Acme siren
The Acme siren is a musical instrument used in concert bands for comic effect. Often used in cartoons, it produces the stylized sound of a police siren. It is one of the few aerophones in the percussion section of an orchestra. The instrument is typically made of metal and is cylindrical. Inside the cylinder is a type of fan-blade which, when the performer blows through one end, spins and creates the sound. The faster the performer blows, the faster the fan-blade moves and the higher the pitch the instrument creates. Conversely, the slower the performer blows , the lower the pitch. Iannis Xenakis used it in the 1960s in his works "Oresteia", "Terretektorh", and "Persephassa". A siren was used in Bob Dylan's classic album, "Highway 61 Revisited". Acme is the trade name of J Hudson & Co of Birmingham, England, who developed and patented the Acme siren in 1895. It was sometimes known as "the cyclist's road clearer".