Posts made by J. Jericho

I've tried to find a way to contact him for quite a while now. No success.

@JorgePD said in So how did you start out to learn the trumpet?:

... trumpet never hurt me with girls either....

In high school, trumpet players and majorettes tended to gravitate toward one another. This was in pre-PC times, when appearance was a requirement to be a majorette, so they ranged from cute to unforgettable. Oh, also... if you didn't maintain a "B"/3.0 average in your classes, you couldn't be in Band. That was a win-win for trumpet guys! But I digress....

Never had a problem with vibrato. I've been able to apply it judiciously and to remove it where appropriate. I generally like some vibrato, as it seems to my ear to add depth, richness, and emotion to the part, although some music requires a clean clarity that would be degraded by vibrato, so naturally vibrato would be avoided in these situations.

The director put me on Eb alto horn my first year in Band (7th grade), much to my disappointment, since I had joined in order to play trumpet. He issued me the music folder and a mimeographed fingering chart, along with another mimeographed page or two summarizing note values, rests, and time signatures. Figuring out how which notes correlated to the desired pitch was up to me. The director gave me guidance along the way to make sure I was playing properly, so I wasn't entirely on my own.

Fingering is the same for the trumpet, so when I switched (much to the director's chagrin and anger) before the next school year, I already knew how to play. As punishment for switching, the band director (a trumpet player himself, BTW) put me in the last chair in the section (didn't bother me; I was thrilled to finally be playing trumpet!), but I worked my way up on a regular basis.

I know this seems like a crude way to start, but the minimum expectation of the students was excellence, and the director motivated us. As a result we were considered the best junior high school band around.

And that's how the fight started ........

One year, I decided to buy my mother-in-law a cemetery plot as a Christmas gift . .
The next year, I didn't buy her a gift.
When she asked me why, I replied,
"Well, you still haven't used the gift I bought you last year!"
And that's how the fight started.....

My wife and I were sitting at a table at her high school reunion:
she kept staring at a drunken man swigging his drink as he sat alone at a nearby table.
I asked her, "Do you know him?"
"Yes", she sighed,
"He's my old boyfriend. I understand he took to drinking right after we
split up those many years ago, and I hear he hasn't been sober since."
"Good grief!" I said, "Who would think a person could go on celebrating
that long?"
And then the fight started...

When our lawn mower broke and wouldn't run, my wife kept hinting to me that I should get it fixed.
But, somehow I always had something else to take care of first, the shed, the boat, making beer.
Always something more important to me.
Finally she thought of a clever way to make her point.
When I arrived home one day, I found her seated in the tall grass,
busily snipping away with a tiny pair of sewing scissors.
I watched silently for a short time and then went into the house.
I was gone only a minute, and when I came out again I handed her a toothbrush.
I said, "When you finish cutting the grass, you might as well sweep the driveway."
The doctors say I will walk again, but I will always have a limp.

My wife sat down next to me as I was flipping channels.
She asked, "What's on TV?"
I said, "Dust."
And then the fight started...

My wife was hinting about what she wanted for our upcoming anniversary.
She said, "I want something shiny that goes from 0 to 165 in about 2 seconds."
I bought her a bathroom scale.
And then the fight started......

I rear-ended a car this morning...the start of a REALLY bad day!
The driver got out of the other car, and he was a DWARF!!
He looked up at me and said 'I am NOT Happy!'
So I said, 'Well, which one ARE you then?'
That's when the fight started.

From my limited experience, I'd say it depends upon the assertiveness of the players. Ideally it's a collectively cooperative endeavor where the music is the priority and presenting it in the best possible way is the goal, but personalities being what they are, egos can get in the way. As a result, the music suffers.

@Newell-Post

During the band recruitment concert in junior high school (7th grade), I fell in love with the trumpet. I liked it before, but the idea that I could make those sounds myself was thrilling. I joined Band and was promptly told by the director that he had enough trumpets and put me on alto horn. Was I disappointed! I did fine, and the director loaned me a French horn for me to familiarize myself with over the summer.

By the end of summer, I'd had enough. Although it was a difficult instrument to play for some of the reasons mentioned above, I didn't have much trouble sounding at least presentable. My irritation was with the timbre of the French horn itself and the type of parts a horn player was expected to play. I convinced my parents to buy me a trumpet, and I returned the French horn before the start of the new school year.

I told the director that if he wanted me to be in the band, it would be with me playing trumpet, not French horn. He was livid! He told me that I would have to start at the bottom - the last chair in the 4th Cornet section. I feigned disappointment, but inside I was screaming "I'M GOING TO BE PLAYING TRUMPET!!" We had a system whereby if you thought you could play better than the player ahead of you, you challenged him, and I moved up on a regular basis.

For me there is no more difficult wind instrument to play than the French horn; I would rate trumpet a close second. I think that it's easier to go from French horn to trumpet than the other way around. The focus and precision required to play horn can be a help in playing any other brass instrument. To this day I use concepts and play exercises developed by Philip Farkas, the legendary horn player.

@Dr-GO said in Accessories for the Other End of the Horn:

Just saw this advertisement on my Facebook page. Does anyone have this and does it actually work?

I did a short search and came up with this* :

Here's the info sheet: https://www.brass-innovations-germany.de/download/Sound-Assist_2_GB.pdf

Whether these devices are more than gadgets, IDK.

• Despite the name, I have no connection to this product, company, principals, employees, nor associates, other than finding their website a few minutes ago.

@Chuck-Rose Welcome! The name looks familiar.

@administrator https://www.computerworld.com/article/3195706/start-up-touts-3d-printer-that-can-build-carbon-fiber-kevlar-fiberglass-parts.html

gifer.com

Whether it has wheels, propellers, or both, as long as it moves under its own power, post it here!

I'll start:

When my Claude Gordon Benge and my tuner and all my music were stolen, along with a cooler with food, they were in the back of the car hidden under a blanket (we were traveling, and there was no room in the trunk). The thieves used a coat hanger to open the door, left the hanger on the floor of the car under the passenger seat, and relocked the car when they left.

We were among many at the police station with others who had had similar experiences, other than the part about the thieves locking the car afterward. The police said that in their experience the trumpet was probably on its way to another part of the country and that it probably wouldn't turn up locally. It has not been found, and it has been decades since the theft.

Yes, there are many variations on abstract painting which succeed as art and not as garbage, but like any artistic endeavor, there is a whole range of competence and lack thereof. One would not look at abstraction, however slight, and declare it to be photographic, but to be offended at such a compliment reveals a lack of character and ability IMO. A lot of art consists of sycophants stroking fragile egos over what, from any rational perspective, is crap, not art.

Read the seller's feedback. You might be surprised.

It occurred to me that if the thieves can't sell your horn, they might toss it in a dumpster to distance themselves from loot that is hotter than they anticipated.

@Newell-Post I know that awful feeling myself. I posted your FB page on TromboneChat.com and TheMouthpiece.com .

@Bob-Pixley said in Community Band:

I've never understood why directors punish the musicians with rehearsals right before a performance. Surely they realize they are tiring the musicians to the point that the last rehearsal is the best performance, not the concert.

You have described perfectly a Big Band concert when I was in college. The director had us come in early so we could run through some spots he wasn't satisfied with. Then we went through the entire concert. Then we went through the entire concert again. Then a short break, followed by showtime! Everyone was a bit fatigued, and I was the featured soloist out in front of the band for one of the charts. I was not at my best, and the audience could hear it. After the number I took my bow and trotted back to the trumpet section so I could get there before the applause died down.