinctoris's De inventione et usu musicae (c1486): having mentioned shawms, Tinctoris wrote '... however. for the lowest contratenor parts and often for any contratenor part one joins to the shawmists [tibicines] trompeters [tubicines] who play very harmoniously on that kind of tuba which is called trompone in Italy and sacque-boute in France. Virdung's Musica getutsht (1511) includes a woodcut of a trombone that closely resembles the earliest surviving instruments - tenor trombones by Erasmus Schnitzer (1551; now in Nuremberg, Germanishes Nationalmuseum) and Jorg Neuschel (1557; formerly in the Galpin Collection, now owned by René Clemencic, Vienna). The bells of these instruments have virtually no terminal flare (thus resembling 16th-century trumpet bells); the diameter at the rim is only 12 to 13 cm. The slide bore of the Neuschel trombone is about 12 mm in diameter, somewhat larger than other instruments of the period. There is no expansion of the tube until after the U-bow of the bell. The stays are flat and are secured to the slide branches by binged clasps lined with leather, which give flexibility and allow the whole instrument to be dismantled (most of its parts being fitted together without soldered joints). Surviving mouthpieces have hemispherical cups, wide rims and wide, sharp-angled throats. Neuschel's correspondence from 1541-2 (published by Eitner in Monatshefte für Musikgeschichte, 1877) mentions Grosse- or Quart-Posaune and Mittel-Posaune, indicating the existence of the bass trombone and suggesting that a smaller instrument than the tenor was also made. The terms alt and tenor seem to have been adopted late in the century; another name for the tenor at this time was gemeine, 'ordinary'.

Praetorius listed and illustrated four sizes of trombone: Alt or Discant Posaune (comparable to a modern alto), Cemeine Posaune (comparable to a modern tenor), Quart- and Quint-Posaunen (bass instruments a 4th and a 5th below the tenor), and Octav Posaune (contrabass, an octave below the tenor). The Octav Posaune could apparently be made with a double slide (Praetorius's wording on this point is not clear). A Swedish contrabass dated 1639 (now at the Stockholm Musikhistoriska Museet) has a normal slide. Other sizes mentioned in town and court inventories are Terzposaune and Secundposaune (a 3rd and a 2nd below the tenor), perhaps represented by two or three early 17th-century specimens that are larger than normal tenor . These may have been employed to avoid using crooks when playing music in downwards transposition. Inserted between slide and bell joint, a crook lowered the pitch of the tenor by a whole tone or more. According to Mersenne the tenor had a crook to lower its pitch by a 4th, enabling it to be used as a bass. Speer contributed information on slide technique. In the 17th and 18th centuries the positions were counted diatonic- ally, as tone, tone, semitone. With the slide closed, Thetenor stood in A' (nearly equivalent to modern B'). From the A' harmonic sties the extensions were to G. F and E. chromatic notes were considered as half-positions and 8b was obtained by full extension of the slide (modern 7th positions. Speer also mentioned an alto in D and a bass in D. Several 17th- and 18th-century Nuremberg bass trombones incorporate a small slide in the bell joint. pushed backwards by a long rod. It could scarcely have been used while playing, but no doubt enabled the player to lower the Quart to Quint quickly without the diminished stability that insertion of a crook brings to a large instrument. Structural changes during the 16th and 17th centuries included enlargement of the bell and alterations to the stays. From about 1660, while the flat stay was retained on the bell joint, those on the slide were tubular, consisting of two sections, one end of each fixed rigidly to each limb of the slid and the other ends resting one inside the other in a loose fit to provide flexibility (this lasted until about 1850. It was used with cornets, to support voices in churches, and in mixed consorts like that depicted on the title-page of the last volume of Lassus's Patrocinium musices (Munich, 1589). consisting of violin, bass viol, flute, cornets, two trombones, lute and virginal. As at that time music was arranged for the instruments ad hoc by the musician in charge, it is rarely possible to point to 16th-century compositions in which trombones were specified, although they were constantly required to participate. In the earliest works with specified instrumentation trombones figure prominently. They were the Gabrieli's' main vehicle for the lower parts, and one of Giovanni Gabrieli's canzonas requires 12 trombones which play every part from alto downwards in three juxtaposed choirs, the treble parts being taken by two cornets and a violin. Schütz employed up to four trombone both in lively figuration in imitation of other instruments and in slow-moving polyphony. The 16th-and 17th-century trombone was designed as an instrument of medium sonority. Mersenne stated that it should not be sounded in imitation of the trumpet, but should approach the softness of voices to avoid spoiling the harmony of the other instruments and the voices with which it was blended. An instance of trombone combined with violin and organ is recorded in Aubrey's Lives of Eminent Men: Sir John Davies was a great lover of Musick and especially of John Coparario's Fansies, which were for a sagbot, a violin and an organ, equivalent to five parts. These were performed by Chistopher Gibbons his organist (since Doctor), that was sagbuteer (and his Butler) to king Charles I and Humphrey Madge (his valet de chambre) violinist.

Technically the trombone was considered hardly less agile than cornet or violin, and Mersenne knew a player who could improvise divisions in semiquaves (trombone divisions with semiquavers occur in Francesco Rognone-Taeggio's Selva di varii passaggi, Venice, 1620). Some English and German 17th-century music for a band of two cornets and three trombones (alto, tenor and bass) survives. This includes pieces in Adson's Courtly Masquing Ayres (1621) marked 'for Cornets and Sagbuts', and Locke's Music for his Majesty's Sagbutts and Cornets (1661; two pieces in manuscript score are in GB-Lbm, and the manuscript partbooks, without the alto are in GB-Cfm). Among the German examples Pezel's Fünff-stimmigte blasende Music (Frankfurt, 1685) is particularly attractive. In England this type of band did not outlive the 17th century. Talbot (c1695) quoted the famous London trumpet maker William Bull as stating: The chief use the Sackbutt here in England is in consort with our Waits or English Hautbois [shawms]. It was left off towards the latter end of King Charles II and gave place to the French Basson [bassoon].

In southern Germany and Austria, however, bandsmen continued to use trombones, and solo parts written by Fux and others at the imperial chapel at Vienna (in the late 17th century and the early 18th) show the adventurous treatment given to the instrument, especially the alto.

Trombone History since 1750

Although used in church musk (particularly for doubling the lower voices,) and in small ensembles, the trombone did not become n part of the orchestra until the the 18th century. At this period the instrument had strong associations of the ecclesiastical of the supernatural. Gluck wrote for the traditional trio of alto, tenor and bass (e.g. in the oracle scene of Alceste), as did Gossec, who also scored for the single trombone joined to a bass part. Mozart used trombones only in his operas and sacred works; his dramatic use of the instrument is particularly well exemplified by the supper scene of Don Giovanni, and he provided a notorious solo for the instrument in the 'Tuba mirum' of the Requiem (not without precedent in his earlier church music). In Germany the reorganisation of military bands gave the trombone the role of strengthening the bass line, though the trio was maintained in large infantry bands as well as in the orchestra. Technical changes included realignment of the old high A pitch (of the tenor) to concert and band pitch Bb. and acceptance or seven chromatic slide positions instead of the previous diatonic positions. At the same time the trend in France and Germany was towards performing all orchestral trombone parts on the Bb tenor instrument. Early in the 19th century in Germany Gottfried Weber and Fröhlich recommended playing the Bb trombone with a small mouthpiece for alto parts, and using a wider-bore Bb instrument with 8 large mouthpiece for bass. Up to the mid-century German tenor trombones usually retained the traditional bore of 11 4 mm, while the bass trombones were proportionately wider and had broadly expanding bells to add to the volume of their tone. The use of large-bore tenors (essentially tenor trombones built with the bore and bell of an F bass trombone) began after 1850, in military bands. Brahms wrote for large-bore instruments; consequently leading English players even into the early 20th century changed to instruments of wider bore for works by Brahms and Richard Strauss and for the later works of Wagner.
Romantic composers considered the trombone capable of expressing a broad range of emotional situations: Berlioz said the instrument could portray everything from 'religious accent, calm and imposing ... to wild clamours of the orgy'. With its formidable reserve of power it is not surprising that the trombone was sometimes, used as if loudness were its main attribute The military bard buccin, a freak design of trombone with a dragon-headed bell, typifies this image. According to Algernon Rose (Talks with Bandsmen, 1895) trombonists' propensity for playing too loudly was the reason one conductor, about 1850, employed trombones designed with the bell pointing back over the shoulder. Over-the-shoulder trombones were also used in at least one American band (the Boston Brass Band) to match the design of the other instruments, which were all over-the-shoulder horns. 19th century composers often limited themselves to a stereotyped usage of the trombone for reinforcement of tutti passages and for background harmonies in soft passages; because of the preponderance of 19th-century music in 20th-century concert programmes, it is with these least interesting sides of the trombone's character that audiences are most familiar. In dance music, however, arrangers have made liberal use of the trombone's inimitable cantabile, which dance band trombonists execute so well they are sometimes credited with having discovered new techniques. Other technical developments have been largely due to the influence of jazz musicians. Jazz trombonists, using a variety of mutes for expressive effects, have shown that a greater range of timbres is available than is usually employed even by modern symphonic composers. Vibrato - always a technical possibility has become part of the trombone soloist's style. Slide technique has become more flexible, and the instrument's range has been extended at both ends, making the feasible range of the tenor trombone from E, the lowest pedal note, to g" or above. Although the trombone is now seldom heard in the concert hall as a solo instrument apart from jazz, several 19th-century players made reputations as soloists, including C. T. Queisser and F. A. Belcke in Germany, and in France A. G Dieppo, whose Méthode (1840) indicates that he used a slide tenor of curiously slender proportions (a bore of 1 cm and bell of 12 cm). Very narrow bores are indeed found in some surviving French trombones of the period by Courtois and others.

Origins      

One of the earliest "horn-like" instruments, the lur, dates back to sixth century B.C. Made of bronze, these horns were used on the battlefields by Scandinavian clans.  It makes a loud, obnoxious sound, just perfect for striking terror into the enemy camp.

Shortly thereafter, the horn began to appear in the concert halls and theaters.   Too raucous for inclusion with the fine oboes and violins in the orchestra pit though, at first the hunting horns were used only onstage in scenes depicting, naturally, the hunt. The horn at this point was not yet ready for serious artistic endeavors - only as "special effects," to give flashy theatrics to stage productions.

Meanwhile in Bohemia, Austria and Germany a more refined school of horn playing was developing under the auspices of Count Franz Anton von Sporck.  The gentleman Count was, for all of his life, a hunting aficionado. He even founded The Order of St. Hubert (the patron saint of the hunt).  Then while visiting France in the 1680's, Count von Sporck heard some cors de chasse at a hunt. Immediately after hearing the French hunting horns, von Sporck instructed that two men of his consort be taught to play the instrument. These two men, Wenzel Sweda and Peter Röllig became the source from which horn playing in all of Bohemia and Germany grew.

Crooks and Hand Horns

Beginning with the cor de chasse (French for hunting horn), the horn began its evolution into a refined concert hall instrument. From early beginnings in stage settings depicting the hunt, Baroque composers began writing more complex and artistic music for this horn. Yet, the corno da caccia (Italian for hunting horn), was still a single, fixed length of tubing and its musical potential was limited to the natural harmonic series.

The most useful range for melodic writing was in the upper harmonics (the "clarino" range) where the natural harmonics are close together. It was still necessary however to switch horns if a composer wanted the hornist to change keys. The impracticality of this soon led intelligent horn makers in the early 1700s to the invention of the crook.

The crook was simply a section of coiled tubing that, when inserted into the horn would change the overall length of the instrument. Changing the length would also change the pitch (the longer the tube, the lower the pitch), allowing the same entire harmonic series, but now, in a different key. Instead of carrying many instruments in different keys, horn players would only have to carry one horn with a set of crooks of varying lengths.  They could change the key of the instrument simply by inserting a new crook.

Hand horn technique

It wasn't just the instrument that was evolving though.  The players were getting more clever as well. By 1760 a new technique in playing had firmly caught on that was taking the horn to the next step in its evolution.  The Bohemian virtuoso hornist in the court of Dresden, Anton Hampel (1711-1771) is generally credited with developing and teaching the technique that had been known by some hornists as early as the 1720s.   Quite simple really: by manipulating the right hand inside the bell of the horn, he could play tones other than the natural harmonics, thus filling in the gaps between the notes of the harmonic series. Coupled with the use of crooks, this new "hand horn" technique opened up exciting new possibilities for musical expression, and composers of the Classical Period eagerly embraced it.

In Europe, horns gained popularity in the trendy sport of hunting. As this aristocratic sport spread, horn-makers experimented with different shapes and sizes to increase the range of notes possible.  In 1636, French musical scholar Marin Mersenne wrote of four different kinds of horns in his Harmonie Universelle: Le grand cor (the big horn), the cor à plusiers tours, (the horn of several turns), le cor qui n'a qu'un seul tour (the horn which has only one turn), and le huchet (the horn with which one calls from afar). Horns such as the cor de chasse and trompe de chasse (pictured left) fall into this latter category.

The Cor Solo and the Waldhorn were among the first instruments designed for hand horn technique. The Cor Solo was still somewhat limited in its range of keys though, as in the case of the cor solo pictured left - it has attachments for only G, F, E, Eb and D transpositions. The Waldhorn had a similar system - a master crook producing the highest key needed, and optional successive crooks, each adding more tubing, to produce harmonics for lower keys.

It wasn't until Anton Hampel encouraged a Dresden instrument maker, Johann Werner, to construct a horn with detachable crooks for BOTH the mouthpipe and the middle of the horn that a full range of transpositions was possible on one instrument. The Orchestra horn, as it was called, was honed and perfected between 1750 and 1755.

With the Orchestra horn (pictured left), all transpositions are possible, from Bb basso to Bb alto.  And utilizing hand horn tehcnique, it could now play a full chromatic scale in any key.  The horn was no longer a "special effect," but was firmly established as a refined musical instrument, and had become a regular member of the symphony orchestra (which was also beginning to grow as other instruments were added).

The horn had even become a solo instrument for which Haydn wrote two concertos, and Mozart wrote four.

Hampel was regarded by some as the "father" of the horn as a musical instrument because of his cultivation and teaching of the hand horn technique. A new era of musical artistry blossomed from his contributions. Hampel's most outstanding pupil, Johann Wenzel Stich (1746-1803), also known as Giovanni Punto, became a virtuoso horn soloist of great reputation in Europe. Not only did Punto compose his own original pieces, but he also inspired other composers, such as Mozart and Beethoven, to compose great works for the horn.

Although the Orchestra horn was a marked improvement in horn technology, it still had some significant drawbacks. To change keys, the player still had to stop playing and change crooks. And it was cumbersome to carry around all of the necessary crooks. To accommodate these concerns many ideas came about - including an odd instrument that was thought to be the answer.

Omnitonic Horn by Charles Sax
Brussels, c. 1824

The Valve

The piston valve, which moves up and down, soon inspired another development in horn technology.  About 1832, the rotary valve, which turns in a circle, was invented by Joseph Riedl in Vienna.

Late in the 19 century, a German horn maker, Fritz Kruspe, was one of the first to manufacture both "single" and "double horns" with rotary valves. With the double horn, he crafted an instrument having a fourth valve that routed the air through shorter tubing that changed the entire pitch of the horn from F to Bb.  Today, the double horn is the most commonly used horn worldwide.

Doubles, Descants and Triples

The Compensating Double

In the late 1950's Richard Merewether and Robert Paxman began making double descants - a dual-bore full double horn pitched in F and F alto. Soon a B-flat/F alto double horn was also created, which allowed the player to use the B-flat side for most of the range and the F alto side for the extreme high notes.

Triple Horns

Merewether also developed a triple horn that is constructed of three full sections of tubing - pitched in F, B-flat and F alto. Using hollow valve rotors, he was able to keep the weight of the instrument down somewhat, but triple horns are still among the heaviest instruments around.  Many principal horn-players in symphony orchestras today use descant and/or triple horns for added security in the upper register.

A Branch of the Family Tree - The Wagner Tuba

The German word for Wagner Tubas is "Tuben," which in the German language is plural.  However, some English speaking musicians use the word "Tuben" when referring to only one Wagner Tuba, adding an "s" ("tubens") to speak of more than one.  Notwithstanding improper grammatical usage, they are speaking of one of the branches of the horn's family tree.

This brass instrument and relative of the horn was invented in the late 1800's to meet the specifications of the German opera composer Richard Wagner. He wanted an instrument that would add depth to the brass section and provide a tonal color that would bridge the colors of the horn and the trombone.

Originally built either in B flat or F (tenor tuba or bass tuba), several companies in the Twentieth Century also started making a double Wagner Tuba, combining both B flat and F, on the same principal as a double horn.

A single Wagner Tuba has four, in-line, rotary valves manipulated by the left hand. The valves work in the same manner as on most French horns: first valve lowers the pitch by a whole step, 2nd valve by a half step, 3rd valve by one and a half steps. The 4th valve (very rare on the horn, but common on the Wagner Tuba) lowers the pitch by two and a half steps (a perfect fourth). On the double, there are three in-line valves, and a thumb valve which changes the key of the instrument from F to B flat.

Wagner used them in all four operas in "The Ring." Bruckner used them in his Symphonies 7, 8 and 9, and Stravinsky used two in "The Rite of Spring." Other composers like Richard Strauss, Edgard Varese, Arnold Schoenberg, and even the contemporary composer Christopher Rouse have all used Wagner Tubas in their orchestral works. Hollywood has also discovered the Wagner Tuba, it was first used in the 1968 film "Ice Station Zebra."

Some horn players dislike playing the Wagner Tuba because it is inherently out of tune and requires lots of fussing and a very good sense of intonation to play it well. Others love that challenge, especially because on most engagements where they are asked to play on both horn and Wagner Tuba, the contract specifies that the player be paid "doubling" fees - an extra percentage (up to 50%) higher than the basic rate paid for the engagement if playing on just one instrument.