The Price Is Right is a long running American television game show that premiered in 1972, where contestants guess prices to win prizes. Its losing horn became one of the show's most recognisable cues, signalling a lost game with exaggerated musical disappointment. The effect builds on the older sad trombone tradition from vaudeville and cartoons, but this specific descending version became tied to the show through decades of broadcasts. Clips later spread online as the price is right sad trombone reaction, reused far beyond the original studio games.
About this sound
The classic Price Is Right losing trombone fail sound from the TV game show, a descending wah wah sting people use for mistakes, losses and bad luck moments.
This is the famous losing sting from The Price Is Right, played when a contestant fails a pricing game. A small trombone section delivers four descending notes, each bending downward with a muted wah wah tone that gets slower and sadder as it falls. The final note droops and fades out, making even a small failure feel theatrically final. Because the phrasing is so drawn out, audiences instantly read it as comic disappointment rather than real tragedy, which is why the clip works as a punchline for everyday mistakes, bad guesses and unlucky outcomes in videos and streams.
