Tuba after American bandmaster John Philip Sousa, resembles a hélicon with the bell pointed up (in the original models as the J. W. Pepper prototype and Sousa's concert instruments) and then curved to point forward (as developed by Conn and others). Some ancestors of the tuba, such as the military "bombardon", had unusual valve and bore arrangements compared to modern tubas. During the American Civil War, most brass bands used a branch of the brass family known as "saxhorns", which, by today's standards, have a narrower bore taper than tuba—the same as true cornets and baritones, but distinct from trumpets, euphoniums,
Ophicleide Ophicleide The ophicleide ( ) is a keyed brass instrument similar to the tuba. It is a conical-bore keyed instrument belonging to the bugle family and has a similar shape to the sudrophone. The instrument's name comes from the Greek word ophis (ὄφις) "serpent" + kleis (κλείς) "keys", since it was conceived of as a serpent with keys. Like the serpent, some found it difficult to play, and early twentieth-century musicians felt it had a somewhat unpredictable sound. The ophicleide was invented in 1817 and patented in 1821 by French instrument maker Jean Hilaire Asté (also known as Halary or