The Vienna horn (German : Wiener Horn) is a type of musical horn used primarily in Vienna, Austria, for playing orchestral or classical music. It is used throughout Vienna, including the Vienna Philharmonic and Wiener Staatsoper .
During the nineteenth century, a number of experiments were made in adding valves to the natural horn to enable it to play chromatically without the need for hand-stopping. These experiments included adding piston valves (as used in modern trumpets) to a single F horn. The horn was still crooked, by inserting other tubing, to re-tune the instrument for music written in base keys other than F.
The Vienna horn uses a unique form of double-cylinder valve associated with the Viennese firm Uhlmann of the 1840s known as a pumpenvalve. A pumpenvalve is similar to the standard piston valve, but it is not pushed directly inward. Instead, long push-rods reach across to each lever key (as with rotary valves), allowing either a fast or slow change in the valve, by lever speed. The pumpenvalve allows the air to flow straight when the valves are not actuated. When a valve is engaged, each cylinder redirects the air stream 90 degrees in one bend, lessening the resistance felt by the player. This type of valve is one of the many contributing factors to the liquid legato that is one of the trademarks of the Viennese school. However, the indirect linkage between the fingers and the valves can make the action slower and therefore make quick technical passages more difficult for the player. [1]
The internal diameter of the Vienna horn is also smaller than more modern horns. This bore size and shape is actually very close to the design of the valve-less natural horns. The removable crooks (usually an F and A and/or B♭) are also smoothly tapered for the length of the horn. Thus, there is no "compromise" (of dual tubing) as found in the modern double horn and triple horn.
Although subsequent developments, including the rotary valve and double horn, supplanted these horns in most places, the pumpenvalve horn was retained in Vienna because it sounds more like the natural horn: with a more mellow sound and arguably smoother legato. This is due in part to the piston valves and in part to the larger throated (but smaller diameter) bell-flare still used with these instruments. The Vienna horn has remained virtually unchanged since the mid-nineteenth century.
Horn players who use the Vienna horn also use a natural horn mouthpiece, which is less concave than a typical double horn mouthpiece. A standard horn mouthpiece is more concave, partly to facilitate the playing of lower notes because of lower impedance of the double horn. [2]
A brass instrument is a musical instrument that produces sound by sympathetic vibration of air in a tubular resonator in sympathy with the vibration of the player's lips. Brass instruments are also called labrosones or labrophones, from Latin and Greek elements meaning 'lip' and 'sound'.
The cornet is a brass instrument similar to the trumpet but distinguished from it by its conical bore, more compact shape, and mellower tone quality. The most common cornet is a transposing instrument in B♭, though there is also a soprano cornet in E♭ and cornets in A and C. All are unrelated to the Renaissance and early Baroque cornett.
The euphonium is a medium-sized, 3 or 4-valve, often compensating, conical-bore, tenor-voiced brass instrument that derives its name from the Ancient Greek word εὔφωνος euphōnos, meaning "well-sounding" or "sweet-voiced". The euphonium is a valved instrument. Nearly all current models have piston valves, though some models with rotary valves do exist.
The flugelhorn, also spelled fluegelhorn, flugel horn, or flügelhorn, is a brass instrument that resembles the trumpet and cornet but has a wider, more conical bore. Like trumpets and cornets, most flugelhorns are pitched in B♭. It is a type of valved bugle, developed in Germany in the early 19th century from a traditional English valveless bugle. The first version of a valved bugle was sold by Heinrich Stölzel in Berlin in 1828. The valved bugle provided Adolphe Sax with the inspiration for his B♭ soprano (contralto) saxhorns, on which the modern-day flugelhorn is modeled.
The French horn is a brass instrument made of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. The double horn in F/B♭ is the horn most often used by players in professional orchestras and bands, although the descant and triple horn have become increasingly popular. A musician who plays a horn is known as a horn player or hornist.
The trombone is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips (embouchure) cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate. Most brass instruments use valves to alter the pitch, but trombones have a telescoping slide mechanism instead. Many modern trombone models also have a valve attachment which lowers the pitch of the instrument. Variants such as the valve trombone and superbone have three valves similar to those on the trumpet.
The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet with the highest register in the brass family, to the bass trumpet, which is pitched one octave below the standard B♭ or C Trumpet.
The tuba is the lowest-pitched musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, the sound is produced by lip vibration – a buzz – into a mouthpiece. It first appeared in the mid-19th century, making it one of the newer instruments in the modern orchestra and concert band. The tuba largely replaced the ophicleide. Tuba is Latin for "trumpet".
The bass trumpet is a type of low trumpet which was first developed during the 1820s in Germany. It is usually pitched in 8' C or 9' B♭ today, but is sometimes built in E♭ and is treated as a transposing instrument sounding either an octave, a sixth or a ninth lower than written, depending on the pitch of the instrument. Having valves and the same tubing length, the bass trumpet is quite similar to the valve trombone, although the bass trumpet has a harder, more metallic tone. Certain modern manufacturers offering 'valve trombones' and 'bass trumpets' use the same tubing, valves, and bell, in different configurations - in these cases the bass trumpet is virtually identical to the valve trombone.
The tenor horn is a brass instrument in the saxhorn family and is usually pitched in E♭. It has a bore that is mostly conical, like the flugelhorn and euphonium, and normally uses a deep, cornet-like mouthpiece.
The mellophone is a brass instrument typically pitched in the key of F, though models in B♭, E♭, C, and G have also historically existed. It has a conical bore, like that of the euphonium and flugelhorn. The mellophone is used as the middle-voiced brass instrument in marching bands and drum and bugle corps in place of French horns, and can also be used to play French horn parts in concert bands and orchestras.
The keyed trumpet is a brass instrument that makes use of keyed openings in its bore rather than extensions of the length of the bore as the means of playing all the notes of the chromatic scale. The instrument's popularity reached its high-point around the turn of the nineteenth century; but it waned with the emergence of the valved trumpet in the early nineteenth century and it is rarely seen in modern performances. Prior to the invention of the keyed trumpet, the prominent trumpet of the time was the natural trumpet.
A crook, also sometimes called a shank, is an exchangeable segment of tubing in a natural horn which is used to change the length of the pipe, altering the fundamental pitch and harmonic series which the instrument can sound, and thus the key in which it plays.
Marching brass instruments are brass instruments specially designed to be played while moving. Most instruments do not have a marching version - only the following have marching versions:
The most frequently encountered types of trombone today are the tenor and bass, though as with many other instrument families such as the clarinet, the trombone has been built in sizes from piccolo to contrabass. Although trombones are usually constructed with a slide to change the pitch, valve trombones instead use the set of three valves common on other brass instruments.
A water key is a valve or tap used to allow the drainage of accumulated fluid from wind instruments. It is otherwise known as a water valve or spit valve. They are most often located where gravity assists the fluid collection, in such valved instruments such as trumpets, cornets and flugelhorns under the lowest bend of the main tuning slide and on valve slides. On the trombone, it is on the lower side of the bend in the hand slide. Baritone saxophones have a water key attached below the top loop of the instrument.
Brass instrument valves are valves used to change the length of tubing of a brass instrument allowing the player to reach the notes of various harmonic series. Each valve pressed diverts the air stream through additional tubing, individually or in conjunction with other valves. This lengthens the vibrating air column thus lowering the fundamental tone and associated harmonic series produced by the instrument. Valves in brass instruments require regular maintenance and lubrication to ensure fast and reliable movement.
The "Wiener Klangstil" is the particular way in which Viennese and – to an extent – Austrian orchestras interpret orchestral and chamber works, preferring a performance style and tonal qualities markedly different from international practice. This term to describe the characteristics of the Viennese style of playing was first defined by Gregor Widholm in 2006 in the Österreichisches Musiklexikon, vol. 5.
A horn is any of a family of musical instruments made of a tube, usually made of metal and often curved in various ways, with one narrow end into which the musician blows, and a wide end from which sound emerges. In horns, unlike some other brass instruments such as the trumpet, the bore gradually increases in width through most of its length—that is to say, it is conical rather than cylindrical. In jazz and popular-music contexts, the word may be used loosely to refer to any wind instrument, and a section of brass or woodwind instruments, or a mixture of the two, is called a horn section in these contexts.
The German horn is a brass instrument made of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell, and in bands and orchestras is the most widely used of three types of horn, the other two being the French horn and the Vienna horn. Its use among professional players has become so universal that it is only in France and Vienna that any other kind of horn is used today. A musician who plays the German horn is called a horn player. The word "German" is used only to distinguish this instrument from the now-rare French and Viennese instruments. Although the expression "French horn" is still used colloquially in English for any orchestral horn, since the 1930s professional musicians and scholars have generally avoided this term in favour of just "horn". Vienna horns today are played only in Vienna, and are made only by Austrian firms. German horns, by contrast, are not all made by German manufacturers, nor are all French-style instruments made in France.
