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The keyed bugle

20 Jun 07 - 04:11 PM (#2082508)
Subject: The keyed bugle
From: McGrath of Harlow

I was reading Dickens' Martin Chuzzlewit the other day, and at one point came across a mention of an instrument I'd never heard of, the keyed bugle: "He was musical besides, and had a little key-bugle in his pocket, on which, whenever the conversation flagged, he played the first part of a great many tunes, and regularly broke down in the second."

So I looked up the instrument on google, and found out something about it, and turned up this page with a clip of a collector using it to play The British Grenadier. (Scroll down the page a bit.)

I wonder if anyone out there is playing one? It's a great sound. I can just imagine it with a Morris side. Hertfordshire Hollies have a cornet with their band, but I think the keyed bugle would be even better.

20 Jun 07 - 07:58 PM (#2082700)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: McGrath of Harlow

With my curiosity awakened I've been hunting around, and found this fascinating page about the impact of the instrument in its day, and especially about an 19th century virtuoso on this instrument, "dark-complexioned" Boston musician Ned Kendall, who pioneered circus band music, and played for Queen Victoria, who was said to have presented him with a silver bugle

The site I linked to also has a few tunes with his name - Ned Kendall's Hornpipe and Ned Kendall's Favourite and Ned Kendall's.

Here's a taster:

An instrument known as the Kent Horn (dedicated to the Duke of Kent) was one of the first of these innovations, and looked like a cross between a saxophone and a bugle, but the keyed bugle was one of the best of the early innovations, recorded in use in America at the military academy at West Point as early as 1816. It caught on enormously in the succeeding decades but was eventually subsumed by another refinement when valves, developed in the 1830's and 1840's, replaced keys.

The development might be likened to the impact of the electric guitar in the 20th century, for simple horns were transformed into loud, agile, sonorous instruments perfect for demanding soloing performances in the days before amplification. Kendall himself remained a key-bugle player all his life.

Coinciding with these developments was the rise in martial activity in both Europe and the United States as both a civic duty and recreation. Local units sprung up all around the United States, often with colorful names and uniforms, and paraded in public as much as for performance value as for military instruction. Often these units had bands attached to enhance both booted measure and élan, and thus skilled musicians were much in demand and well-regarded.

Ned Kendall was one of the best. His playing is said to have been stunning, and he had a gift for improvisation and spontaneous elaboration of themes he heard only once...

20 Jun 07 - 09:21 PM (#2082738)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: Rapparee

Apparently there is only one bugle maker in the US now -- Rexcraft and the other one closed some years back. I think the remaining one is called "Officialbugle".

I've played on a VERY old (pre-1860) keyed bugle, once, years ago, in my distant youth. My high school band director owned it and some other antique instruments.

20 Jun 07 - 10:07 PM (#2082756)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: cookster

Did it sound like a trumpet, or a bugle.

21 Jun 07 - 03:19 AM (#2082837)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: GUEST,Geoff the Duck

I would expect it to sound like a bugle, but with a capability for more notes.
The tone of brass instruments is in a large part created by the shape and the size of the instrument. A trumpet does not sound like a cornet. A standard bugle has a different tone compared with a trumpet played without using the valves. A flugel horn is essentially the same shape as a bugle, but slightly larger and with valves added. It has a more mellow tone than the trumpet or cornet.
Quack!
GtD.

21 Jun 07 - 06:13 AM (#2082913)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: McGrath of Harlow

Listen to the Real Player video on the link I gave, and judge for yourself. I'd say it sounded like an ordinary bugle, but with the extra notes that allowed it to play the tune.

21 Jun 07 - 01:46 PM (#2083239)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: McGrath of Harlow

Here's a vid clip of Danny Boy played on the fugelhorn for comparison.

I prefer the sound of the keyed bugle in the other link I gave.

21 Jun 07 - 11:27 PM (#2083682)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: Azizi

Thanks for starting this thread, McGrath of Harlow.

I'd never heard of a keyed bugle before.

I also never heard of "dark-complexioned" Boston musician Ned Kendall, who pioneered circus band music".

I'm gonna read more about that instrument and read more about that man.

From the information presented here, both that instrument and that innovative musician deserve much more recognition than they have received.

22 Jun 07 - 12:57 AM (#2083716)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: Rowan

Great, Azizi.

Cheers, Rowan

22 Jun 07 - 11:30 AM (#2084064)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: McGrath of Harlow

Here's another page about Ned Kendall, with some more links - including this picture.

23 Jun 07 - 10:36 PM (#2085294)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: Rapparee

There is also a bugle with one valve, a horizontal one. It's used mostly in drum and bugle corps stuff.

Seems to be hard to find a good bugle these days.....

24 Jun 07 - 01:49 PM (#2085717)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: McGrath of Harlow

I gather there was also a slide bugle, known as "The Regent's Bugle".

Here is a link to a page about a record which came out a couple of years ago called "The Regent's Buge", featuring various instruments that are no longer in vogue - various keyed and slide trumpets. But evidently not including a slide bugle, or a keyed bugle.

Still it sounds as if it would be an interesting record to hear.

I wonder how it is that some instruments survive and others get forgotten? It doesn't seem to be just a matter of which make the best sounds or are easiest to play well.

24 Jun 07 - 02:18 PM (#2085740)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: Rapparee

Keyed bugles have a more complicated mechanical arrangement than simple valved horns. Almost all bugle these days are either pitched in one key or have a simple slide to allow a semi-permanent key change (C to F, for example).

24 Jun 07 - 03:22 PM (#2085789)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: McGrath of Harlow

But then Saxophones have a more complicated key arrangement than valved horns, and that hasn't stopped them being played pretty widely.

24 Jun 07 - 04:00 PM (#2085822)
Subject: RE: The keyed bugle
From: Rapparee

So are clarinets. But the heyday of keyed brass instruments was the 19th Century, and very early at that. We've come a long way since then, and today's french horns are just as reliable as my valved trumpet. Remember that the saxophone wasn't developed until about 1840 and they monkeyed around with the clarinet from about 1600 to the late 19th Century. But those are reed instruments, not brass, and the playing characteristics are different.