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The euphonium ( ; ; ) is a tenor- and baritone-voiced valved brass instrument pitched in 9-foot (9′) B♭ an octave below the B♭ trumpet or cornet, employed chiefly in brass, military band, and . The euphonium is a member of the large family of valved bugles, along with the tuba and flugelhorn, characterised by a wide conical bore. Most instruments have four valves, usually compensating , although instruments with four or five are common in Eastern and Central Europe.
Euphonium repertoire can be notated in concert pitch in the bass clef, or in the treble clef as a transposing instrument in B. In British brass bands, it is typically treated as a treble-clef instrument, while in American band music, parts may be written in either treble clef or bass clef, or both. A musician who plays the euphonium is known as a euphoniumist, a euphonist, or simply a euphonium or "eupho" player.
The euphonium has many relatives in the large and diverse family of valved bugles to which it belongs. The baritone horn found in British brass bands, although similar, has a narrower conical bore, smaller bell, and often lacks a fourth valve. The American baritone with three front-mounted piston valves, a narrower conical bore, and a curved forward-pointing bell, was dominant in American school throughout most of the 20th century. This instrument, along with the euphonium and similar-looking cylindrical bore instruments like the trombonium, were almost universally lumped together and labelled baritone by both band directors and composers. Band scores and manufacturers have sometimes treated them as the same instrument, or used the word baritone to refer to the euphonium, thus contributing to a confusion of terminology in the United States.
Ferdinand Sommer's Sommerophone was patented in Berlin in 1844 as the Euphonion, and adopted in Britain as the euphonium after Sommer toured it in the 1850s. The euphonium is sometimes called the tenor tuba particularly by British composers, although this term can also refer to other types of tuba. Names in scores in other languages include the French basse, saxhorn basse, and tuba basse; German Baryton, Tenorbass, and Tenorbasshorn; Italian baritono, bombardino, eufonio, and flicorno basso. In Italy, flicorno tenore refers to the narrower bore baritone, while flicorno baritono and flicorno basso refer to the euphonium with three or four valves, respectively. The most common German name, Baryton, may have influenced Americans to adopt the name "baritone" for the instrument, due to the influx of German musicians and instrument makers to the United States in the 19th century.
By the 1890s, American euphoniums were sometimes called the B♭ bass (with only one "B"). The 1894 Lyon & Healy catalog depicts instruments called the B♭ tenor, B♭ baritone, and B♭ bass with the same pitch and overall three-valve construction, differing only in bore and bell widths (while also listing "EE♭ bass" and "BB♭ bass" ). In the 1930s, American drum and bugle corps introduced the baritone bugle (or Baro-tone) in G with a single D piston valve, before a euphonium bugle in the same key but with a much wider bore had largely replaced it by the end of the 1960s.
The euphonium can trace its origins partly to the ophicleide, an all-metal, conical bore keyed brass instrument developed by the Paris instrument maker Jean Hilaire Asté in 1817 to extend the keyed bugle into the bass range and replace the serpent. The ophicleide improved on the serpent, in use particularly in France since the late 16th century, by using keys covering larger tone holes sized proportionally to the bore width, in their acoustically correct positions. The wide conical bore of the ophicleide, extrapolated from the keyed bugle, imparted the warm, noble timbre characteristic of the modern euphonium. The ophicleide was widely used in French and British , orchestras, and the emerging civic brass band movement for several decades, even after the invention of valves, and as late as the 1870s.
As early as 1829 in Berlin, the Prussian military conductor Wilhelm Friedrich Wieprecht required for his trumpet corps a Tenorbasshorn in B♭ with three valves, a name which was later sometimes used for the euphonium. It was probably a larger bore version of the Tenorhorn, later often called the Baryton.
Several instruments appeared in the 1830s and 1840s that fit the broad description of a baritone valved bugle (in B♭ or C) with a wide conical bore. In Vienna, valves were applied to the ophicleide to replace its keyed tone holes, otherwise retaining its bore and shape. The larger versions of these became known as bombardons.
In 1838 Carl Wilhelm Moritz, son of Johann Gottfried Moritz who with Wieprecht in 1835 had patented the Baß-Tuba in F with five valves, built a similar but smaller tenor tuba in B♭ with four valves. In Italy around this time, the Milan maker Giuseppe Pelitti developed his bombardino with four valves based on the larger bombardone, a valved ophicleide in F. While Pelitti preferred to call his instruments Pelittone, other makers in Italy made similar instruments and called them flicorni (pl.; sing. flicorno). Built in B♭ with either three valves as flicorno bombardino or four valves as flicorno basso, they became the equivalent respectively of the modern baritone horn and euphonium.
Adolphe Sax's saxhorns became popular in bands in Britain and the United States due largely to the Distin family, who helped popularise the British brass band movement by promoting and performing widely on Sax's brass instruments. By 1850 Distin & Co. was manufacturing them in London, and in New York and Pennsylvania by the 1870s after the London business was purchased by Boosey & Co. The bass saxhorn also formed the basis of the six-valve French tuba in C, the standard tuba used by French composers and orchestras well into the 20th century.
In Austria-Hungary, the instrument maker Václav František Červený built his Baroxyton in 1852, a four valve baritone instrument. Červený developed several instrument families in ophicleide, helicon, and tuba shapes, but is especially notable for his later Kaiser instruments, with and large conical bores. These included the Kaiserbaryton, in a distinctive oval shape. This design was quickly adopted by other makers, and has become the standard configuration for euphoniums in central and eastern Europe.
The modern "British-style" compensating euphonium was developed in the 1870s by David Blaikley, the factory manager at Boosey & Co. Blaikley, after experimenting with a three-valve compensation system, obtained a patent in 1878 for a four-valve version where the fourth valve returns the airway through the first three valves a second time, adding smaller tubing loops to rectify intonation. Similar designs were patented earlier, by Gustave Auguste Besson in 1859, and Pierre-Louis Gautrot's système equitonique, found on his instruments of the period, was patented in 1864. Blaikley's compensation system was the most successful, and has since been in continuous use in Britain, little-changed, on instruments by Boosey & Co. (later, Boosey & Hawkes), and Besson after their acquisition by Boosey & Hawkes in the mid-20th century. In 1974 the patent expired, and many euphonium manufacturers added the compensation system to their euphonium models, including Hirsbrunner, Miraphone, Sterling, Willson, and Yamaha.
Modern euphonium makers have introduced some improvements, such as tapered and wider-bore valve tubing, small adjustments to the compensation tubing to soften some of the sharp bends, and triggers for the main tuning slide. Adams developed an adjustable lead-pipe receiver for their euphoniums, which allows players to customise the timbre and responsiveness of the instrument.
The euphonium has a wide conical bore, gradually increasing in diameter throughout its length (apart from the necessarily cylindrical bore valve tubing). The bore ranges from at the first valve, and the bell ranges from . Like the flugelhorn and tuba, the conical bore of the euphonium emphasises lower frequency spectral content by favouring the lower partials, resulting in a mellower tone compared to cylindrical-bore instruments such as the trumpet or trombone.
The valves each add lengths of tubing to lower the pitch of the instrument, combining to produce a fully chromatic scale and range. Euphoniums commonly have three top-action piston valves, played with the first three fingers of the right hand, plus a fourth valve, generally found midway down the right side of the instrument and played with the left index or middle finger. On most models the fourth valve is a compensating valve which resolves intonation issues below E. On European instruments with rotary valves, the three or four valves are operated together by the right hand and are non-compensating; some include a fifth valve to allow for alternate intonation fingerings instead. Beginner models often have only the three top-action valves and no fourth valve, while some intermediate "student" models may have a non-compensating fourth top-action valve placed next to the other three, and played with the fourth finger of the right hand.
Less commonly, there are three-valve compensating euphoniums. Usually older instruments, these similarly route the tubing of the third valve back through the first two, to bring the notes C and B in tune. This three-valve compensating configuration is sometimes found on three-valve British style baritone horns.
In Britain, a rare, non-compensating five-valve euphonium was manufactured in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Besson, and Highams of Manchester. The five-valve euphonium improved intonation by providing more valve fingering combinations, and was more economical to build than complex compensating instruments, but they were not widely adopted.Arnold Myers, in Trevor Herbert, ed., The British Brass Band: A Musical and Social History (Oxford, 2000), 179. The Besson five-valved euphonium featured the first three piston valves mounted horizontally, and an additional two off to the side.
Marching euphoniums and baritones only have three valves, partly to conserve weight. The convertible euphonium can switch, by swiveling its leadpipe, between a concert configuration with upright bell and marching with forward-pointing bell on either the left or right shoulder. Marching euphoniums are produced mainly by B.A.C. Music, Eastman, Jupiter, and Yamaha, as well as several Chinese-made stencil brands like Schiller, John Packer, and O'Malley. In the 20th century, the American makers Olds, King, Conn, and Kanstul also made marching euphoniums.
American composers writing for the concert band since the mid-20th century continued the British brass and concert band tradition of using the euphonium as the principal tenor-voiced solo instrument, akin to the cello in the string section of the orchestra. A large body of more serious works, including challenging concertos for solo euphonium with brass or concert band accompaniment, has been amassed since 1960 including works from American, German, Scandinavian and British composers. This has also included concertos for euphonium and orhcestra, newly commissioned and recorded, as well as existing band concertos arranged for symphony orchestra.
Music for unaccompanied solo euphonium until the late 20th century had been largely adaptations of works for other instruments, often trombone, cornet, tuba, cello, or bassoon. The International Tuba Euphonium Association (ITEA) sponsored new solo works for euphonium through its "GEM Series" published in its journal.
Euphonium is also called for in Leoš Janáček's Sinfonietta (1926), Shostakovich's ballet The Golden Age (1930), and several symphonies by the composers Havergal Brian, Roy Harris, Arnold Bax, and Samuel Barber. Despite the successes of these early works and of its larger tuba cousin, the euphonium has not gained a permanent place in the regular symphony orchestra, although it is commonly used to play parts originally scored for the ophicleide, and sometimes the bass (in F) Wagner tuba.
As with the cornet and flugelhorn, the euphonium and baritone horn are easily doubled by one player, with some adjustment of breath and embouchure, since they have essentially identical range and fingering.
In orchestras, concert bands, and US military bands, the euphonium is generally written at concert pitch in the bass clef, treating the euphonium as a non-transposing instrument like the orchestral trombone, with high passages often written in tenor clef. Concert band music often provides the euphonium parts in both bass and B♭ treble clef, to accommodate players from either background, although professional players are usually familiar with either notation. In continental European band music, parts for the euphonium may also be written in transposing bass clef in B♭, sounding a major second lower than written.
The lowest notes obtainable depend on the valve set-up of the instrument. All instruments are chromatic down to E2, and four-valved instruments extend that down to at least C2. Non-compensating four-valved instruments suffer from intonation problems in this range and cannot produce low B1. These problems are solved with the modern compensating fourth valve, or with five non-compensating rotary valves on European models, using a flat whole-tone tuning for the fifth valve, as is common on five-valve tubas. Although less satisfactory, a good player can also provide these notes on a three-valve instrument using falset tones, which are more distinct on instruments with wide conical bores and large bells. From B♭1 down lies the pedal range, the fundamentals of the instrument's harmonic series. They are more easily produced on the euphonium and tuba than on other brass instruments, and the extent of the pedal range similarly depends on the instrument.
In Brazil, (1863–1916) was an influential musician and professor of the genre of Choro music, composing and performing on ophicleide and bombardino (euphonium). He participated in the first early 20th century recordings of Brazilian music, and he and his influential student Pixinguinha (1897–1973) established and popularized Choro music and its instruments.
Arthur ("Art") Lehman (1917–2009), euponiumist with the United States Marine Band, was an early proponent of the double-bell euphonium and wrote The Art of Euphonium, a significant pedagogical text. Lehman was a student of Harold Brasch and Simone Mantia, and advanced a rich sound concept with sparing use of vibrato, pioneered by Mantia. Brian Bowman, euphonium soloist with the United States Navy Band and United States Air Force Band, was professor of euphonium at the University of North Texas and co-edited Arban's Method for Trombone and Euphonium, an adaptation of Arban's 1864 method for cornet. Bowman developed a sound based on a fusion of the mellow British sound and Falcone's recordings, and played the first euphonium recital at Carnegie Hall. Discogs 23846084.
In Japan, the euphonium soloist and clinician Toru Miura was a founding member in 1973 of the International Tuba Euphonium Association (ITEA; founded as TUBA). He is professor of euphonium at the Kunitachi College of Music in Tokyo, and in 2008 was awarded the ITEA Lifetime Achievement Award for his role in promoting the instrument.
The Welsh brothers Robert and Nicholas Childs have recorded and commissioned many works for euphonium, as well as conducting and adjudicating brass bands. Robert's son David Childs is also a euphonium soloist and recording artist, and professor of euphonium at the University of North Texas, succeeding Brian Bowman. He commissioned a euphonium concerto The Sunne Rising – The King Will Ride (2004) from the Welsh composer Alun Hoddinott, and published and recorded an adaptation of the Vaughan Williams tuba concerto for euphonium and orchestra.
In popular music, the New Zealand musician Don McGlashan began his musical career as an orchestral horn player, before including euphonium in his switch to popular music with bands such as Blam Blam Blam and The Mutton Birds.
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