23. Observe and Imitate

Try to find the best teachers,

listen to the finest playing, and

try to emulate that.

Be true to the music.

-- Wynton Marsalis

I have been reading Words Without Music, an interesting memoir/autobiography by modern American composer Philip Glass. It is a good insight into the creative process of one remarkable composer and how he developed into the person he has become. Reading it with an openness to seeing creativity develop is worth the time. At one point he is describing his working with sculptor Richard Serra. Glass spent several years working with Serra as a "day-job" to support his composing. He expressed to Serra one day that he would like to learn how to draw to which Serra replied that he could do that by teaching glass how to "see" and then he would be able to draw.

That was an eye-opening insight for Glass. He reports the following thought that flowed from it:

Drawing is about seeing, dancing is about moving, writing (narrative and especially poetry) is about speaking, and music is about hearing. I next realized that music training was absolutely about learning to hear - going completely past everyday listening. p. 223 [emphasis added]

This reminded me of an article about Clark Terry on the Jazz Advice website. Terry's three steps to improvising are:

Imitation, Assimilation, Innovation.

That simple. (Yeah. Right!) They define imitation this way:

Listening. Learning lines by ear. Transcribing solos. Absorbing a player’s feel, articulation, and time.

The same as Glass's insight- learning to hear. Paying attention.

We've all heard someone say (or have said it ourselves) that they just don't "get" or "understand" that music.The first time you hear music from a completely different culture based on scales and rhythm that is "foreign" to us, we scratch our heads in wonder. What that means on some level is that we are not listening or able to listen to the music as it is meant to be heard. Our own brains don't expect it to sound that way.

Learning to hear. Paying attention.

But we can keep working at it.  We can keep listening. We can train ourselves to listen differently. Too often we expect things to be just like they have been before. Or in a way that we are used to. Glass himself faced a great deal of criticism and even hatred for the type of "odd" music he was writing. When he started in the 50s and 60s "modern music" was considered the music of the 1900s- 1920s or so. People came on stage and attempted to stop his concerts! They weren't able to hear- and therefore made a judgement about its quality and even its definition as music.

I would go beyond listening to learn to improvise. I think it is essential to being a musician of any type of music. Hearing what it sounds like; hearing what it feels like. Then picking up our instrument and trying to imitate it. The more we listen, the more we are open to hearing, the greater our musical skill will become and the deeper our understanding of music will go.

What this boils down to is going beyond the music theory and an intellectual understanding. The website Brain Pickings has a post from the 1982 book by author and composer Elliot Schwartz Music: Ways of Listening. The book outlines seven essential skills of learning to listen in this age where, he believes, we have been “dulled by our built-in twentieth-century habit of tuning out.”

The first skill is:

• Develop your sensitivity to music. Try to respond esthetically to all sounds, from the hum of the refrigerator motor or the paddling of oars on a lake, to the tones of a cello or muted trumpet. When we really hear sounds, we may find them all quite expressive, magical and even ‘beautiful.’ On a more complex level, try to relate sounds to each other in patterns: the successive notes in a melody, or the interrelationships between an ice cream truck jingle and nearby children’s games.

It's all about hearing. The other six skills Schwartz explains help us guide our learning and our hearing, going deeper and broader.

• Time is a crucial component of the musical experience. Develop a sense of time as it passes: duration, motion, and the placement of events within a time frame.

• Develop a musical memory. While listening to a piece, try to recall familiar patterns, relating new events to past ones and placing them all within a durational frame.

• If we want to read, write or talk about music, we must acquire a working vocabulary.

• Try to develop musical concentration, especially when listening to lengthy pieces.

• Try to listen objectively and dispassionately. Concentrate upon ‘what’s there,’ and not what you hope or wish would be there.

• Bring experience and knowledge to the listening situation. That includes not only your concentration and growing vocabulary, but information about the music itself: its composer, history and social context. Such knowledge makes the experience of listening that much more enjoyable.

This isn't just about music, of course. The relation to writing, or cooking, or being good at your job can be easily made. From the Brain Pickings post:

Perhaps most interestingly, you can substitute “reading” for “listening” and “writing” for “music,” and the list would be just as valuable and insightful, and just as needed an antidote to the dulling of our modern modes of information consumption.

Go for it. Listen!
Then, really hear.
Then imitate.

22. The Inner Game (part 1)

People ask me how I make music. I tell them I just step into it.

It's like stepping into a river and joining the flow.

Every moment in the river has its song.

― Michael Jackson

I have referred in the past to something called "The Inner Game." It began when W. Timothy Gallwey wrote a book in 1974 called The Inner Game of Tennis. Other books on the same theme followed including The Inner Game of Golf, The Inner Game of Work, and, by Barry Green, The Inner Game of Music. The overview blurb to the tennis book said it is

a revolutionary program for overcoming the self-doubt, nervousness, and lapses of concentration that can keep a player from winning.

The Inner Game Website says

Instead of serving up technique, it concentrated on the fact that, as Gallwey wrote, “Every game is composed of two parts, an outer game and an inner game.” The former is played against opponents, and is filled with lots of contradictory advice; the latter is played not against, but within the mind of the player, and its principal obstacles are self-doubt and anxiety. Gallwey’s revolutionary thinking, built on a foundation of Zen thinking and humanistic psychology, was really a primer on how to get out of your own way to let your best game emerge. It was sports psychology before the two words were pressed against each other and codified into an accepted discipline

Barry Green decided in the mid-1980s to write the first book about the Inner Game that was not about sports. Instead he applied it to music. Gallwey commented in the introduction that with both sports and music we use the word "play" for things that take a lot of discipline. In music as in sports, "overteaching or overcontrol can lead to fear and self doubt." Hence the techniques and philosophy of the Inner Game work equally well.

Green tells us then:

The primary discovery of the Inner Game is that, especially in our culture of achievement-oriented activities, human beings significantly get in their own way. The point of the Inner Game of sports or music is always the same -- to reduce mental interferences that inhibit the full expression of human potential. (Page 7)

We learn in the inner game that there are two "selves" that can be at work in our heads- Self 1 and Self 2. These are not psychological states, personality traits, the conscious and unconscious, right-brain and left-brain, mind and body, or neocortex vs. reptilian brain. They are brain processes that are judged by their impact, the outcome. Simply put by Gallwey and Green:

• If it interferes with your potential, it is Self 1. 
• If it enhances your potential, it is Self 2.

Both Self 1 and Self 2 can access the brain's conscious and unconscious resources, utilize the right- and left-brain styles, or whatever. It's all about the results. (See Green, pp. 16-17)

Gallwey came up with something called The Performance Equation. Green says it this way.

The basic truth is that our performance of any task depends as much on the extent to which we interfere with our abilities as it does on those abilities themselves. This can be expressed as a formula:

P = p - i

In this equation P refers to Performance, which we define as the result you achieve - what you actually wind up feeling, achieving and learning, Similarly, p stands for potential, defined as your innate ability -- what you are naturally capable of. And i means interference - you capacity to get in you own way.

Most people try to improve their performance (P) by increasing their potential (p) through practicing and learning new skills.

The Inner Game approach, on the other hand, is to reduce interference (i) at the same time that potential (p) is being trained -- and the result is that our actual performance comes closer to our true potential. (Green, pp. 23 - 24)

He then applies Self 1 and Self 2 to the equation:

• Self 1 is our interference. It contains our concept about how things should be, our judgements and associations. It is particularly fond of the words 'should' and 'shouldn't', and often sees things in terms of what "could have been".

• Self 2 is the vast reservoir of potential within each one of us. It contains our natural talents and abilities, and is a virtually unlimited resource that we cab tap and develop. Left to its own devices, it performs with gracefulness and ease. (Green, p. 28)

Which is, naturally, what we all want as musicians. To be able to play with gracefulness and ease is quite a goal. We all know those moments when it has happened. We also know those many moments when it didn't. Sadly, we often let those less than graceful moments command what we do and how we feel.

When that happens, Self 1 is in full command.

But Green and Gallwey believe that it is possible to work toward a greater role for Self 2 in our lives, and especially in our music.

Inner Game techniques can reduce the effects of self-interference and guide us toward an ideal state of being. This state makes it easier for us to perform at our potential by rousing our interest, increasing our awareness and teaching us to discover and trust our built-in resources and abilities. It is a state in which we are alert, relaxed, responsive and focused. Gallwey refers to it as a state of 'relaxed concentration', and calls it the 'master skill' of the Inner Game. (Green, p. 35)

That's the introduction to the Inner Game. Simply and concisely it will be a way for us to empower Self 2. Since Self 2 has the same access to our experiences, training, desires, and dreams, it becomes the source of our own empowerment and growth in our skills. It will assist us in dealing with the interference we experience from Self 1.

Of course we have to identify Self 1 when it is taking over. We have to hear that voice and know that it is getting in the way of us doing what we can do.

So for the time being, just become more aware of how your Self 1 voice gets in the way of you doing what you are able to do. Become more able to identify it, even when it makes sense.

In the back of my head, for example, I have an image of an old trumpet player I knew once upon a time. When I knew him he was probably about the same age I am today, maybe even younger. He was not an accomplished musician. He enjoyed playing, I think, but he had trouble keeping up. His image has always been there in my head as to what happens to amateur trumpet players as they age.

Or, as Self 1 tells me, as I, myself, age.

Self 2 has learned that this is false. Very false. I mentioned Herb Alpert's age when I saw him in concert back in October. I have more than a decade to get to that. The same as with one of the participants in last year's Shell Lake Big Band Camp. So I have set Self 1 aside over this past year and went on as if Self 2 were the truth. I am glad I did.

This, as I say over and  over, applies to all of our lives. Self 1 is our inner critic for whom nothing will ever be right. Self 1 will always find the faults, the imperfections, the extreme lack of possibilities. Don't let Self 1 get in the way of your joy.


The Inner Game of Music Website

21. Be Crazy- Crazy Good!

Those who dance were thought to be insane 

by those who could not hear the music.

I know- I ended last week's post with that same quote. Well, consider it the theme, the phrase that ties last week to this week. It is a segue into what is like a coda to last week. For when I was finished typing it for last week, I could hear the unmistakable voice of camp director, Mr. Baca:

Are you crazy?

and the response, as always

Yeah- crazy good!

Not sure what to say about that I Googled the phrase "crazy good" and ended up at the online Urban Dictionary where I found:

a. Awesome, amazing, cool, stunning, super cool

Knowing the humility for which we trumpet players are so well known (?), that made sense. Hey- this is about being "crazy good." Awesome, amazing, etc. It is beyond just plain good. Man, it's crazy good!

But that's not what the quote is about. It's more than being especially good, talented or stunning. And sure enough, right after that first definition was another:

b. The feelings following an enlightenment; typically in creative work (elevation of work of art, idea, ability, level of happiness), where one is playing with and extending further. As the paradigm has shifted, others may express the genuine feeling you have actually gone crazy, however the opposite could be true and the path to awesomeness is being cemented.

Wow. Now that I have had happen. A moment of enlightenment, that old "Aha!" moment, leads down a path that you had never thought you would be following. The idea or ability or level of happiness is beyond what we have thought to be "normal." And that can feel like crazy!

Isn't that what musicians are looking to do- go beyond the "normal," find the new idea, the new experience, even in the song you have played hundreds or more times?  You finish playing that exercise in Clarke or the Etude in Concone and you find yourself sitting in silence. Something has just happened. You can't explain it, but you know it is real. People may look at those hours of practicing studies from the 19th Century and look at you and say,

What? Are you crazy?

and you smile and say,

Yeah- Crazy  good!

Or you are sick and tired of that piece your band plays every gig. There isn't even a place of solos or improvising. Sure, the group plays it well. You should after how many times you have played it. But then there's that moment when the audience stands and applauds and you realize you have just played it in a way that you never remember before. Sure, same notes, same rhythms. But the groove? The expression? The tightness of the group? You smile to yourself and say,

Yeah- Crazy good.

Or there's that memory of that place on the west facing lookout at the park. There's room for maybe 20 or 30 people- and the place is full. It is almost sunset on a perfect day. People are chatting and discussing everything from the weather to politics to how to keep the kids quiet long enough for you to see the sun set.

You didn't need to worry. As the sun sinks into t he western horizon and the colors begin to grow and deepen, the crowd speaks more softly. Even the children are entranced by this every day event as daylight lessens and shadows lengthen. You realize that the whole group is now silent. Adults and children in awe of one of the most common events on the planet. In awe as if there has never been one like it- and never will be again.

Try to explain that to someone who may not be able to get it, who doesn't hear the music of the sun or the birds in the forest behind you. Try to describe what it means to one of those overly logical-types who want answers.

What? Are you crazy or something?

Yeah- crazy good!

The past few weeks I have written about the language of music and the ability to speak it, live it, understand it, play it. It is a wordless language that makes no sense to someone who has never experienced it. It is tough enough for most of us on those days when the lip won't stay on the right note, the brain forgets how to play a "G major" scale, and you run out of breath half-way through every phrase.

But we keep coming back because we know the language and we know it works. Not every time, not every day, but when it happens, we are transformed.

So, I will end by again quoting Mr. Baca:

Let's get crazy!
Crazy good!

20. Sing, Play, and Dance

Everything in the universe has a rhythm,

everything dances.

― Maya Angelou

Last week I wrote about Joshua MacCluer and a post he wrote titled "10 Principles for Learning Music for Beginning and Amateur Musicians." Just to put this week into context, here are the first five:

1) Start with the “Why?”
2) The goal is to learn to speak music, not to learn how to play an instrument.
3) At the beginning, there are no mistakes or rules.
4) All hail the groove! Find and feel the groove before you play.
5) Don’t worry about the notes! Make it feel right!

Where does he take this list? Let's follow him...
(Note: that the italicized text is from MacCluer's post. The others are my thoughts.)

6) Listening is at least as important as playing.

• We must develop the ability to listen to others and play at the same time. We must also learn what to listen to at what time. ...For example, one technique is listen to a song several times, each time listening to a different instrument or element of the music. First listen to the bass line. Then the groove. Then the feeling. Then the drums, the woodwinds, the keyboard, the violins, then the dynamics. The choices are unlimited. The most important step at the beginning is developing the ability to move our ears away from our own playing to other players or elements of the music.

I will have more to say about this one in a later post. Music is meant to be heard, just like language. It is communication. What have others had to "say" in their music? Listen to it. What does Arban's 1st Characteristic Study sound like when it is played well? You will find it on You Tube. Sometimes if you are having trouble finding a groove- find a performance and listen for it. Then find it in your playing.

7) Don’t practice, jam!

• Jamming is the way to learn any language.... [T]he way to learn any language is to listen, imitate, and jam.... we don’t recite speeches, we have improvised conversations. Every conversation we have with other people is an improvisation! Jamming in music is playing improvised music with other people, trying things out and learning to play with others in a way that works.... Learn to listen, reach and find new things, feel the groove together and talk about the same thing musically, in an improvised and relaxed setting.

One of the interesting things I experienced last summer at the big band and trumpet camps was practicing with another musician. One of us would play the exercise, then the other would. It accomplished a couple of things, First it helped each of us hear the piece or exercise from the other side of the horn. We pick up nuances and phrases that way. Second, it keeps us from rushing through our practice. We pay better attention. It is only a small step from that to "jamming" together.

8) Play with other music as much as possible, even when practicing. Always keep a musical context when playing.

• If there is no one to jam with you today, it’s best to find some music to play along with. Even if you are playing your scales, having a groove to play with is very helpful. Playing with recordings or drum tracks or loops is much better than playing alone.  It is also super fun and very educational to play along with recordings by great musicians of your favorite songs. Make it feel right when you play along with pros on the recording, and it will feel right when you play with people in real life.

This goes back to the listening- and moves it further. Sure, you may do this when trying to transcribe a song, but what about just to play along with Miles Davis or the Canadian Brass? I have learned many wind band and quintet pieces that way over the years. I can feel their groove and find my place in it. And, as MacCluer says above- it really is "super fun."

9) Sing!

• The ideas we want to express [in our music] live inside of us, waiting to be expressed in the real world. However, the connection between our inner world and the outer world must be developed. The best way to do this is through singing. It removes our technical limitations and allows us to find our inner voice and ideas much more easily. Singing should be a daily practice for all musicians.... Once we know what we are hearing or trying to play, it is much easier to produce that in real life.

I don't do it as often as I should, but singing a piece should probably be a standard of playing new or difficult pieces. Someone said at camp last summer that if you have already sung the piece, you are no longer sight-reading. Amazingly- it works. Sometimes I will sing the exercise before playing it a second time. Again, that slows me down (resting as much as playing!) and helps me get the groove a little more firmly established in my head.

10) Learn to move with the music.

• Along with finding our voice another primary goal of music is to feel and live in the groove. The groove does not live in our heads but in our bodies. Therefore, dancing and playing drums is also very helpful. If we dance and feel the music in our bodies or maybe with a small percussion instrument, we will truly be in the flow of the musical experience and the music will flow easily and happily through us....Dancing gets the music in our whole body, and makes for much closer connection with the musical energy. So dance! It’s fun and feels great. If you’re embarrassed, do it in private, and dance your way through the music you want to play. The rhythm and groove you get from that will make the instrumental playing much easier.

Dance. Move. Let the music express itself in your body language. At a recent concert one of my friends commented on the musicians on stage. They had no energy. As you watched them you almost expected them to fall asleep mid-note. Now, there are professionals and top-notch musicians who may not move much in their performance. (Bob Dylan comes to mind, but then his musical and verbal language is so rich, he lives the movement!) So moving when practicing (or singing or listening) does make sense.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That groove thing keeps coming back, doesn't it? Well, after writing last week's post on these 10 principles, I was doing my daily practice. After I got warmed up, etc. I pulled out one of the Concone Lyrical Studies, #7 to be exact. I have had this problem that these "lyrical" studies have not felt all that lyrical. They are a collection of notes, one after the other, on the page. In language terms, they are words strung together in a foreign language that I haven't been able to understand. I have also found it more difficult to give slow, lyrical pieces the emotion they deserve.

Well, earlier last week I had found a You Tube recording of #7 and listened to it. It was okay, but it didn't move me. So I did what MacCluer has talked about. I sang it, then started to play it listening and feeling for the "groove." Surprise, surprise. There really is a groove in Concone #7! The next thing I knew I was playing in that groove.

I liked it enough to play it again. I found myself moving with the music as I played it. I can't say I was dancing, but the music sure was.

This is why, at age 67, I am still a student and still learning. There is always something new in the next piece, in the middle of the old Arban's or Concone, or waiting in an unexpected phrase on the next page, around the corner of tomorrow, or even as I take a moment to pay attention to the groove of my own life and the music I make. I call this blog series reflections on life and music. If it works in the practice room, it will work in all our relationships.

• Sing.
• Play.
• Dance.

And one of my favorite all time quotes:

Those who dance were thought to be insane 

by those who could not hear the music.

19. Why?

Music is a language that doesn’t speak in particular words.
It speaks in emotions, and if it’s in the bones,
it’s in the bones.

― Keith Richards, According to the Rolling Stones

In some of my surfing this past week I came across the website of Joshua MacCluer, trumpeter, educator, performance coach. One of the links was to a post he wrote titled "10 Principles for Learning Music for Beginning and Amateur Musicians." While most of us are probably well past the "beginner" level, I found the list a good refresher of what we are all about as musicians. It also reminded me that even if I am not a professional musician or music educator, many times it is in the ensemble work of learning from each other that we can make a lot of progress. This blog has been for me a way to concretize my own learning and practice as a musician.

Back to MacCluer, though. Here are his first five principles. Comments in italics are from his explanation:

1) Start with the “Why?”

• If we forget our real “Why?” while we are playing we might start thinking the answer is something like, “I want to not make mistakes” or “I want to get it right” or “I want to not embarrass myself” or “I want to win this audition” or one of many ego-based desires that make music making much more difficult. Instead, we should figure out our real personal “Why?” and remind ourselves regularly, especially while we are playing music. This is very important.

What is your real "Why?"

Several of mine- I can't stop making music. My life without it would be dull. The performance is one of the ways of sharing joy. My mind is expanded, skills developed, joy embodied. It's been happening for almost 55 years now.

2) The goal is to learn to speak music, not to learn how to play an instrument.

• Music is a language. Therefore, like any language, the foremost goal is communication. If we want to learn how to communicate with music, it is much more important to learn what music is and how it works and how to express ourselves with it... I believe a lot of music can be more easily learned away from the instrument, or using other instruments like our ears, imagination, voices, hands, feet and bodies.

I discovered this several years ago when I started playing in a Big Band. Almost all of my trumpet playing for decades was "concert" material- the great repertoire of wind bands. While I had listened to jazz and Big Band for just as many decades I had little experience playing it. I found it was a whole new world. I struggled. A lot! Fortunately I was 4th trumpet and could easily drop back (or out) when it got to the tougher parts without being missed. While I "knew" the language of jazz and big band, I couldn't "speak" it with my horn. I still had the wind band to play in and there, even with new numbers, I could drop back into a style and language I knew. It kept my chops up and helped me technically while I was learning to speak "jazz."

I am now able to do a lot more with that 4th trumpet part. Last summer at Shell Lake Big Band I learned I know the language and can even play some of the improvising. I am becoming more multi-lingual.

3) At the beginning, there are no mistakes or rules.

• Self judgement closes down the mind and kills learning... The principle here is don’t worry about mistakes. It’s not about “getting it right” it’s about expression. Just play and have fun, and learn quickly and easily like a child

I will be doing a lot more with this one over the next couple months with the Inner Game ideas. Suffice it to say, this is important!

4) All hail the groove! Find and feel the groove before you play.

• The groove is where the magic lives in the music.... The first step of playing music is to connect to the groove. How to do that? Quiet your mind and try to feel it. Focus on the feeling of the music and getting that feeling into your body. You will know you have found it when your body starts to want to move with the groove.

This can be an important part of learning the language talked about above. I know, almost instinctively, the "groove" of a Sousa march, a Holst Suite, an Alfred Reed or Samuel Hazo arrangement. I read over the piece, even if I have played it before, and my body wants to move with it.  That's the groove. With jazz I have felt the groove through decades of listening. Now I am learning how to express that movement through the horn.

5) Don’t worry about the notes! Make it feel right!

• Here’s a secret about music: people don’t listen to music, they feel it. If a song has all the right notes but doesn’t feel right, it doesn’t work.... Right notes with bad rhythm are wrong notes... Victor Wooten’s Rule #1, “Never lose the groove to find a note.” ... If you play a wrong note with perfect rhythm, in most cases most people will not even notice. It will slide right past their ears because the feeling is right.

Naturally this doesn't mean play whatever you want. That is the language of gibberish, the mumbling and noise of pre-language. But it does mean that it is more than just the right notes, the technically correct but lifeless string of notes. Remember in a language that the same words are available to the high school student essayist and the Pulitzer Prize-winning author. It's more than using the words, it is how and why (!) you use them. It is the passion and emotion embodied in them. Feel the music- let the feeling flow.

 I am excited by these principles. They lay more of that foundation that is essential to the continuing growth of my music. I will explore more of these in the next five of MacCluer's principles next week.

What are your reasons "Why?" Let me know.

18. Review and Plan for a Happy New Year

Don't practice quickly and hope it gets better;
practice excellence and hope it gets faster.
--Frank Campos

It is an old and trite idea to take the end of the year as a time to look back and reflect on what has been happening in one's life. But what makes something "old and trite" is that there is truth in it. Most of the time we don't stop to review and see where we have come. Why not take the end of the year as such a time?

Which is where the importance of the journal comes in. Remember a few weeks ago or so when I reminded us of the importance of keeping a journal of our practicing? Seems like busy work. But here is when you will appreciate it- and maybe get back into the habit since if you are like me you have not kept the journal for a few weeks or more.

I went back and looked at my journal from right after trumpet camp last summer. At camp we were given ideas on a regular practice routine. In addition I was given the idea to do the Arban's exercises from page 13 - 22 and 25-28. These are good, basic exercises that have been proven to be so fundamental it might be valuable to practice them on a regular basis.

So starting in mid-August I did that. For six weeks or so I made sure that I went through those on a regular basis. Now anyone who has played trumpet for more than a few months knows how to play these. There's nothing particularly difficult in them. For years I mostly ignored them since, well, I can play that.

But could I play them well? Could I play them at speed? Did I take the time to play them slowly enough to develop excellence? Often I would practice it quickly so I could say, "Did that. What's next?" Over these last five months I have discovered that there is an amazing depth in those exercises. They start easy; some are more difficult than others; they introduce us to key signatures and chord structures.

Last week, aware of reflection time for this week, I went back to page 13 and started playing through them. I hadn't done them all in about 2 months. I had worked on other things and had continued to notice my progression as a trumpet player. What would these sound like now?

I started with a medium tempo and found they fell into place smoothly. They moved along and felt right. Can I play them as the upper suggested tempo? Surprise. Yes, I can, at least many of them. I looked at my notes in the journal (minimal though they are) and saw that it took me a lot longer to play them in August and September because I a) couldn't play to tempo and b) missed a lot of notes.

I can talk about other reflections, but this is a good introduction to it. What I discovered was

• if I hadn't kept a journal I would have had to rely on imperfect memory for comparison
• if I hadn't taken time for reflection I wouldn't have been as aware of my progress
• if I hadn't slowed down when first working on these back in August I wouldn't have gone beyond "just good enough"

The natural question then is "So what? What do I do with this?" As I was working through these sections of Arban's with a little better insight I discovered the ones that were still causing me difficulty. I was reminded that there are always (!!) the basics that need to be worked on. It may be "easy" to breeze through and play some of these. But there is always the opportunity to strengthen the foundation.

That brought me to the result of review and reflection- planning. I have already talked about goal-setting, etc. but that will often return as a theme. In short, for this particular review, I came up with a specific plan to refine my daily routine. I have taken the sections between pages 13 and 36, some of the very basics, and divided them into three sections. At first I will play through each section every third day. I will be going through each section twice each week for the next 3-5 weeks. My goal- reinforce these basics and add a bit of "excellence" beyond "good enough." This will take about 10 - 15 minutes of each day's routine.

With all that aside, the biggest reflection for me is what has occurred in my trumpet playing since June when I attended the Big Band Camp at Shell Lake. The quintet I am part of then had a "peak experience" at the Vintage Band Mini Fest in Northfield, MN. I then headed back to Shell Lake for trumpet camp where my whole view of my trumpet playing took a huge positive jump. I have continued to play in two Big Bands, two concert bands and the quintet and have practiced 8 out of 10 days.

I am humbled and amazed at what has happened. I am grateful to all who helped, encouraged, challenged, instructed and allowed me to play along with you this past year.

There is more to come.

Happy New Year to all!

17. It's a Gift

Music is God's gift to man,

the only art of Heaven given to earth,

the only art of earth we take to Heaven.

-- Walter Savage Landor (16th C. English poet)

Gifts are on our mind today. It is the day before the day before Christmas. Any last minute gifts to buy? Any gifts I hope I get? What is a gift, though? The word comes from a word that means "give." Not a big surprise there. We know what a gift is, of course. The definitions come as no surprise:

1. a thing given willingly to someone without payment; a present.

synonyms: present, donation, offering, bestowal, bonus, award, endowment; 

2. a natural ability or talent.

synonyms: talent, flair, aptitude, facility, knack, bent, ability, expertise, capacity, capability, faculty; endowment, strength, genius, brilliance, skill, artistry

But the gift of heaven? Music? The only "art of heaven" that we can experience? I think I can agree with that, both as a listener and performer.

No great insights on that. Just a reminder that we as musicians at whatever stage of development we may be are gifted and givers of gifts. Be serious about your gift but enjoy it. The gift is useless if it isn't opened and used. The greatest gifts are shared.

Listen to music this week.

Make music this week.

Celebrate the "art of heaven."

The earth has grown old with its burden of care,

but at Christmas it always is young,

the heart of the jewel burns lustrous and fair,

and its soul full of music breaks the air,

when the song of angels is sung.

--Phillips Brooks

16. Making It a Story

Where words fail, music speaks.

― Hans Christian Andersen

Who knows what Frank Foster had in mind when he wrote the wonderful Blues in Hoss' Flat or what Count Basie thought as he put together the band playing the number? It is a fine tune with lots of style, flair and pure joy. Most of us don't think much about the meaning behind the songs we hear or play, especially if they are instrumental. It is just a song.

But don't say that too loud. Music has probably been telling stories since the first cave dweller pounded in some sort of primitive time. Last year at the Big Band Camp at Shell Lake we did the Blues in Hoss' Flat. But first we watched this video- a classic by Jerry Lewis from his movie, The Errand Boy. Take a couple minutes and enjoy it.

Lewis is, of course, pantomiming a "chairman of the board" leading a meeting. Does it help to know that the original Basie album was titled Chairman of the Board? Even if it doesn't, Lewis' interpretation is a wonder to watch. I can never hear the number without this pantomime playing in my head as well.

My first real introduction to "serious" music appreciation was back in junior high (dates me, huh?) when the music teacher dropped the needle at the start of an instrumental piece. She gave us the simple instruction, "What do you hear?" No name, no introduction, just that question. Through the speaker came the opening bars of one of the great works of American music of the 20th Century, An American in Paris. It didn't take me long, even with my 7th grade ears, to hear a street scene, car horns and soon I saw people scurrying to and fro. After a few minutes, she stopped and asked what we heard. I don't remember what anyone else said. I'm not sure I even said anything myself. But when she told us the name and what Gershwin was doing I was blown away.

I had heard the story in the music. I had heard what the composer was trying to tell me without having words get in the way. That one day in class 55 years ago changed my life. I don't always hear stories in the music I listen to. Sometimes I look at the name a composer gave to a song and try to put it to the music. For example, I don't know what Miles had in mind when he titled one of his numbers, Solar. But I hear the sun and energy, light and bright skies when I listen. But then Bruce Hornsby, Christian McBride, and Jack Dejohnette put a different arrangement of the same song on their album, Camp Meeting. Now the sun and light and energy are placed in a different context. I still see the power and light, but now it's in the spiritual context of a tent or camp meeting. Same notes, same basic song - but now a whole new story is being told.

Isn't that what we try to do when we play? More on this sometime in the new year. For the next few weeks spend some quality time listening to instrumentals, stories without words, and find the stories they tell you.

15. Sky Thinking

Hard work beats talent 

when talent doesn't work hard.

-Tim Notke

I'm actually not going to write about "hard work" but about what I may need in order to do the "hard work." That happens to be having "goals." In essence goals are the ways we know where we are going. Over the years I have been taught at many workshops that goals have to be SMART:

• Specific – target a specific area for improvement.
• Measurable – quantify or at least suggest an indicator of progress.
• Attainable – assuring that an end can be achieved.
• Realistic – state what results can realistically be achieved, given available resources.
• Time-related – specify when the result(s) can be achieved.
-Wikipedia

Which means that my goal

to be an excellent trumpet player

doesn't really fit the criteria. But

to be able to play at speed the first section (12 measures) of Arban's 1st Characteristic Study by January 15

does fit. (And now that I mention it, might be a goal to work on over the next month!) I have a few goals related to next summer's Big Band and Trumpet Camps, including

to be able to comfortably extend my range to that elusive (to me) high C or D

as well as

to be more comfortable with dealing with changes in songs and do an improvised solo.

That goal of comfort in changes is a little too vague to really fit the criteria. If I have some specific activities and exercises that I am using to get in that direction such a long-range goal can tend to be okay.

The Edge of Unachievable is one way we learned at camp to find goals. Maybe we could use the phrase Sky Thinking. Even though that phrase is often used to mean things that are out of touch with reality, why do our goals have to be that way? How about, instead, may be on the edge of unachievable but not quite out of reach. With hard work informing and forming whatever talent we may have, who says we can't get there?

Hoping your Sky Thinking plans have been

Written Down, and traced back to exactly

what to Act on today.

-Bob Baca

Expanding on Bob Baca's wish for us at the end of camp, there are three things necessary for us to move forward.

• Do your sky thinking. Brainstorm. Take some time to think about where you want to be in a month, six months. I was talking to a young trumpet player the other week who has been working on the Carnival of Venice from Arbans. He has already played it for Solo/Ensemble but hasn't reached where he wants to go with it. He is still pushing his sky thinking.

• Write them down. Start a journal where you note your sky thinking goals and can see your progress. If they aren't written down, they are less likely to happen. The further out you go, of course, the less specific you can be. You also have to be ready to go with whatever life may throw at you. Don't be so rigid that you will break if something gets in your way. Writing them down may also be a way to share them with others- teachers, family, friends, band directors- who can help you.

• Translate into action. Ah, here's the work. I am great at spinning ideas and plans into thin air (the "sky" of sky thinking.) I can easily get side-tracked by those pesky squirrels that are everywhere. I can lose focus and direction if I don't have some form of plan of action. It doesn't have to be fully outlined with footnotes and explanations. I'm not that structured. But I need a flow-chart that keeps me on the ball. I need to have some way of knowing what I need to do today in order to get closer to my goal tomorrow.

Put this all together and I end up with a far better set of goals than I had when I started. I also feel better about what I am doing. I know I am going somewhere that I can regularly test by my own criteria.

Try some of these for yourself if you are having trouble in some area of your life. Where are you going? What do you want for you? Get out of the rut by going off into that almost unachievable place.

[By the way- since I listed some achievable goals above, I promise to let you know how I'm doing.]

14. No Wandering

On those long notes behind the trumpet solo,

if anyone lets his mind wander for a minute

he is dead.

-Don Ellis

Things are moving along nicely. You are in "the groove." You are feeling what the rest of the group is doing. It can be a concert band piece or a trio. You know the music is working its magic on you and you couldn't feel better.

Then for  moment you get distracted. It could be something out of the corner of your eye or a note that didn't land just right from you or someone else. Maybe you just remembered something you forgot to do before you left home. Perhaps a memory of another performance was triggered by a note or just a random thought drifted up from the unconscious.

Suddenly the whole mood and feel changes. You aren't lost- you know right where you are, but the groove is gone. You are not in sync with what's happening.  If you are in a concert band you may get away with it. If you are in the midst of a solo, as great trumpet player Don Ellis so bluntly put it- you're dead.

Now, I know Robert Baca said the same thing about "panic" that I quoted a few weeks ago. The truth is, though, it's true. It took me years to realize the truth of it- and why my performances were often riddled with moments when I "died." No one noticed most of them except perhaps the director and the person sitting next to me. But distraction is for me the worst of.....

Squirrel.

Just kidding. Another way of describing this result of distraction is that obstacles appear when we take our mind away from the sound, the music, or the goal. Obstacles are things that get in the way of doing what we want to or are usually able to do. When I have listened to recordings of some of my solos in the big band or concert band I have often noticed one thing in particular- the sound. Perhaps it is better to say that I notice when my "sound" goes flat or isn't alive. The obstacle is not that I can't keep a clearer sound, the obstacle is maintaining it when I am distracted.

Sometimes I get distracted by the fact that I just did the previous line or phrase better than usual. I take that moment to congratulate myself- and I am distracted. Sometimes I get distracted by paying too much attention to the audience and I get flustered. Sometimes in life I get distracted by "the small stuff" and miss the goals and hopes I have for myself.

Even good things can be distractions, of course. If it takes me away from my goals, it is a distraction.

High-wire artist, acrobat, and daredevil Nik Wallenda of the famous Flying Wallendas has this to say:

I've trained all my life not to be distracted by distractions.
Nik Wallenda

Perhaps the word for what Wallenda does is maintain focus and being mindful. Staying in the moment is essential. Notice that he says he has had to "train" all his life to do it. I do not think it comes naturally. We are easily distracted because that is how our brain is constructed. It is part of the ancient survival system. To learn how to do this takes time and energy.

We learn in the practice room when we work on our pieces so that we know them more than just technically. We learn focus as we become familiar with the rhythms and flow that make the music alive. We learn mindfulness as we take the time to sing the parts out loud to feel the movement. We discover awareness as we listen to ourselves play and how what we are playing fits into the greater picture of the music.

But we also improve our musical focus ability when we take five or ten minutes on a daily basis to meditate or focus on our breathing as a way of bringing ourselves back into the moment. What we do in the hours of the day when we are not playing music can have a huge impact on how we learn to avoid distractions. Our music is not a box we can separate from the rest of our lives. Nor is our life a separate box from the music.

As we learn to integrate who we are and what we do, we find that our music will flow from us.

And we can flow from our music.

Practice mindfulness. Stay in the moment. Pay attention to your breath. Feel the pulse of the music as you play. Remember the sound you want and play it. Don't think about it; don't analyze it. In your practice - just play it so it is yours.