38. Logic vs. Emotions

Music is the shorthand of emotion.

― Leo Tolstoy

Yeah, but what did Tolstoy know? The music that is arguably the most amazing in western history is the music of Johann Sebastian Bach- and it is some of the most logical music ever written. Mathematically precise; ordered in almost uncanny exactness. No wonder that when Wendy Carlos (under her birth name of Walter Carlos) wanted to show the amazing use of the Moog Synthesizer, she used the music of Bach. (Switched on Bach. 1968.) There should be no emotion in a computer-generated song; no human input to play it other than the 1s and 0s of computer/digital coding.

Yet it was an amazing album that touched people deeply, and not just because of the newness and uniqueness of it. For many of us who first heard it in 1968, the album, for example, captured the emotion of Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring with amazing clarity.

Logic will get you from A to B.
Imagination will take you everywhere.
- Albert Einstein

As much as mathematical precision, Bach also used imagination that allowed him to place layer upon layer of things never before seen or heard. The imagination of Wendy Carlos added another layer which grabbed us like nothing ever seen or heard before. Yet it was all there in Bach's logic combined with his musical imagination.

Then we have Miles Davis on Kind of Blue or John Coltrane on A Love Supreme. At one moment their solos can sound as precise as Bach's mathematical journeys. The next moment, then, is filled with an emotion that sweeps in and takes over, surrounding us with things that are like nothing ever seen or heard before. All of us who work with music from the rank amateur to the amazing heights of Davis or Coltrane know that everything they do is based on all the logical manipulations of music theory. They may twist those theories and make up a few new ones of their own, but they are acutely aware of the logic behind what they are doing.

A mind all logic is like a knife all blade.

It makes the hand bleed that uses it.

- Rabindranath Tagore

It is no doubt obvious where I am going with this. We are not dealing with an either/or situation when we deal with logic and emotion. It must be a both/and for it to go beyond just the notes on the page or in our heads. In human thinking it used to be that we believed that if only we humans would be "logical," then we would always make the right decisions. When faced with choices, we should be able to use the coolness and precision of logic to make the good choices.

Without going into all the details, science, medicine, and psychology were all shocked when this proved to be an incorrect theory. There were examples where a person, through an injury or surgery, lost the ability to connect emotions to decision making. All their decisions were based on good old-fashioned rational thinking. "Just the facts!" The old theory would say that their decisions post-trauma should have been better decisions- emotions weren't in the picture.

That is not what happened. In essence, they actually lost some of the critical ability to make any decisions in the first place. Neuroscience had to be rewritten. Cold, impersonal logic does not make good decisions alone. To disconnect emotion is to take away what makes us human- and what makes human decision-making human in the first place.

Which is why I think music has played such an essential and foundational role in human culture and development. Daniel Levitan, neuroscientist, session musician, sound engineer, and record producer, captured this idea in his two seminal works, This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession and The World in Six Songs: How the Musical Brain Created Human Nature. Somewhere in our brain, music, I think, brings together emotion and logic in ways very few things do.

Music expresses that which cannot be put into words
and that which cannot remain silent.
― Victor Hugo

So, let's get back to you and me and how this is important to us. Actually, in some ways it is another way of reminding us of things already discussed and beginning to put them into a "logical", effective, and helpful place.For example, we have talked about being able to be aware of, and able to share, "your story" in your music. How do you know your story? By your feelings, among other things, and then applying logic and thinking to it. We discussed the importance of the "groove" in music. Well, first we have to have the "logical" ability to play the notes correctly. Then we add the feeling, the emotion we are sensing in the notes. That becomes the groove.

That's why we practice. First to find the notes- the specifics of this song in this place. Then we find the groove- the story, the emotions, the nuances. These are built on the logic of knowing the fundamentals as well as how we are feeling. We may be able to play a piece with clockwork precision, but does it "feel?" It is in the feeling that we connect with the music.

Am I just repeating the same thing over and over, driving it into the ground until you say, "Enough already! We get it."? Perhaps, but I have found over the past year that I forget these things on a regular basis. I get bogged down in the notes on the page or the dynamic markings. I forget to listen to the music as I am playing it in my practice room. I rush through the notes instead of listening to them; I try to get the piece down cold in one or two attempts; I don't savor the world found in each note. Or, in performance, I can ignore the other musicians I am playing with. Sometimes I get so emotionally involved in a song that, without me realizing it I get sloppy and the technique can get lost.

I have to be constantly reminded of the interaction of logic and emotion- unless the emotion I want to drag out of the horn, myself, or the listener is disgust. It is in the balance of our logic and emotion that practice turns into performance, that we discover how a particular song can express our own story.

We will look a little more at this in another post in a few weeks on some ways to work with the Inner Game in new ways. For now, don't let your logic close out your emotions- or your feelings dismiss logic. Together they make quite a duet.

37. The Reality of Dreams

If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams,
and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined,
he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.

-Henry David Thoreau

A month or so ago I came across a group of people going door-to-door for some cause or other. I was polite and said, "Hello. How are things going?" The answer was a kind of sarcastic, almost fatalistic, "Living the dream!"

Huh? I just went on my way- as did they.

A couple days ago I was talking to a fellow trumpet player who asked about my involvement in groups and my regular routine. After telling him he responded, "Well, that is being a musician full-time."

I smiled and said that this has been a dream of mine for years- to be a "full-time musician. Finally, with semi-retirement, I'm doing it."

When I stop and think about that statement I am still taken aback. What right does a 67-year old retired pastor and semi-retired counselor have to think he can be a "full-time musician?" Even though I don't need to do it to make a living, is it realistic? Isn't it naïve to think it is possible or should even be worth doing?

One of the quotes I wrote down at the end of trumpet camp last summer was:

The reality of dreams comes from naive ideas.

Simply put, even to think some of our dreams are possible is an act of naive belief. As usual, I like to look at definitions and found these two for naive:

• showing a lack of experience, wisdom, or judgment.
• natural and unaffected; innocent.

Most times when we dream of things we would like to do or become there is a definite lack of experience. It is naive in that we don't know what it means or even how to get there. It sounds impossible. We may be told, "Get real!"

A lack of experience, wisdom and judgment, however, can easily lead to the second definition- innocent. Many dreams have a simple, joyful aspect to them. They are based on innocent belief that this might just very well be possible. It can be found in that age-old question, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" I once wanted to be an astronaut. But it wasn't a dream. Just a sense of adventure. I also dreamed of being a youth worker, a counselor, a preacher, a radio announcer and a TV host/producer.

I have been ALL of these at times in the past 50 years. I found ways to make all those naive dreams into reality.

I have also dreamed of being a musician. I never let go of that one. Things often got in the way- like earning a living, time commitments, etc. But I never let the trumpet go. Whenever and however I could, I found ways to keep playing, however sporadic or mediocre it was at times.

The subject is dreams and believing in them as possible. This is all about the reality of dreams beginning in naive innocence and growing into existence.

When researching this week's post I came across a blog by Joey Tartell, an Associate Professor of Trumpet and the Director of Undergraduate Studies at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music. In a post titled "Belief" he had this to say:

Last week, in a lesson, I told a student that I knew she could play the piece in question great. But the look I got back from her reminded me of the second hardest part of teaching:

There are times where the teacher has more belief in the student than the student has in her/himself....

Which brings me back to belief. It’s a very difficult concept to teach. Try this: picture a player that you admire. Now you need to know that that player was once a beginner. That player was not born playing at a world class level. That player had to learn fundamentals and music just like everyone else. And on the first day of playing did not sound like a professional. So if that player can do it, why not you?

Belief in oneself is at the heart of turning dreams into reality.Belief is based on your dreams and the reality those dreams represent. Belief is based on what you think you are able to accomplish, what your skills are and, just as importantly, what your skills can develop into!

Back when I was talking about the Inner Game of Music I wrote the following:

Self-trust. Do you believe you can do it? Have you worked on being able to do it? Have you set goals, formal or informal to be ready to do it? Have you allowed you and the music to meld into a unique idea?

If so, you can do it.

If not, don't quit, just go back and work some more. But remember, sooner or later we will have to be ready. Do it. You know you can.

That is belief and it is basic to overcoming the inner barriers we place in our own way. Such trust and belief is what we build as we practice, develop helpful and healthy routines, begin to develop our skills into new levels of experience and even expertise. This is where those routines and experiences, the people we hang around with, the story we discover in ourselves and the song we sing come together. In our dreams and the belief we can live them.

Joey Tartell concludes his post:

So here’s what I need for you to do:

• Dream big. Think of what you want to do, not what you’d settle for.
• Realize that someone gets to do that, so it could be you.
• Get working, because it’s unlikely anyone is just going to hand it to you. You need to earn it.

But most importantly, believe in the possibility. Like most things, this becomes a logic problem for me. So follow me here:

• If you don’t believe, your chances of success are virtually zero.
• If you believe, your chances are now higher than zero just based on the acceptance of the possibility of success.

Link- Belief to Dreams

By the way: This year's Shell Lake Trumpet Camp is less than three months away. Hope to see many of you there. Link.

35. The World in a Note

The more you get into music, the more you discover that

a whole note becomes the whole world.

- Trumpet Camp 2015

The Music Lesson is a wonderful musical philosophy book by bassist Victor Wooten. Early in the book Victor's "mentor" Michael asks him if he remembers the Dr. Seuss book, Horton Hears a Who. "Do you remember what the poor elephant found inside the little speck of dust?"

"There was a whole civilization living inside it."

"Exactly," [Michael] said, pointing at me. "Notes are the same. If you listen closely, you can find a whole world living inside each one. Notes are alive, and like you and me, they need to breathe. The song will dictate how much air is needed."

At the end of trumpet camp last year we heard the same thing in our closing session as quoted above.

Months ago, as I put together the themes for this blog year, I sent Mr. Baca an email asking for an explanation, a line or two that I could riff on. He was always too busy.

Actually, I think he was doing me a favor. He was letting me figure it out on my own. I would schedule a post on the subject, then push it back. A few weeks ahead, I would say,

"Nope, Mr. Baca hasn't answered me yet."

I would push it back again. It seems I needed to discover the world in a note for myself.

To understand how the world exists in a single note is not something that can be clearly taught. It is one of those things that makes sense only when you have your "Aha!" moment. Sure I've been given clues and ideas about what it means, but, hey, I can be a little slow. The answer was right in front of me all the time. It was shown over and over on web sites and articles. It showed up every day I picked up my horn to practice.

A couple weeks ago it came to me. Clear as the bell on my trumpet. It came together when watching a video of Wynton Marsalis on the website- Arban Method. (Video at bottom of post.)

Long tones. The boring, bane of every trumpet player.

I remembered Mr. Baca at Big Band Camp telling me to take the tuning slide off and just play that single tone, basically, "G" on the staff.

• Play it; 
• listen to the sound;
• center it; 
• hold it; 
• just let the air go through; 
• listen to the sound;
• keep it centered;
• Now do it again.

In that note is the whole world of trumpet music. In that note will be every note you play.

Now, put the slide back in and do it with "G". It's still there. THAT note hasn't changed. The trumpet does the work.

Play up the scale. Every note is still that single buzzing tone- the single note of the world. Play down the scale. The same thing is happening.

With every long tone, you play that same single tone. It is, in essence, the foundation of every note on the horn. As long as you keep that in mind, and the physics and philosophy of the buzz note, you will have the whole scale.

How simple.

One of our local PBS stations is currently rerunning the Ken Burns series Jazz. It's amazing how much different the series is 16 years after first aired. I am hearing and seeing things that were irrelevant to me when I first saw it. In last week's episode one of the commentators was discussing the revolutionary genius of Louis Armstrong. (An understatement!) He was describing how Armstrong took "pop" songs and interpreted them for his jazz bands. No one else was doing that. They played them straight. Armstrong, the commentator said, went to the very essence of the songs. He would often distill it all to one note (!) playing the tempo and swinging the groove. One note! The whole song in that single note.

When I started this trumpet journey last summer I thought the purpose of doing long tones was to build chops. If I did long tones on a regular basis I would improve the embouchure, increase my range, build endurance, develop breath, and learn to center each note. All of which is true. But now I have a hunch these are the important results of finding the whole world in the single note on the horn.

Most instrumentalists face the same task. We can't make chords on our instruments like a pianist or guitarist (or even banjo player) can. We have one note at a time to work with. At first we learn the notes. We discover the ways to play each individual note. It has its place on the scale and we play it. We do our version of "chords" when we move to intervals, playing thirds and arpeggios. But it is still only one note at a time. (Ignore overtones for this discussion.)

Somewhere along the line we begin to hear differently. We begin to discover the world in our trumpet, the voice we talked about in an earlier post that is uniquely ours.

And it's all in that single note we can only play one at a time.

Let's move away from music for a moment and get philosophical. My goal in this blog is as much to "tune" our individual lives as it is to "tune" our musical chops. This is as true for who we are and what we hope to do or be each and every day.  That single, buzzing "G" is our individual core. It is our personality, our skills, our hopes and dreams. If we try to focus too much on these and seek all the answers we will quickly become unfocused. Our lives simply responding to the next "thing" or next "crisis" or even next "dream."

But what is your "G" tone? What is your world in a single note at the center of your soul? What's in your heart? How does that define what you can do and how you do it? Take the time to center on that. Meditate on it. Learn to live it and let it guide you no matter what is happening.

33. Sing Your Song

If you cannot teach me to fly, teach me to sing.

― J.M. Barrie, author of Peter Pan

After a previous post I got this from my friend and fellow trumpet player, Steve:

I began to think about the human voice either spoken or sung and I thought about the trumpet voice. I remember being taught that if one could make a good sound on the mouth piece, that sound would be even better on the trumpet itself.

This directed me toward a number of things related to music, voice, and trumpet.

• The human voice itself is an incredible musical instrument.
  
  Scat singing in jazz is an excellent example. Some of Bob Dylan's greatest lyrics make no "logical" sense but are an incredible melding of the melody and the human voice singing actual words. The words form the melody as much as the notes. It does take a whole orchestra to match the range and wonder of the human voice.

• Instrumental music often is asked to imitate the human voice.

  Cantabile- In a smooth singing style

  One could ask whose vocal style should it be imitating? Most composers are thinking lyrical music at that point, but I can imagine an instrumental sound like say folksinger John Prine's gravelly style, the rough edge of John Fogerty, or the smooth as velvet with rough feel of Jim Morrison of the Doors.

• Many teachers suggest singing the part first before even picking up the horn.
  
  One said that means when you are playing it on the horn, you really aren't sight-reading it for the first time.

But even beyond the connections of voice and instrumental music Steve points us trumpet players to the trumpet voice itself and our using it in the best, most effective, and most musical way possible. Steve mentioned that if you can make a "good" sound on just the mouthpiece, the horn will only enhance it. Borrowing  a technique I discovered last summer let me add a bit to that.

Pull the tuning slide out and just play the lead pipe. Make it a solid, centered sound of "G" on the staff. Listen and keep it centered. THAT, my instructors have been telling me, is the basic on which all notes on the trumpet are based. The simple act of a solid, centered, even "G". The recommendation has been to do that every day as a start to your playing. Get that in your mind and you have the solid voice of your trumpet and trumpet playing. That brief action on Mr. Baca's part at the Big Band camp literally began a major transformation in my trumpet playing.

It isn't even about the "buzz". It's about the movement of air. All music is the movement of air. It is air vibrating at specific wavelengths, like A 440. I was reminded of this just this past Sunday when I attended (along with Steve) a concert and clinic put on by the Compass Rose Brass from Minneapolis. The trumpet clinic reminded us of this. It is one of those simple foundations of trumpet playing that we often forget. Keep the air moving at that steady pace. Learn how to move the air as needed. It isn't even all about the embouchure, although that is involved. It is about the air.

That in itself is enough to think about when talking about the voice of the trumpet- singing the song through the instrument. It is allowing the sound of the horn, the sound of the air, and the sound in your head to become music.

Which leads to your voice. We have talked about that from the outside when talking about story and song in the past month. But you and I may both have the same song and come from the same place, but our voice will be different. Like those singers mentioned above. No two have the same voice. Or take a song like Dylan's "Mr. Tambourine Man". A beautiful, mystical, mysterious song- when Dylan sings it. A beautiful "pop" song when even such a talented group as The Byrds sing it.

Even if you are not a good singer, you still sing through your instrument. Think about that a second. My horn becomes an extension of my voice; it is how I can sing. The Compass Rose clinic on Sunday reminded me that we need to think about the song we are playing, not just playing the notes. Think about the meaning of the music; translate that meaning into the way you play the notes; it's your voice, let it sing.

30. It's YOUR Song

Most people die with their music still locked up inside them.

― Benjamin Disraeli

Two weeks ago I did a post on "Story," the first of three things that composer, arranger, and educator Stanley Curtis on his blog Trumpet Journey calls the three "S"s. These are what he sees as the three key elements all great trumpet players have in common. They are simply

• Story
• Song and
• Support

Let's look at the second thing- Song!

Curtis wrote:

This is how we play what we play. This song can be sung with heart-on-the-sleeve romanticism, laser-beam clarity, or rhetorical interpretation. This is our personal song we sing on the trumpet when we play. Each of our voices are different–and they should be. Our song is the meeting place of our phrasing, our interpretation, our experience and, of course, our tone. I learned a beautiful lesson about tone from a former colleague of mine, the great euphonium player named Roger Behrend. He said it helps him to think about tone in terms of color, texture and taste. So, for instance, if you are thinking about maroon, velvet and chocolate, you get an especially luxurious sound. Or, perhaps you’re thinking golden, rough and with the taste of jambalaya, like I do, when I hear [Louis Armstrong]...

How we play what we play.
Just starting with that idea is enough to put it into a framework. Miles Davis famously said:

You hear three notes and you know it's Herb Alpert.

While some argue about the possible meaning, there is enough circumstantial evidence to indicate this was not a condemnation of Alpert. Instead it is a way of saying that Herb knew (and still knows) what his song is. One could certainly say the same about Davis or Chet Baker or Louis Armstrong. In every performance, in every recording, you can, in one way or another, hear the underlying song of the musician.

No- that does not mean that all the songs they do sound alike. Far from it. It's the jambalaya Curtis mentions in Armstrong. It's the California Cool in Chet Baker. It's a life of daring and innovation driving Davis. It is a curious spirituality in Coltrane. It's how they play.

The song we sing on the trumpet when we play
The song is your story. The song, as you play it, tells who you are. Now, I don't want to make too much of this. It isn't all that evident in those of us who aren't full-time professionals. Or maybe it is. Think about your playing. Think about how you play. Most of us have our "style" regardless of the music. Pay attention to it. is it you? Have fun with it in your practice room. You will notice yourself being more consistent.

The meeting place of our

• phrasing
• interpretation
• experience
• tone

That's really the crux of it.


What about me? What is my song? How do I play what I play? I never thought of that until reading Curtis' post. But then again, I knew it in my intuitive self. It started- and continues today, 55 years later- with one song- "When the Saints Go Marching In". I can now play that in all 12 major keys! (Some keys way more slowly than others!) I have at least 50 various versions of the song in my iTunes library from Dixieland to Bluegrass to "classical." Closely related to it is "Amazing Grace." I have around 90 variations of that song. Throw in "Tijuana Taxi/Spanish Flea" for some color and you can hear my song. It's how I play what I play.

What I have is blues and jazz, American gospel,  a sense of gratitude and joy. I wrap that into everything I play. It is not a surprise that the only song I have a solo on in either big band is "Basin Street Blues." My favorite solo piece for concert band is the (for me) blues-driven "Song Without Words" from Holst's 2nd Military Suite. I can probably hear that in my style from time to time when playing a Bach chorale, Moravian hymn, or Gabrieli's "Canzon #2."

So what? Always an important question. What difference does it make if I know this or not?

Does my song change? Do I play a different song today than I did 55 years ago, or even 10 years ago? For me, no. But the song does find different interpretations, tone, phrasing- all based on the changing of my experiences. Remember, the "song" is the meeting place of all those things. It is how the story gets told.

It is yours!

Don't lose it- and don't let it stay locked up inside you.