Update for everyone: I'll probably be out of hospital some time next week.

This question is one that hits me very directly as it is connected to my permanent condition as an Autistic... We in the Autistic Spectrum tend very much to overemphasize our shortcomings and belittle our capabilities - it's just one of the expressions of how our brain is functioning. I don't say that only we experience this; but most of us are more prone to thinking we are not good enough than Neurotypicals. I'm looking at my own example: I finished my Leaving certificate with best marks, being third in a class of 129; I completed undergraduate university in record time with an MA in history as third of a class of 355. I then completed my PhD in record time - less than a year - coming second in a class of 88. And yet I always sought after becoming better still because being second was already a cause for depression - I was simply unable to put my achievements in relation to what others managed to do. Even when I reached the absolute pinnacle of my chosen profession and was awarded a Professorship in Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, I was not content. I could not strive for more, but there was that nagging thought I was not good enough... it ended with a divorce and deep depression; several years of therapy which did not help me at all because the therapists did not recognize the root of the problem, i.e. my Autism (and please forget everything about Rain Man and similar movies: There are such people about, but they are at most one % of the Spectrum). Only when one clever psychiatrist, at the goading of my wife, took the trouble of testing me for Autism did I suddenly receive the master key to everything that had ever happened in my life, and to my own mind. Since then, I have found the key to compromise and happiness; and now, I am not driven any more to try and reach unattainable goals, but am content to be what I am, and - in music - to be a good player within my own comfort zone. I still try to do as well as I can; but I now accept my own limitations while still trying to improve. And I am happy that way.

Hope you could make some sense out of this.

Well, after mourning TM and my hard-earned status as fortissimo user, I'm here.

Whether you are celebrating Christmas, or Hanukkah, or Diwali, or the 12th Week of Halloween, or Birthday or Wedding Anniversary or Happy 9th Divorce, my Season's Greetings to you. May all of you enjoy the best of health, the best of food, the best of company, and the best of trumpets!

At this point, I think I just have to chip in with the story of how I got hooked into big bands... 1993... I was a fairly competent amateur player with lots of experience in brass bands and wind bands, some orchestral stuff and already a vast repertoire of church stuff. No jazz experience whatsoever. Then, one Saturday morning, I got a phone call... a very Bavarian, very bearded voice at the other end...
"I've heard you're a trumpet player." -
"Yes?" -
"We are a big band." -
"Yes?" -
" You have a red shirt?" -
"Yeees??" -
"Free this afternoon?" -
"Yyeees?" -
"Be at the Saint Florian Restaurant at three." CLICK.

Spoof or truth? Well, the place was not too far away, so I collected everything I thought I might need... rotary Bb, rotary C and picc, black jacket and bow tie... (my usual church gig outfit) and went there.

In my innocence, I thought it might be just a short gig, with probably a third or fourth trumpet awol, possibly an hour's sight-reading of easy stuff, cash in and get out... "otherwise you don't hire a guy you don't know anything about four hours before a gig"...

What I found...

an Austrian wedding, and the band scheduled to play for the afternoon coffee break, then provide dinner music and continue to play for the dancing until dawn... the guy who had gone awol was the 1st trumpet, and they expected me to fully replace him for a whopping 16 hours or so... with a repertoire I had never seen or played before... I had to come clean about my big band experience so far, so trumpet #3 stepped up and I filled his place and managed to muddle through somehow... interestingly enough, they did not throw me out afterwards with catcalls and rotten eggs, but invited me in as full replacement for the now promoted #3. I stayed with that outfit for a full eleven years, playing another 196 weddings with them, 40-50 balls, and smaller gigs, numerous... have never been without a big band ever since.

@BigDub In a local paper: "The inventor of Autocorrect just pissed away. He was an anthole. Restaurant in pieces."

@bigdub Sir Thomas Beecham is best remembered for this incident... He loved to mingle with the audience in Covent Garden during the interval. One day a guy rushed into him and without apology, asked him where the loo was. Sir Thomas told him to follow a certain passage, adding, "The first door is labelled "Ladies". Don't go in there. The second door is labelled "Gentlemen". Go in there nevertheless."

Two trumpet players in Rome, in the only caffè possible!
barliman2001, left, and ssmith1226, right.

A friend of mine, former musical show trumpet player Alexander Gerzenberg, now has decided to throw his vast expertise in all things trumpet in with the Breslmaier company, being part responsible for mouthpiece development. A few days back, he gave me one of his first efforts at hands-on creating screw rim mouthpieces for my birthday. It's quite a story, so I am sharing it with you.
One of the chief products of Breslmaier is creating screw-on rims for existing mouthpieces, and vice versa. Usually, the leftover bits are thrown away for recycling... now Alexander has made it his pastime to root through the throwaways looking for something nice. What he found was a Bach Mt. Vernon 1 1/2 stem and cup, and a Bach Mt. Vernon 1 1/4 rim, both discarded. He cut a thread on both, inserted a slightly tapered distance ring and thus created what might easily be described as a Bach Mt. Vernon 1 1/4 A mouthpiece...
I played it for a full day yesterday, on both my Courtois Balanced and Olds Recording, and it was fabulous... nice control, warm silky smooth sound with optional paint-stripping... definitely a keeper! Thank you, Alexander!

P.S.: Tried it on my Courtois Roger Delmotte D today, a very mouthpiece-sensitive horn, and it was grand on that as well...

Suddenly, after a longish wait, I found "Global Moderator" beside my name... well, quite a few people here know about me from TM, but for all those who don't or who did not really care at the time, here's all about me. I don't have a fancy website - more or less because I'm busy updating my wife's website. But here's everything of interest about me:
I'm a 53-year-old Bavarian (well, German national, but I prefer my local tribe) living in Austria, near Vienna. Married to an opera singer (www.reginaschoerg.com). By trade, I am a historian.
My musical past consisted of children's choir, then the local church choir and finally, after studying voice with several renowned teachers, soloist with the Passau Cathedral Choir and the Dublin Guinness Choir. From age four, I played piano - did not really like it, but was good at it.
Until I accidentally put my hand through a glass door and cut a nerve. Fortunately, the same year I had won my first trumpet in a raffle... went on to Kinneil Band in Scotland (current British National Champions!), then back to Germany. Seven years in Ireland, playing with a number of brass bands and the Greystones Symphony, eventually conducting this orchestra. Since then, Principal Trumpet of the one and only Vienna Klezmer Orchestra (www.klezmerorchester.at) and webmaster for Munich-based Markus Fluhr Big Band (www.bbmf.de).
So far, I have performed on trumpet in twelve different countries and a total of 97 orchestras or bands (usually as a sub). I have been known to pack the car at a moment's notice and drive several days just for one interesting gig...
My finest moment in history? When I walked into a Vienna coffee house and they had a clarinet converted into a table lamp!

Feel free to contact me - I'm sure to answer.

@Bb-Brass Arnold & Sons are also good clones of good Bach pieces... and they ave the additional advantage that they are readily available in Europe (whereas Blessings aren't).

Do you use proper valve oil, and not a creeping oil like WD-40?

Strange instruments seem to find me... my first trombone was inherited from a friend who departed this life some twenty years ago. Fifteen years later, his daughter called me and was rather embarrassed... they had only now for th first time since his demise, opened up her father's music room and inspected the contents... and his #1 trombone, a 609 B&H Sovereign, bore a hand-written label that it was to go to me... this horn...

First thing I did was to visit my friend's grave and play Amazing Grace... and then happened onto a newly-formed big band with lots of trumpets and no trombones...
A couple of years later I was in a Vienna antiques store looking for a comfy seat with ears when I noticed a trombone hanging from the ceiling. Asked the seller "how much" and got a gruff answer, "two hundred". Replied, "here's a hundred - ok?" - "ok". It's a 1940s Willi Garreis tenor with valve, originally built of a member of the Munich Philharmonic, with a "long water key" feature... quite nice, all original and still in quite good shape. Came with a 12C generic trumpet mouthpiece...

And a couple of years back, found a Besson International baritone horn on e-bay for a whopping € 65..., got it, played it in a couple of brass band gigs
and then thought something might be wrong with the horn... brought it to Ivan Hunter who diagnosed that the horn had at some time suffered a catastrophic accident, been dismantled and somehow reassembled wrong way round... too costly to repair back to original condition, so he got it to convert into art...
and then, on e-bay again, found a Weltklang euphonium "for collection". Went to England for it (had some other things to do there anyway) and heard a remarkable story... the euph was owned by a long-time brass bander who had been given an ultimatum by his wife to either lose the horn or lose the wife. Chose wrong, the poor fellow... and his wife insisted that she should get the use of any money he would make out of the sale, so he gave it away for free...

@TrumpetSweden A pro trumpet, albeit it will need a bit of Tender Loving Care. I am no knowledgeable about Yamahas, but I know that the higher the first number of the type number, the better. A 2 would indicate a beginners' instrument, a 4 a good intermediate, and a 6 a pro instrument (albeit at the lower end of the pro scale). But there are people around here who will know the back history of every screw on your trumpet.

@administrator It's always on the first full weekend of July - see you then.

@ROWUK That Round Stamp Sovereign has enough room to up to A=450... but many of these instrumentsare not consistent in themselves.

So far, my B&H Sovereign Round Stamp has done everything I ever asked it for... I know that these instruments are reviled for wonky intonation, but mine so far has behaved perfectly. And a friend of mine has just - after a long search! - found another one that ain't misbehavin', and has chosen it as his primary sop over the band's 4xxx Yammie...

@administrator You coming? Splendid. Contact Nick Jones directly, will you? He is in charge of reserving accommodation - always the same 3* hotel in the centre of town, and all gigs are within easy walking distance. Most important is a good music stand - you can borrow one of mine if necessary - and a good music light: Some of the gigs are open air at night.

@Kehaulani-0 Perhaps next year? It's always on the first full weekend in July...

@Kehaulani-0 Then why don't you become a repeat offender by going there? Would love to have you!