Best New Health Tip for Marching Band According to Reader’s Digest, dermatologists say that 10% of all cancers occur on the eyelids. For best protection, use a gentle sunscreen designed not to irritate the eyes and wear sunglasses.

    Best Question Exemplifying the Lack of Stability in a Band Program After several “one and dones” – “Mr. Bratten. Who is going to be our band director next year?”

    Best Déjà Vu Experience Serving as a long-term sub at a small single A school.

    Best Comment to Students Selling Mattresses for their Band Fundraiser
    “I don’t know. Let me sleep on it.”

    Best New Musical Show on TV Alter Ego.

    Best Annoying New Term to Enter the National Consciousness Supply chain.

    My Best New Technological Advance Learning how to use the Adobe Scan app on my iPhone.

    Best Rediscovered Movie Classic That Made My Day Mary Poppins (1964).

    Best Enlightening Read An article on tubist Cora Youngblood Colson in the ITEA Journal.

    Best New Terrifying Technological Adventure Joining and then opening the TikTok app.

    Best Relaxing Thing Done That Shows My Age Float around the lazy river at a resort for days on end.

    Best Term of Endearment My students calling me Mr. Jigglesworth. (I don’t want to know why.)

    Best and Most Useful Retirement Memento Two quilts made out of my old band shirts.

    Best “If I Had to Do It Over Again” Thought Put the date on band shirts each year.

    Second Best “If I Had to Do It Over Again” Thought Do a better job of keeping up with concert programs and recordings.

    Best Music Documentary That Is New to Me It’s a tie: Quincy Jones, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Garth Brooks, Miles Davis, ZZ Top, and Frank Sinatra.

    Best Excuse for Not Keeping Up with Recordings Life went digital.

    Best New Tip for Getting Tuba Players to Open Up the Oral Cavity Tell them to pretend they have a grape on their tongue.

    Best Rediscovered Oldie Played During an MRI Where Is the Love? (1972) performed by Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway.

    Best Little Book to Improve Rudiments Life’s Little Rudiment Book by David Steinquest (Row-Loff Productions).

    Best Supplementary Book to Help a Non-Percussionist Teach Musical Snare Drum Playing Portraits in Rhythm: Complete Study Guide by Anthony J. Cirone (Alfred).

    Best Show of Physical Endurance While Judging Marching Band The iPad I was using overheated before I did.

    Best Band Fashion Trend to Keep an Eye On Cheaper, more stylish band uniforms made from different blends of materials.

    Best Post-Retirement Activity I Never Thought I Would Enjoy, But Do Driving a school bus for activity trips.

    Best Musical Thing I Get to Do Now More than Ever Play duets with private lesson students.

    Best Quote on Humility “People with humility don’t think less of themselves; they just think of themselves less.” (Norman Vincent Peale)

    Best Sign I Am Losing My Ability to Concentrate During Band Rehearsal Thinking about the tasty chicken wings I am going to eat after rehearsal and missing an entrance.

    Best Shocking Revelation that Rocked My World My college fight song was lifted from another university about 70 years ago.

    Best Pressing Question “What will I do when I can’t blame the pandemic for something anymore?”

    Best Small-Town Discovery Visiting the Gainesville, Texas Morton County Museum and learning about the Gainesville Community Circus and its band.

    Best Book Series for Escapism The Longmire Mysteries by Craig Johnson.

    Best Teaching Tip to Improve Technique That I Need to Use More Have students alter and practice the rhythms of rapid eighth, sixteenth, and triplet note patterns before returning to the original rhythm. (See Alternative Practice Strategies by Andrew Allen, October/November 2021 Instrumentalist)

    Best New-to-me Reason to Use an Alternate Slide Position Timbral consistency: Since the position closest to the first ordinarily yields the fullest sound, there are times when a lighter sound is wanted, and this is most easily achieved in an outer position.

    Best Term Most Likely to End Up in Student Excuses for Absences from Now On Mental health.

    Best Sign That All Is Well with the World Football players and cheerleaders attending a marching contest to watch the band. 

The post The Best of 2021 appeared first on The Instrumentalist.

    Dm7 Arpeggio and Scale


    G7 Arpeggio and Scale
 

    C Major Arpeggio and Scale

    Analysis of the scales for each chord will illustrate that it is basically the same scale starting on a different note each time.

    The difference in the sound of each chord comes from the 3rd and 7th.

    In the D Dorian scale, the 6th note B contributes to the Dorian quality.

    Because these are the peak tones (3rd, 7th, 6th) of each cord, learn to sing and hear what they sound like over the ii7, V7, I chord progression.
    Begin by singing the 3rd of each chord.

    Then sing only the 7th of each chord.

    Next, listen to how the 3rd and 7th of each chord sound.

    Now, this begins to sound more like a melodic line. By adding a few more scale tones, the phrase takes on more melodic content.

or

    As students develop an understanding of how these notes in the above exercises are used and their relationship to the chords and melodic line, they should continue to sing and play them with a play-along recording. These peak tones define the quality of the melodic line.
    There are many play-along recordings for developing the ear to hear and practice singing peak tones. These notes give the improvised melodic line direction and forward motion. If you go back and examine your transcribed solos, you will see how these notes are used by the pros in improvised phrases. Now when you hear a phrase in your mind you will begin to use these notes to develop a better-focused phrase. By identifying these notes you will discover and better hear the quality of each chord. If it sounds Dorian it will be an ii7 chord, if it sounds dominant it will be a V7 chord and if it sounds Major you know it is a I chord.
    After completing all of these steps, students should start to hear and create great melodic lines in their minds. Once again, keep them short and simple at first. Suggest that they sing what they now hear in their heads and then try to find the notes heard on the instrument. With hard work, patience, and confidence, they will begin to express themselves with their improvised lines just like a pro.

The post Improvisation Beyond The Notes appeared first on The Instrumentalist.

Problems with Notes
(For sections playing similar material)

Slow Down the Notes
    Use this technique to make sure that there are no incorrect notes written in the part and that everyone is playing (fingering) the same note. It also helps students understand the passage.
    To further work on the passage, try the following at the slower tempo:

    •    Play each note tongued four times.
    •    Play each note tongued three times.
    •    Play each note tongued two times.
    •    Play the passage double or triple tongued
    •    For instruments that play with vibrato, play with two, three and four vibrato cycles to each note.
    •    Play with the common articulations (for four notes)
    •    Slur two, tongue two
    •    Tongue two, slur two
    •    Slur three, tongue one
    •    Tongue one, slur three
    •    Play with common articulations (for three notes)
    •    Slur two, tongue one
    •    Tongue one, Slur two
    •    Play in dotted rhythms: dotted eighth and sixteenth and sixteenth and dotted eighth.

    Of course, the best way to combat technical issues in music is to improve students’ command of theoretical technical material. Add these ideas to practice of scales, thirds, arpeggios, seventh chords etc.

Chunking
    Chunking is a practice technique in which a student plays one inch of music and then inserts a rest. During the rest, a sip breath is taken. While a one-inch chunk is the amount that is seen by the human eye, practicing in chunks in various lengths is also beneficial. Here are some chunking ideas:
    Chunk by beat (play first beat, rest, play second beat, rest, play third beat, rest etc.). This is an excellent technique because it reveals that the student knows where all the beats are in a measure.
    Chunk by two beats (play two beats, then insert a rest). Continue this idea, chunking by three and four beats, and then by measure.
    During the rest have students say, “the name of the next note, blow or set.” For poor readers saying the name of the next note improves reading immensely. Saying blow encourages a good air stream and set helps students get all of the fingers in place at precisely the right time. For some students coordinating the right and left hands at the same time is a challenge.
    Remember not only to chunk going forward, but also chunk from the end of the passage to the beginning of the passage. In other words, play the last chunk, rest and then play the next to the last chunk followed by a rest.
    Have students play one chunk, rest and then sing the next chunk followed by a rest. This helps develop the ear.

Opposite Hands for Woodwinds
    To practice playing with opposite hands, have flutists use their cleaning rods and other instrumentalists use drum sticks. Rather than having the left hand on top, place the right hand on top and the left hand on the bottom and finger the passage as the instrument works. For example, for flute, B would be right hand thumb and right index finger. If students can work their way though this fingering challenge three times, they will be able to play the passage with regular fingering.

Transpose
    For more advanced students encourage them to play the passage up and down a half step and then a whole step. Usually, one of these keys is easier to navigate and students can bring that feeling of ease back to the original key.

Write It Down
    Encourage students to memorize the passage and write it on staff paper. The visual image may improve performance.

Play It on the Piano
    For those who can play the piano, playing a section on the piano helps with the visual imaging of the passage.

Practice by Omission
    For a passage comprised of repetitive four sixteenths, practice in the following ways:

    •    Play the first note only of the four sixteenths. Rest on notes two, three and four.
    •    Play the second note only of the four sixteenths.
    •    Play the third note only of the four sixteenths.
    •    Play the fourth note only of the four sixteenths.
    •    Play notes one and two and then rest on three and four.
    •    Play notes two and three and then rest on four and one.
    •    Play notes three and four and rest on notes one and two.
    •    Play notes four and one and rest on notes two and three.
    This plucking of notes produces amazing results in a short time.

Record Yourself
    Play the passage and have students listen to the playback repeatedly in class and during practice at home.

Make a Video
    In small group settings or private lessons, make a video of a student playing the passage and analyze the movements. Are the fingers lifting too high off the keys? Is there a place where the student looks or feels awkward? More than likely solving the awkward problem will solve problems playing the passage as well.

Add-A-Note Both Forwards and Backwards
    Have students play the first two notes and then add a note so they are now playing the first three notes. Continue adding a note in this manner until they reach the end. Then start at the end and go backwards adding one note back each time they play. Often students have played the beginning of a composition more times than the ending, so it is always a good idea to work from the end towards the beginning.

Wiggles
    If there is a certain fingering in the passage that gives students trouble, wiggle back and forth between the two notes saying, “I am go–ing home” followed by a rest. Try from the lower to upper note and the upper to lower note.

Write an Etude
    If you can identify the technical problem with the passage, find or write an etude that works on that issue. Generally, what is difficult for one player will be difficult for others.

Memorize the Passage
    Once memorized, work so they can play it 10 times in a row perfectly from memory. Another trick is to have students play it facing north, then facing east, south and west. Spatial practicing is an excellent aid in consistency.

Traveling Fermata
    Place a fermata on the first note and then continue through the passage. Then move the fermata to the second note, the third, and so on. Continue until each note has been played with a fermata. Tell students to play with the best sound possible on the fermatas.

Problems with Rhythms
    As with learning the notes, the best prevention of finding rhythmic concerns is good preparation of rhythmic fundamentals. Most high school students understand simple meter far better than compound meter. Daily drill, rotating through all of the keys, on the following two scales produces amazing results.
    These examples include the most common rhythms found in music. The first is in simple meter (beat divisible by 2) followed by its companion in compound meter (beat divisible by 3).

Simple Meter

Compound Meter


    From The Flute Scale Book by Patricia George and Phyllis Avidan Louke, Chapter 1, Page 14 (Theodore Presser)

    Once students are familiar with  practicing these rhythms in scales, ask which one is causing the problem in the passage. When students can recognize that a rhythm is one they already know, rhythm issues becomes easier to fix.

Playing on the Same Pitch
    Play the rhythm of a passage on one pitch until it is satisfactory and then repeat adding the pitches.

Filling In or Subdivision
    No matter if the difficult passage is in simple or compound meter, tonguing the number of sixteenths in a beat improves accuracy and clarity. Start this practice technique in the first year of instruction and problems will disappear in the later years of study. For filling in, tongue the number of sixteenths in a dotted eighth and sixteenth passage. Students will tongue three sixteenths for the dotted eighth and one for the sixteenth.

Ping Pong
    First, you play a beat and students as a group play the next beat. Continue alternating several times. Then divide students into two groups and have them play the rhythms ping pong style without you. Repeat and switch parts.

The Metronome
    For years students were taught to practice starting on a low setting on a metronome and after ever three successful play-throughs, they were told to increase the setting on the metronome by one notch. There are some passages that this truly works for but I have had the greatest success not with the metronome click setting but with the voice setting. In my studio, students call this type of metronome “The Lady.”
    The benefit of the lady is that she calls out the number of the beat the student is on. Since most students equate counting to feeling the beat, hearing her say the beat number helps them to aurally learn to count beats with the proper number.
    Some of these techniques will work better for a particular passage than others. The main goal is to have a go-to list that you can immediately employ and not have to fall back on “One more time.”    

The post Rehearsal Strategies appeared first on The Instrumentalist.

    At first I shared the common misconception, based on the Arban method, that the mouthpiece should he placed on two-thirds of the lower lip and one-third of the upper lip. Over time, however, I became certain, through talking with other teachers and players all over the world, that when you start with a student, you need to allow them to find a place that fits them best. Of course, if that place is completely out of whack, you make the adjustments. In most cases, 50-50 is a good place to start, and then the natural thing will happen.
    Before any brass player begins their practice, it is important to buzz the mouthpiece for thirty seconds or so before beginning to play, in order to get the air and the vibrations moving. I was never taught by any of my great teachers to do mouthpiece practice, perhaps because the great Schlossberg did not teach this method. It wasn’t until I was well into my forties or early fifties, when I took some lessons with Arnold Jacobs, the fabulous tubist with the Chicago Symphony, that I began thinking about using the mouthpiece as he did. On his way to work, he would have the mouthpiece in his right hand while driving with his left, playing everything from the Star Spangled Banner to the repertoire scheduled for that day’s rehearsal.
    I am now convinced that mouthpiece practice is essential to becoming an accomplished player. I never did get to study with the highly respected West Coast teacher Jimmy Stamp, but I understand that it was an essential part of his teaching. I believe that the current trumpet teacher at the Eastman School of Music, Jim Thompson, whom I admire tremendously, is also an ardent advocate of mouthpiece practice. In my daily routine as a young player, my teachers instructed me to buzz the mouthpiece for about thirty seconds: start playing a tone, tongue a few notes, and then use it as a fire engine, making a kind of Whooooo siren sound up and down, up and down.
    After buzzing the mouthpiece, I would start at the beginning of Schlossberg, with the long tones of low C, which we now know today is not the best way to start. Beginning in low C relaxed the embouchure – the position in which you set your mouth and face – more than was necessary. The second-line G for the Bb trumpet, I discovered, was the better place to start. My top priority was to immediately strive for a good tone.
    Not one of my teachers ever explained proper breathing to me. It was only after I finished my fourth season with the Tulsa Philharmonic that I went to New York to study with Frank Venezia and learned something about how to breathe. I think my life as a trumpet player would have been significantly different if any of the other great trumpet teachers I had would have taught me how to breathe correctly. In retrospect, I think because I immediately had a beautiful sound and played well right away, my teachers assumed I was breathing properly.
    I had no idea of the importance of using my abdominal muscles. In our very first lesson, Frank Venezia really opened my eyes to the fact that all these years I had been playing by using too much mouthpiece pressure, rather than using the air column properly. When I came back for my second lesson and played the exercises that Frank had written out for me, I complained to him that I was experiencing a lot of pain in my abdomen, my back, and my side. He was very happy and told me, “Good! Good! Now you are using muscles you have never used before.”
    Regardless of their teaching techniques, every great brass player agrees on these key points. You still have to put the instrument up to your mouth. You still have to buzz your lips. You still have to push air through the horn. The approaches may be different, but these are always the basics of playing a brass instrument.
    I remember the late great Bud Herseth, trumpeter with the Chicago Symphony, saying that he did not like to use the word “register.“ Herseth felt that all the notes were the same. Many brass players used to go to Orchestra Hall with a pair of binoculars to watch Herseth. There was almost no movement when he was playing; red face, yes, but no movement in the embouchure. One of the most defining statements anybody could make about the perfect embouchure, while not thinking about the concept of register, would be what Maynard Ferguson did in his album A Message from Newport. On one track, he played one of the greatest big-band charts ever, Framework for the Blues. On this track, Maynard’s very last entrance, he hits a double high C and, without removing the trumpet or mouthpiece from his lips, uses a little improvisation to go from double high C all the way down to low F#, the lowest possible note on the trumpet.
    What else can I say? In a brass player’s perfect world, the hardest notes still feel like you’re playing the easiest ones. For giants like Bud Herseth and Maynard Ferguson, every single note they played on the trumpet had the same relaxed feeling as I did when playing an easy note like middle-G.
    A defining experience for my own playing was studying with the great teacher Don Jacoby, to perfect his concept of the pivot note. At the time, I was playing principal trumpet in Dallas, and we were rehearsing Pagliacci in the Dallas Civic Opera In this opera, the very first entrance for the Bb trumpet starts on the Bb above the staff. You have to work your way down, never taking the horn away from your lips or resetting your embouchure. I was having a tough time with it, and Don Jacoby said to me, “Well, when you get ready to play that first Bb above the staff, are you setting your embouchure for that Bb above the staff?“ “Of course,“ I replied. Don said, “This is where we change your life. Now we are going to introduce you to the pivot note.”
    The pivot note concept was to simply look at a passage, find its highest and its lowest notes, and then set your embouchure for the middle. In this case, that would have been a third-line Bb. Don Jacoby then had me play three, four, or five middle Bb in a row and, without taking the horn off my mouth or the mouthpiece from my lips, he would have me start at the high Bb and play the passage all the way down. It worked like magic because now everything felt like I was in my perfect range, right in the middle of the horn.
    Don Jacoby also cured me of my chronic apprehension about playing the famous solo near the end of Der Rosenkavalier, a popular part of the Dallas Symphony’s repertoire. I dreaded it, because it was one of the few pieces in my entire career in which I lacked the confidence in my ability to play it without cracking it. It didn’t help that I was playing such challenging music on a Bb trumpet, instead of an easier C or D trumpet. After Don had me apply the pivot note theory of finding the middle ground, I never missed it again. I even began to anticipate and love playing this solo.
    Still another critical aspect of trumpet technique is how a musician initially attacks the first note in any passage. As a teacher, I quickly learned to never make a general statement and claim, “This is the only way you can do something” because as soon as you say this, someone will come along and do it ass-backwards, or completely differently, and get it done just fine. The one thing I have felt very strongly about is that when you make the first attack of any passage, you must use the consonant T. For instance, on a low note, think of tah; in the middle range, think tu, and for the upper, think ti. I know there are many teachers who believe in simply blowing air and vibrating the lips to begin the tone. In his book, Trumpet Techniques, my uncle Louis Davidson advocated instead a three-part process of attack. Step one, you put the horn up to your lips in complete repose, without setting any embouchure. Steps two and three happen simultaneously. If it is going to be a middle G, then you simply get your tongue right behind your top teeth, and as soon as you take your breath, your tongue immediately strikes behind the top teeth with the syllable tu.

Bud Herseth, Maynard Ferguson, and Ron Modell

    In my experience, one of the greatest challenges is to effectively attack a high note softly. My own approach was to use the same forceful stroke of the tongue as you would for a loud note, while simultaneously controlling the amount of air that is released. This gave me the psychological confidence that made it unnecessary to try to sneak into any soft attack, an approach that too many players rely on.
    My whole philosophy in teaching the trumpet technique of tonguing was that if you could master the legato single-tongue – where you have no break in the sound, but simply sustain a note and interrupt it with the correct syllable then the art of articulation would never be a problem. In order to play the legato single tongue, the student must practice long tones, interrupting each one after the initial T attack with the du syllable. For example, start on an easy middle G and proceed to sound out tu-du-du-du-du without any interruption to the air column. As the student progresses, the du syllable becomes shorter and in time changes into a simple tongue staccato which still retains the sound of the original long tone. The same principle holds true for the more advanced techniques of multiple tonguing, or double and triple-tonguing.
    During the twenty-eight years that I taught at Northern Illinois University, we had three or four days a year when students would come to audition for entrance into the School of Music. It was amazing that when I would ask any student on a brass instrument to play a major scale, if their articulation was such that they had never been taught about legato single-tonguing, many times it came out sounding like a motorboat, a sort of “putt-putt-putt.” You would hear the scale with very short abbreviated notes, with no quality of sound to them or really good pitch. On the other hand, students who had been taught about legato-style tonguing would play a scale that sounded very different.
    When I was studying with my teachers and being assigned the long-tone Schlossberg exercises, I didn’t realize it at the time, but every few months they would have me shorten the stroke, so I would still retain the beautiful sound of a legato tone just being interrupted. They were teaching me all of the different articulations, so if I needed to play something heavily punctuated with a marcato, they would have me do that. It was a learning process that I didn’t even realize was going on, but the foundation was the fact that I could legato single-tongue, and I carried this forward into all the playing that I ever did. I was always very comfortable in being able to play a long legato and then cut it short to a very staccato sound, while still having it come out with a good tone quality, a good definition of pitch. Never, except in rare occasions, such as a Stravinsky piece, would the tone become secco, or a very dry short sound. I used that kind of sound in Stravinsky’s Firebird, and I also remember using it in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.
    I also used portamento tonguing, which is a slur line on top of notes with dots underneath them. To me, this tonguing produced the most beautiful articulation. I always thought of Felix Mendelssohn’s Fingal’s Cave Overture, or the second movement in Beethoven’s first symphony.
    It became absolutely imperative with my students that they master the legato single-tongue because that was the key, the common denominator to all tonguing articulations. When we got into multiple tonguing double and triple-tonguing using the famous studies in the Arban book for some reason, all the teachers and players I ever talked to taught triple-tongue before they taught double-tongue. You started with a tu-tu-ku, accenting the ku very heavily. In the first two notes, there was no interruption of the air column, simply a long tone.
    During my tour with Cornelia Otis Skinner’s Paris 90, our conductor Nat Shilkret introduced me to one of the greatest trumpeters of our time, Rafael Mendez. He invited me to his home the next morning for a private lesson and asked me what I wanted him to help me with. I said simply, “You are known as the world’s greatest double and triple-tongue player. Could you show me your secret?“ What an astounding shock when he immediately went over to his books, pulled out the Arban volume, and turned to page 155, saying, “You start by going tu tu ku tu tu ku with a heavy accent on the ku. You are just introducing a new syllable into your mouth and into your playing, and you must heavily accent it without breaking the rhythm.” It usually took my students about eight weeks before they could triple-tongue at a fast tempo. The easiest part of triple-tonguing, of course, was that the same note was repeated over and over. The difficulty comes when the notes start to change. And it gets tricky when the fingers have to coordinate with the tongue. Mendez pointed out to me that most Spanish-speaking people, and Polish people as well, always had phenomenal double and triple-tonguing, simply because of their native languages. In Spanish, many words begin with a K articulation, but this is far more rare in English. Once again, perfecting the legato single-tongue can do nothing but lead you to the greatest results in all the articulations on a brass instrument you will be called upon to do for the rest of your musical life.

    I had my pre-war French Besson trumpet in a little cloth gig bag, which I took out and prepared to play. Rafael took out his Olds trumpet – he was a big sponsor for the Olds company – and proceeded to do his warm-up with pedal tones, something I had never done in my life, going up three octaves with tremendous flexibility. After five minutes of this, I started to put my horn back in its bag. Rafael looked shocked and asked me what I was doing. “Do you really expect me to play something after what I just heard?” I asked him. He said he had hoped it would inspire me, so I got out my horn again, and we started working on triple-tonguing.
    Something else that really interested me during our lesson was that I noticed that so many of your solos were written in keys with four or five sharps. Why was that? He told me that when he started his study in Mexico, unlike American students who begin in the simple key of C major (which has no sharps or flats), he was immediately immersed in music with key signatures of many sharps or flats. This kind of training also contributed to his unusually strong third valve finger. American beginners spend so much time in the key of C that their first two valve fingers are usually much stronger than their weaker third valve finger. Rafael’s third finger was just as strong as his first two.  Another bonus was that, for recording purposes, keys with many sharps give the trumpet a much more brilliant sound.
    As I came to my lessons each morning with Rafael Mendez in his Culver City house next to the MGM studios, I noticed a big jar in the entryway. He went over to the jar and took out something that at the time I didn’t know was a jalapeno pepper. He took a bite and invited me to try it. Not knowing any better, I took a taste and thought my tongue was coming right out of my mouth! “Wow!“ I exclaimed. “That was hot!“ Rafael Mendez replied, “Yes, it gets you up in the morning, gets you right up, gets you feeling good.“
    One of the things that I prided myself on during my career was that I had achieved a true pianissimo on the trumpet. In a big auditorium, I could play pianissimo, and the note would be heard by the person in the last row. It took a lot of practicing at the dynamic, just as you would practice a good fortissimo. Sir Georg Solti himself gave me some wonderful constructive criticism at the conclusion of his season with us in Dallas, as conductor, telling me, “The one thing I would like to see you do, is when you play fortissimo to have you produce the same beauty of sound that you do when you play pianissimo. He asked me if I had ever played in a church, and of course I had played in many.  Maestro Solti said to think of the quality of sound you get in a beautiful church with exceptional acoustics. The one thing that should be in your mind at all times when playing fortissimo is that you are never playing loud for loud’s sake, but rather that you are imagining the beautiful sound of fortissimo as if it were being played softly. The beauty of sound has to be in your mind and come through the horn, just as you would with a pianissimo.
    It really did work. At many clinics, I would play the opening of the Tchaikovsky fourth symphony loud for loud’s sake, and then I would play it loud the way it should have been played. I think students were amazed by the striking difference, a strident ugly sound as opposed to a round beautiful sound, yet both with the same fortissimo dynamic.
    My main objective in teaching was always something my uncle Louis taught me: that whether you were playing one note, a scale, or a concerto, it had to be musical. Whenever my students played a scale, whether in the practice room or for a final jury, it was not simply running up and down the scale to show off technical prowess, it was a musical event. When given a choice, I would have my students slur a two-octave scale, making a crescendo when ascending and a decrescendo when descending, always insisting it be musical.
    In the hundreds of clinics that I have conducted in my lifetime, the main lesson I have always tried to put forth is that there are two halves to musical performance. The first half is learning the music well enough to play it flawlessly from a technical standpoint. This is the easy part, for now we even have computers and synthesizers that can be made to do that. The second part is much harder: to make the music come to life and project to the audience or to yourself something beautiful. I have emphasized to my students that when you go out to perform, always know that the audience comes in devoid of feelings, and it is your responsibility to give them something to take home with them that they didn’t possess when they first arrived. It is never enough to merely play all the right notes – you can do this yet still not achieve the rewards of making music. To make music, you have to make those notes come alive, to project feelings and emotion. The ultimate goal is to project your own joy and exuberance in making music. This entire process is applicable to any discipline.
    Dr. Robert Long, a Dallas psychiatrist whose son I instructed in trumpet, put all of this in perspective during a conversation we had about the career of Adolph Herseth. Dr. Long did not know anything about music, but he went to all the concerts he could, whether symphonic, opera, or jazz. He just loved music. I commented that if Herseth missed a note, the orchestra would probably turn around to see if he was still alive. What Dr. Long said that night helped me for the rest of my career. “I don’t know about Mr. Herseth,“ he said, “but you know if ten percent of the time you leave a performance feeling as though no one could have ever played as well as you just did, and another ten percent of the time you leave wanting to throw your trumpet against the wall, well, neither of those ten percents counts for very much.“ He went on to say that although you always aim for one-hundred percent perfection, if you can manage to get into the ninetieth percentile in your playing, you’ve achieved as much success as any human being can expect. All kinds of things can impact your performance, from ill health and personal issues, to world crisis, severe weather, etc.
    Rich Matteson, one of the premier jazz educators, told a gathering of band directors, “If a major league baseball player gets three hits out of ten times at bat, he is seen as a success. If a quarterback completes six out of ten passes, he is also a success. Now think about your ensembles, a hundred-piece band, a sixty-piece band or a hundred-piece orchestra. Think of the incredible percentage of accuracy that your students give you every day, at every concert, or better yet, imagine each student only getting three to six notes correct out of every ten. It is amazing what incredible accuracy they achieve with a multitude of players.”
    Basically, what Dr. Long was saying was that you try for one hundred percent. But if you played a hundred percent every night, what would there be to look forward to? If you can consistently play at eighty percent or better, and you aim for the upper-ninety percentile, you will have really achieved success. That made me feel better. I don’t know of any players that have gone through perfect seasons.
    In my first year as principal trumpet in the Tulsa Philharmonic, our conductor said to us during our first rehearsal for the season, “I know that anyone can make a mistake. I consider two a habit.” That can scare the hell out of you, because if you make your one mistake at the beginning, you have to worry about the whole rest of the season, or it can be a challenge based on the way you look at it.
    It is a daily chore to prove yourself, or it can be a challenge based on the way you look at it. The old adage is true: the hardest thing isn’t getting the job: it’s proving day in and day out that you are worthy of it. That is something I often heard from my uncle Louis, and I, tried to pass this on to my students as well.
    Finally, one of the greatest lessons I ever learned about the psychology of playing, especially if you are a principal player, was the season in Dallas when we performed Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G, a piece written for a small orchestra of 35 musicians. At the end of the first movement is a famous little double-tongue solo, and you have to play this pattern eight times in a row. From the very first rehearsal, I struggled to get through it. I went home after dinner, I sat in the living room with a cup mute, and just kept playing the passage slowly over and over.
    The next day at rehearsal, I managed to get four or five measures of the pattern before I lost it. That night at home, I put the cup mute in again and played the passage 20 or 30 times, a little faster. I did this the entire week up until our first concert on Sunday afternoon. When I left our apartment with my wife, I told her this was only the second time in my life I was going to a concert knowing there was a passage I could not play.
    But at the concert, I absolutely nailed it to the wall. In fact, the orchestra turned around and shuffled their feet (the ultimate compliment), for they knew I had been struggling with it. Monday night, I also played it flawlessly. I started to wonder what had happened. I finally figured it out, and it was a revelation: the fact that I had practiced it every night, increasing the tempo ever so slightly, until I was at the proper tempo by the night of the concert. When I had left on Sunday to perform, the final piece of the puzzle was my comment to my wife that I was leaving for a concert where I knew I couldn’t play a particular passage. I was able to bring myself to a relaxed state to the degree where I could just go out there and do the best I could. The other element was by practicing it maybe two hundred times that week; I had prepared myself well to perform it.
    It is also important, however, to realize when you encounter a passage that you know you don’t have the capability to play and to step back for the sake of the music. I remember performing at the Playboy Club in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin with one of my idols, the great jazz vocalist Mel Torme. We had a four-hour rehearsal and were planning to break for dinner before doing the show. I had been playing third and fourth trumpet among some of Chicago’s great trumpeters – John Howell, George Bean, and Russ Iverson.
    Near the end of our rehearsal, the last tune was Fascinating Rhythm, and Mel looked at me and said, “Ron, you play lead.“ I took the part and looked through it and, oh boy, right dead smack in the middle of the arrangement was a famous trumpet riff from the tune Bugle Call Rag. Here the trumpet plays a solo that goes up to a high G above a high C, which I had not done in a very long time, and which I certainly found formidable after three-and-a-half hours of playing third and fourth trumpet.
    We started the chart, without me having the chance to say anything, and when we got to my solo, I didn’t play. Of course Mel stopped the band, looked at me, and asked what was the matter. I told him I couldn’t play this and suggested that George Bean should do it; I knew George could perform it without even thinking about it. What is important about this experience is that I never had the least concern that the guys, or Mel Torme, would think less of me.  My only thought was, let the person who can best play it, play it, so we get the maximum performance of the music. My first rule for our NIU Jazz Ensemble musicians was always to check your ego at the door. Our purpose, every moment, was to help each other make great music.
    My son Christopher grasped the nature of performance at a very young age. When he was six, he heard me come home and practice, every night for two weeks, just four measures of the trumpet solo from Richard Strauss’s Das Burger als Edelmann. It was only a four-bar solo, but it began the third movement and was very exposed. Christopher and the rest of my children must have heard me play it at least twenty times a night, or between 240 and 300 times.

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As the Midwest celebrates 75 years, we asked a distinguished group of educators to share their favorite memories of attending the Midwest Clinic.

Paula A. Crider
   The first time I ever attended Midwest, I was a wide-eyed university sophomore, totally in awe of all of the sights and sounds offered at this great convention. While riding on a crowded Hilton elevator, I glanced at a name tag which read “Clare Grundman.” Until that moment, I believed Clare Grundman was a female composer, and the only “female” composer whose music I had performed in high school.
   I still chuckle at my naivete (and more than a little disappointment), but thus began my journey of life-long enlightenment at The Midwest Clinic!
(Side note: The Midwest Clinic is now aggressively encouraging the performance of music by female composers.)

Paula Crider has successfully taught at all levels. She is Professor Emerita at the University of Texas, Senior Educational Consultant for Conn-Selmer, Inc. and serves on the Midwest Board.

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Becky Rodgers Warren
   I began attending the Midwest in the 1980s, early in my career. My college band director, Edd Jones, had been a staff member who took the Elmore County Band from Wetumpka, Alabama to the Midwest in 1965. That photo hung behind his desk and became a symbol of where the best bands are asked to perform. My Midwest experiences helped to shape my career and my life.
   Highlights of my Midwest memories range from sitting next to Elizabeth A.H. Green at my very first concert in the Grand Ballroom to seeing our very own Mandan Band serve as a clinic group for Tom O’Neill decades later. Upon presenting my first Midwest clinic in 2009, my nerves were calmed when I realized that the room was filled with like-minded people who wanted to learn and see me succeed. Having the opportunity to once again present with my friend Lori Hart in 2016 brought two Alabama gals back together.
   Time in the exhibits was always time well spent. Only at the Midwest exhibits could I hear Clare Grundman, with a great chuckle, tell my very tired friend Vanessa, “Miss, you must keep your shoes on in our booth.” Connections became friendships. Questions got answers. Through the Midwest attendees became better at their craft of teaching music. All of that happened for me, and my dreams became reality.
   In 2004, after a very long day of concerts, clinics, and exhibits, I ventured over to George’s behind the Hilton (if you know, you know) and met the Alabama crew. While there my friend Steve McLendon suggested I meet these two guys from North Dakota. One owned music stores, and the other was a high school band director. After a beverage or two, as well as a long discussion of European marches, the band director asked if I would like to go to Water Tower Place for a bit of Christmas shopping on Saturday after the final Midwest Concert. He did not realize that was my annual tradition anyway.
   Fast forward to the 2008 Midwest where John and I attended for the first time as husband and wife. Two “confirmed single people” shared the love of being band directors, the love of attending Midwest, and the love of each other. In 2021 we will attend the Midwest, reminisce about George’s, and shop at Water Tower Place. He will be my biggest supporter as I present a clinic, and I will once again feel the love and support of so many old, new, and soon to be friends. Though we are both retired as full-time band directors we still are “in the business.” We still have so much to learn! So, we’ve already begun letting friends know, “We will see you at The Midwest and meet you at The Tree.”

Becky Rodgers Warren served as a band director for 40 years. She continues to stay active as an adjudicator, guest conductor, clinician, and professional development speaker. She resides in North Dakota with John and their Golden Retriever, Bama.

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Tom Lizotte
   I have attended all but three Midwest Clinics since 1988, so the memories are legion. Here are three of my favorites, all involving Frederick Fennell.
•    Heading up the escalator of the Palmer House and hearing a rumble above. Arriving in the lobby to find a sea of tubas and Mr. Fennell high on a podium, dressed in a Santa suit and conducting TubaChristmas.
•    Rushing in late from dinner for a Fennell concert at the Hilton, breathless and hoping to have not missed the downbeat. Looking in the bar, only to see Mr. Fennell by himself quietly having a beverage. A few minutes later he strides in and conducts a great concert. Few are aware of the cause of the delay.
•    My favorite: a morning with Frederick Fennell at the Hilton. This was one of his last Midwests. He sat in a chair on stage and discussed his life from the 1920s until the founding of the Eastman Wind Ensemble. An hour and a half without a note and without a misstep. Such an amazing display of mental acuity! An irreplaceable figure in our midst.

Tom Lizotte taught for 31 years, including 17 as director of bands at Cape Elizabeth High School in Maine.

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Arris Golden
   At my first Midwest in 1996, I remember being enthralled by actually seeing, in person, all of the composers and conductors that I had spent so much time watching in performance or performing their music myself. If memory serves me correctly, it was also an anniversary year for the Midwest Clinic, so there were so many great bands there. Hearing (I think), Longfellow MS, from Virginia, Winter Park HS from Florida, Lassiter HS from Georgia, and many Texas bands opened my ears to a whole new set of possibilities as a young musician and teacher. I admittedly spent years unpacking all the sounds and heard and finding some of those directors to pick their brains about how they do what they do.
   I cannot remember the year for this one, but having the opportunity to sit in on a clinic presentation by Cheryl Floyd was another inspiring and career-altering event. In a 45-minute clinic session, she absolutely changed the sound of the ensemble and modeled so many “teacher behaviors” that I took back to my teaching situation in North Carolina, all of which made an immediate difference for both my students and me. It was really both eye-opening and stunning to watch. It is a session that I still talk about today with my colleagues and friends in the profession, and I try to share with them every single thing I learned from that experience.

Arris Golden is the Assistant Director of Bands and Associate Director of the Spartan Marching Band at Michigan State University. She previously taught at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Before moving to the collegiate level she taught for 18 years in the public schools of North Carolina.

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Frank Battisti
   My most meaningful Midwest Clinic memory concerns the content of the concert performed by my Ithaca (NY) High School Concert Band on December 16, 1965. It consisted mostly of pieces that were outside the prescribed regulations band directors had to adhere to when selecting pieces for their Clinic concert. For example: pieces selected had to be published within the year and could be no longer than 6½ minutes in length. Directors of the bands selected to perform at the Midwest Clinic were sent copies of newly published pieces from which they were to select those they wished to include on their concert. It soon became apparent to me that there was no possible way I could select a program, from the music sent to me, that would represent what we did at Ithaca High School. I believed that our Midwest concert program needed to reflect what we did in the band program in Ithaca. Therefore, I submitted such a program to the Midwest Clinic concert/program committee, hoping they would approve it. After some rather lengthy discussions, the program (below) was approved.

   All the works on this program were very challenging – very different in style and content than those included on programs performed by the other Clinic bands. Four were written by composers whose music at the time was seldom (if ever) performed by bands (Benson, Schuller. Wilder, Ginastera); two were for small woodwind/brass ensembles (Dukas, Fischer) and four were longer than 6½ minutes (Wilder, Schuller, Benson, Nelhybel). Even though the pieces were not the usual “band fare,” the audience’s response at the concert was very enthusiastic. At the end of the program the band received a lengthy, sustained standing ovation. Donald McCathren, Band Director at Duquesne University, was so excited and thrilled by the performance that he immediately rushed back stage and invited the band to perform at the 1967 Mid-East Instrumental Music Conference in Pittsburgh, PA. A few band directors, however, did think the program was not “really band music”.

Prior to the start of the concert, band members, guest conductors and soloists posed for a photograph. Standing in front of the band are (left to right), Dr. Frederick Fennell, Robert Heinrich, Paul Ingraham, Robert Nagel, John Swallow, Harvey Phillips (members of the New York Brass Quintet), Leone Buyse, Frank Battisti, Walter Beeler, Donald Sinta and Dr. William D. Revelli.

Frank L. Battisti is Conductor Emeritus of the New England Conservatory Wind Ensemble, which he founded and conducted from 1969-99. He is the founder of the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles and author of nine books. During his career he commissioned and premiered over 60 works for wind ensemble by distinguished American and international composers including Warren Benson, Leslie Bassett, John Harbison, Witold Lutoslawski, Vincent Persichetti, Michael Colgrass, Gunther Schuller, Sir Michael Tippett, Robert Ward, and Alec Wilder. Battisti was a visiting fellow at Clare Hall, Cambridge University (UK) in 1986 and 1992 and has been awarded three Honorary Doctorates from Ithaca College, Rhode Island College and the New England Conservatory of Music.

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Charles Menghini
   I was at VanderCook for 23 years and conducted 22 concerts – the only one I missed was the year I had a heart attack and bypass surgery. Of those years, my favorite Midwest memories were always when I was able to make a connection between a conductor or soloist and the band and hopefully the audience. My favorite of all the favorites happened in 2012 when I invited George Quinlan, Sr. to conduct the band. Mr. Quinlan was widely known in the Chicago area for his music company, Quinlan and Fabish Music, but he also was a school band director in his early years in the Catholic School system and I know he was a big part of the early years of the Midwest Clinic too.
   In 2012, Mr. Quinlan’s grandson, Andrew was a student at VanderCook and a percussionist in the band, and I asked Mr. Quinlan to conduct. A week or so before the concert, he fell ill and required hospitalization. With his condition, I thought he might not be able to fulfill his commitment. But the day before the concert, he checked himself out of the hospital, and in a wheelchair proceeded to conduct the band. He later told me, “I told you I would conduct the band and there was no way I was going to miss it!”

So at our 2012 Friday concert, Mr. George A. Quinlan, Sr. conducted the VanderCook Band in John Philip Sousa’s The Thunderer March. This remains my favorite Midwest memory.

Charles Menghini is President Emeritus of VanderCook College of Music. He served as President and Director of Bands from 2004-2017. He also taught successful high school band programs in Missouri and Kansas. He is the host of the Band Talk podcast.

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Scott Casagrande
   I have never missed a Midwest Clinic (including last year) beginning in 1987 when I was a college student. My dad (also a band director and music education professor) was very excited to introduce me to the event, and I recall going with him to buy my first suit in preparation. He had a great saying that he used to share with his Music Education majors that I loved: “You’ll learn more in the Hilton Lakeside Green at the Midwest Clinic than any college class you’ll ever take.” My story relates to that.
   In 2008, our John Hersey High School band played Frank Ticheli’s Symphony #2 for Band. I saw Mr. Ticheli in the Hilton Lakeside Green Lounge and approached him about the piece. It was surreal talking with him about the interpretation of this fantastic work in that stuffed room, shoulder-to-shoulder, talking over all the noise, shouting and yelling. He thoroughly engaged with me about his work (Movement II, particularly) and we spent about 15 minutes talking, although the discussion seemed to last about 2 seconds.

We performed the work at our state event a few months later and won “honor band” designation for the first time, but most importantly, the musical decisions that we made thanks to that chance visit led to one of the most musically inspiring moments in my career a few months later. This is one of the great aspects of the Midwest Clinic: a professionally life-changing moment could happen in any hallway, clinic, restaurant or bar. But you have to go to have that experience!

Scott J. Casagrande was Director of Bands at John Hersey High School in Arlington Heights, Illinois for 22 years and retired in June 2021 after completing 33 years of teaching in Illinois public schools. He taught high school, middle school and elementary students in suburban, urban and rural settings over the course of his teaching career.

* * *

Tom Trimborn
A Midwest Chain of Events
   Back when the nation’s bicentennial was approaching, my keen interest in the music of John Philip Sousa led me to propose doing a Sousa concert made up entirely of his unknown works. After a fruitless search for some of that music, I turned to the Library of Congress for help. It was suggested that I contact a man by the name of Robert Hoe, a former ‘youffer’ who had an extensive private collection of Sousa music. Through letters and phone calls we decided to connect at the upcoming Midwest Convention in Chicago. A time and general location were set to meet in the hotel lobby. After a firm handshake we adjourned to the hotel coffee shop where I told him about my high school band program in nearby Palatine, Illinois and the music I hoped to program.
   During our conversation he promised to send me the music I wanted, and within a week, a large box arrived with every score and part I had hoped to find – suites, novelties, little known marches – the works. And it was all completely free of charge. The concert was a huge success on every possible level.
   Over the course of many years, Mr. Hoe sent me a complete set of LP Heritage of the March recordings plus many more singles which he produced and funded – the music not only of Sousa but a host of others played by the Marine Band and other prestigious ensembles. Later, in the process of delivering my very first article to appear in The Instrumentalist (August, 1975) that described my Sousa concert, I had the pleasure of meeting the founding publisher Traugott Rohner, and later still to meet and spend an afternoon with the legendary Sousa biographer Paul Bierley who had read it and written me a wonderful letter which I treasure to this day. All of this began with a meeting at Midwest. Who could have imagined such a wonderful chain of events? A chain that in my case continues to this day.

Vivid Midwest Memories
   Several other of my vivid Midwest memories include meeting and talking with composer Alfred Reed about his Alleluia Laudamus Te, seeing Col. John Bourgeois’ eyes light up as he was telling me about his miniature Sousa Band figures made at the Le Petit Soldier Shop in New Orleans, hearing a particularly jaw dropping performance by the U of I Band conducted by Harry Begian, and suddenly seeing a large photograph of Claude T. Smith framed in black on the display floor that stopped me in my tracks. It announced his sudden passing just days earlier.    

Thomas Trimborn retired from Truman State University as Professor Emeritus of Music having spent 16 of his early 45-year career in suburban Chicago at Palatine High School as Director of Bands. 

Share Your Midwest Memories
We would love to hear about your most memorable Midwest moments from clinics and performances to the interesting people you have met there. Send your stories to us at editor@theinstrumentalist.com.

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2021 Midwest Highlights
   Here are some of the notable commissioned works that will be performed at the 2021 convention.

Wilderness by Cait Nishimura, performed by Aledo Middle School
Thursday, December 16 at 3 pm
Canadian composer Cait Nishimura is a music educator based in Waterloo, Ontario. She is known for her melody-driven, programmatic music and has used her love of nature as inspiration.

Candor by Omar Thomas, performed by Vandegrift High School Wind Ensemble
Friday, December 17 at 5:30 pm
Brooklyn-born Omar Thomas is Assistant Professor of Composition at the University of Texas at Austin. He is a protege of composers and educators Ken Schaphorst and Frank Carlberg. He also studied under composer and bandleader Maria Schneider.

Bash by Frank Ticheli, performed by Dallas Winds
Thursday December 16 at 7:30 pm
Ticheli wrote this composition in honor of the 75th Anniversary Midwest. Given the celebratory nature of this year’s event, he wrote what he describes as a “euphoric romp.” Ticheli is Professor of Composition at the University of California’s Thornton School of Music.

Diamond Jubilee by Karel Butz, performed by Central Washington University Symphony
Friday December 17 at 11:30 am
Butz, a Houston-based violinist and composer, has had his music performed at the Midwest, Interlochen, and several region and all-state honor bands. His book, Achieving Musical Success in the String Classroom, is published by Oxford University Press.

Midwest Awards
The annual convention also provides an invaluable opportunity to honor various music education leaders for lifetime service to our musical community. There are several distinguished honorees for 2021.

Julie Giroux is a highly respected composer with a large number of classical works, with emphasis on wind band, and more that 100 film, television, and video game credits. She was inducted into the American Bandmasters Association in 2009. She is a graduate of Louisiana State University and her first published work for concert band, published by Southern Music, was written at the age of 13.

James Kjelland is a faculty member at Northwestern University as Associate Professor, Music/String Pedagogy. He is the author or contributor to several books including Orchestral Bowing: Style & Function and the string class method Strictly Strings.

Iris Manus has worked for Alfred Music Publishing since the 1960s, maintaining the title of Executive Producer. She met her husband, the late Morty Manus, President of Alfred, when she was working at the company on Saturdays. They were deeply committed to music education and supported many music scholarships, competitions, and organizations.

Janis Stockhouse served as Director of Bands at Bloomington High School North in Indiana for 38 years. During her tenure, the Advanced Jazz Ensemble performed at the Midwest four times and at the IAJE and JEN conventions seven times. She is a member and past president of the Indiana Bandmasters Association. Stockhouse is a 2015 recipient of the John LaPorta Outstanding Jazz Educator Award.

Bernard Van Doren is the grandson of the founder of Vandoren Paris, world-famous reedmaker. His grandfather founded the company in 1905; Bernard Van Doren took over the company in 1967. Through improvements in machinery and technology, Bernard has strengthened the company’s role as a major manufacturer of reeds and mouthpieces.

Midwest Reading Sessions
Orchestra New Music Reading Session featuring the Chicagoland Educators Orchestra: Thursday, December 16, 1 pm in W192.
Band New Music Reading Session featuring the Bands of the Air National Guard: Friday, December 17, 12:15 pm in W185.
Jazz New Music Reading Session featuring the Army Blues: Friday, December 17, 10:30 am in W196.

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