A wind instrument is an instrument in which a column of air is set into vibration by the player blowing into or over a mouthpiece set at or near the end of a resonator of some kind — usually a tube. The pitch of the vibration is determined by the length of the tube and by manual adjustments of the length of the vibrating column of air (using valves, finger holes, keys, or slides), during performance.
Wind instruments are typically grouped into two families: brass instruments, such as horns, trumpets, trombones, euphoniums, and tubas, and woodwind instruments, such as recorders, flutes, oboes, clarinets, saxophones, and bassoons. With brass instruments, the player’s lips vibrate in the instrument’s mouthpiece, causing the air within the instrument to vibrate. With woodwind instruments, the player either causes a reed to vibrate, which moves the column of air (as in a clarinet, oboe, or duduk), blows across an open hole against an edge (as in a recorder or ocarina), or blows across the edge of an open hole (as in a flute).