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.
A natural horn, with central crook: a cor solo, Raoux, Paris, 1797
Army signal horn, (cornu), Roman period; found in Alphen aan den Rijn, the Netherlands
An instrument for creating sound made from the horn of an animal
Olifant, possibly southern Italian, 11th century
A musical instrument is a device created or adapted to make musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can be considered a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument. A person who plays a musical instrument is known as an instrumentalist. The history of musical instruments dates to the beginnings of human culture. Early musical instruments may have been used for rituals, such as a horn to signal success on the hunt, or a drum in a religious ceremony. Cultures eventually developed composition and performance of melodies for entertainment. Musical instruments evolved in step with changing applications and technologies.
Anne Vallayer-Coster, Attributes of Music, 1770. This still life painting depicts a variety of French Baroque musical instruments, such as a natural horn, transverse flute, musette, pardessus de viole, and lute.
Bamileke slit drum drummers in Cameroon's West Province.
Found in Slovenia, the Divje Babe Flute is sometimes considered the world's oldest known musical instrument
Two Aztec slit drums (teponaztli). The characteristic "H" slits can be seen on the top of the drum in the foreground.