Cromorne


Cromorne is a French woodwind reed instrument of uncertain identity, used in the early Baroque period in French court music. The name is sometimes confused with the similar-sounding name crumhorn, a musical woodwind instrument probably of different design, called "tournebout" by French theorists in the 17th century.

Crumhorn

By contrast, the crumhorn is a capped double-reed instrument usually shaped like a letter "J" and possessing a rather small melodic range spanning a ninth unless extended downward by keys or by the technique of underblowing, which increases the range by a perfect fifth. However, this instrument was apparently little used in England—despite listings in the inventories of Henry VIII and the earls of Arundel at Nonsuch House, and mention in a poem by Sir William Leighton, they are conspicuously absent from inventories and other documents of English town waits —or France and was called a "tournebout" by French theorists including Mersenne, Pierre Trichet, and even as late as Diderot .

Media

– Basse de Cromorne from Organ Suite in D