The British Army is buying bugles were the tunes are played on a synthesiser, you just dial up the the bugle call that you want hold it to your lips and press play. The Army reckons it easier than training a bugler and there a perfect performance every time. The cost of these bugles are £300.00 a piece. When I was younger and out in the North African deserts I always remember the haunting notes of the last post wafting out over those endless spaces. There was one bugler you we used to get to play this tune at a night as he could really hold the notes and had is own way of playing the bugle which was really a part of him. We also used to have a whip round to keep him in beers and to make it worth his while to give us this little bit of pleasure and such strong memories.

sheet...batteries included?

next: synthesized gunfire

awww...thats a shame!

"I electronically shot you dead."

"You couldn't have because I already electronically stabbed you with my sword."

"Did not!"

"Did so!"

If someone is too dumb to learn to play a bugle, I wouldn't want him anyhow. Besides, a synthesizer can't use a weapon.

Oh boy, what's next. They use a synthesizer for MREs.

Somethings shouldn't change, and the Bugle is one of those things.

'Nuff Said!

The US has being using a taped bugle or synthesizer for military funerals for several years now. I can remember from the burial of my cousin's husband @ Bourne National VA Cemetery that it just didn't seem the same as previous military funerals that I had attended. In fact, I thought privately to myself that "this sucks". I guess that this is the sign of the times.

The finest bugle playing I ever heard was when the Marines buried my father. Taps never sounded so sweet or so mournful to me before or since. Afterwards I approached the Marine bugler and commended him on his playing. He looked shocked and told me that if I could tell him that through my pain and sorrow that it meant much more to him than any praise he'd had before. It made me very glad I had told him so.

the gun reloads for you. now thats service.

WTF? Thats ing !!!

Im a band major so i hear bugles (and other military instruments) playing all the time, I also study advanced music at college. I think its an outrage that they could even think about doing this. One of the things the military forces pride themselves on is the standard of their music, and what their doing is essentally taking all of the emotion and feeling out of it. There are some elements of music that can only be captured my a musician playing from the heart, capturing elements of that time and place. It cannot be re-created. Its kinda hard to explain i guess, but it'll never EVER be the same if this carries on.

A recording has no soul, and without a soul it means absolutely nothing... It's an enormous insult.

Rich.