Bugle The bugle is one of the simplest brass instruments , having no valves or other pitch - altering devices . All pitch control is done by varying the player ' s embouchure . Consequently , the bugle is limited to note s within the harmonic series . See bugle call for scores to standard bugle calls , all consisting of only five notes . These notes are known as the bugle scale . History . The bugle developed from early musical or communication instruments made of animal horns , with the word " bugle " itself coming from " buculus " , Latin for bullock ( castrated bull ) . The earliest bugles were shaped in a coil – typically a double coil , but also a single or triple coil – similar to the modern horn , and were used to communicate during hunts and as announcing instruments for coaches ( somewhat akin to today ' s automobile horn ) . Predecessors and relatives of the bugle included the post horn , the Pless horn ( sometimes called the " Prince Pless horn " ) , and the bugle horn . The first verifiable formal use of a brass bugle as a military signal device was the " Halbmondbläser " , or half - moon bugle , used in Hanover in 1758 . It was U - shaped ( hence its name ) and comfortably carried by a shoulder strap attached at the mouthpiece and bell . It first spread to England in 1764 where it was gradually accepted widely in foot regiments . 18th - century cavalry did not normally use a standard bugle , but rather an early trumpet that might be mistaken for a bugle today , as it lacked keys or valves , but had a more gradual taper and a smaller bell , producing a sound more easily audible at close range but with less carrying power over distance . Uses . The bugle is used mainly in the military and Boy Scouts , where the bugle call is used to indicate the daily routines of camp . Historically the bugle was used in the cavalry to relay instructions from officers to soldiers during battle . Biblically , bugles are found in the time of Moses , when God commanded Moses to " make two bugles of hammered silver " in Numbers 10 : 1 - 3 . They were used to assemble the leaders and to give marching orders to the camps . The bugle is used to play " Taps " or the " Last Post " in military rites at funerals . In drum and bugle corps , the bugle has moved away from its military origins , including the use of valves . In American drum and bugle corps , G was the traditional key for bugles to be pitched in through the year 2000 . However , current rules in both Drum Corps International and Drum Corps Associates define a bugle as a brass instrument in any key , with 0 to 4 valves , and bell front . Typically , drum corps brass is in G or B - flat , with mellophones in B - flat brass lines being in the key of F . Civilian drum corps were founded using equipment sold off by the military in the early 1900s , and the last official change made to the military bugle ( before its role as a signaling device was rendered obsolete by the radio ) was to standardize them in the key of G . Bugles in other parts of the world typically were pitched in B - flat or E - flat . A challenge for those attempting to define bugles with such a general classification is to explain how bugles are different from any other kind of brass band instrument . The standardized American G military bugle has been replaced with B - flat instruments by the majority of drum and bugle corps . The bugle is also used in Boy Scout troops and in the Boys ' Brigade . Variations . The cornet is sometimes erroneously considered to be the " valved version " of the bugle , although it was derived from the French cornet de poste ( post horn ) . 19th century variants based on the standard bugle included both keyed and valved bugles . Keyed bugles were invented in England in the early 19th century , with a patent for one design , the Royal Kent bugle , taken out by Joseph Halliday in 1811 . This bugle was highly popular and widely in use until c . 1850 – for example , in works by Richard Willis , later bandmaster of the United States Military Academy Band at West Point . This variant of the bugle fell out of use with the invention of the valved cornet . Modern instruments classified as bugles are often valved .