I just spent the last 4 hours watching the 2004 Master’s championship. It was one of the most exciting major tournaments that I ever watched. I’m a big fan of Phil Mickelson. He has amazing talent and seems to truly enjoy the game. Even in the toughest situations today he had a smile on his face. I think that positive attitude helped him shoot a 31 on the back 9 AND make a putt to win on the 18th. A huge congrats to him. I can’t think of a more deserving person to win.

While watching the tournament I did a lot of lip slurs and long tones. I actually spend a lot of my Sunday’s doing this. I wouldn’t call it mindless practice but it doesn’t require as much concentration as when I’m trying improvisation or scales. It is especially effective when something good is on television. It gives me a way to enjoy what I’m looking at (99.9% of the time it is sports related) and still feel like I’m using the time effectively. Once I throw in some improv practice this evening – I’ll be golden.

I’m still trying to get Cubasis working well enough to post some sound files. Keep tuning in. Hopefully this week will be the charm. I can only tell you that I’m still experiencing consistency and promise of what hard work can do. I did a bit more improv work this past week so I’ll move back to fundamentals this go round.

First of all I must apologize for the lack of sound files over the past few weeks. I just purchased a new system and I’m having some difficulties getting everything to work. I’m also trying to make the move from Cakewalk Music Creator to Cubasis. I’ve had the software sitting in a box for over a year and I really need to take advantage of it. Granted, it is probably WAY more software than I need right now but I could see some benefits from getting familiar with it as my recording becomes more complex. Hopefully I can put something up for my next message.

My sound concept is slowly starting to change with regards to what I like to hear when I play the trumpet. Previously I was dead set against anything that was bright. I was definitely in the dark sound camp and refused to embrace anything that contained any type of edge. Since buying my flugelhorn and getting more familiar with it – I’ve learned to really enjoy the differences between the two. Playing one tune on trumpet followed by the flugel really allows me to hear the contrasts and I like having the option to switch from one to the other. It is amazing how different a tune can sound played on either – even when using similar licks or runs. Another thing I like doing is playing 2 chorus on trumpet, sitting out two and then doing the same on flugelhorn. I try to approach the tune with a different mindset and that can lead to some interesting discoveries to use in the future.

One thing I would like to do in the very near future (next two weeks) is write a tune and dedicate it to my Uncle and another close friend of mine. I lost both a few years ago and not a day goes by when I don’t think of them. I already know what I’m going to name it and right now I’m leaning towards a Bb blues. I do this for two reasons – 1) I am most comfortable in that key & format, 2) I know they would love it. I look forward to sharing it with all my visitors once it is complete.

A few years ago when I first started playing trumpet I met a drummer from
Chicago who shared a similar passion for music. We started out talking about how
awesome Donald Byrd was and eventually developed a friendship. We encourage each
other when the music (and life) doesn’t seem to come in on the downbeat. We have
also shared our successes. I wanted to take a moment to commend him on his
recent success. He had an article published on the All About
Jazz website about the Newport Jazz Festival 50th Anniversary tour. Congrats Sal! Remember
man – if I’m ever in Chicago or you’re in DC, we’re jamming together. Be sure to
give me that Philly Joe lick and I will leave you plenty of space to do your
thing! I already know what tune to do – Blues No. 2 from “Someday My Prince Will Come.”

This week I’ve been bitten by spring fever. I’ve had golf on the brain and
ended up indulging the warm weather a few days. I still got in some really good
practice but instead of 1.5 – 2 hours a day during the week, I only managed an hour. I
haven’t been doing much improvisation. Most of my work has been on fundamentals
and I’m very happy with the consistency I’ve developed over the past few weeks.
I think I may have lost some of that when I focused on improvisation. I have to
figure out a way to balance the two out – either by doing every other day or
alternating weeks. Regardless, I still believe that at this point playing the
trumpet well should be my priority over playing jazz. If my articulation, tone
and phrasing is horrible – who wants to hear what I’m trying to say?

Last week my primary focus during the week was fundamentals. I spent very little time working on improvisation. I still think that there is so much that I need to do as a trumpet player before I try to master improv. Range, tone, endurance, articulation — I’m not entirely sure that I will improve in these areas if I don’t get back to basics. This week I will try to do some improv (specifically note limiting) but a majority of my time will be spent with Irons, Schlossberg, Arbans and Clarke. I may do this for a couple of weeks and see what happens.

One very good thing that happened was I found that I can play chromatically from E up to high C when my chops are fresh. I can only do it three or four times before getting fatigued but I did it several times last week and it is a very good feeling. It wasn’t as big and full as I would like it to be but I can remember the same thing about other notes that I struggled with. I consider this progress! I hear stories of young players who are ripping high Cs after 6 months of playing but I realize and accept that I am NOT one of those types of players. I may try to record it for my next journal entry.

At Swing Band rehearsal I got an opportunity to sing “Night and Day.” The only version of this song that I am familiar with is the slow version performed by Frank Sinatra. This version was a swinging/faster version and it took me a few takes to get comfortable with it. I will probably shed on it a few times before our next meeting so I can do a better job. All in all I think I did ok. We did a lot of new music and as usual my sight-reading was awful. I depend entirely too much on my ear to learn tunes and I don’t trust my reading enough to feel confident in attempting new material. I can only hope that I will improve in this aspect of my playing as I have in other areas.

The hard part about listening to your recordings is NOT trashing it so badly that you briefly think of quitting.

I’ve been listening to the recordings of me playing last Saturday quite a bit and while I haven’t taken it to that extreme — I have been pretty hard on myself. I should have played louder… I should have stood up while I played… I should have used more than 5 notes on Summertime… that sort of thing. Still, the purpose of recording yourself is to hear what you need to work on and I definitely got that.

A few people were interested in hearing a complete song so I prepared the entire version of “Summertime” for your listening pleasure. It’s a pretty big file (3.5MB) so keep that in mind before clicking on it.  I hesitated to do this without the permission of the other players but I think they sounded great. Still, if it becomes an issue I will take it down. We had never played together and this was the very first take. That being considered – I thought it turned out pretty good. With additional work and some polish I could see it being REALLY good.

After the master class I practiced really hard the following day even though my chops were tired. I didn’t take a day off until Wednesday (and that was only because I had choir rehearsal). Thursday I played GREAT. My tone was good, my range was solid and everything clicked. It really reinforced the fact that playing the trumpet requires muscle and just like any form of exercise you see the best results after a day or two of rest. I don’t plan on resting two days but one definitely will do me some good.

Well, I’m sure you are reading this journal entry in search of news of my first time playing with other musicians… well……… the wait is over…..

All in all, it was an OK effort.  I learned a lot and it showed me things that I need to work on — which is why I went to begin with.

First off — I played with a really cool group of people. I was concerned about getting funny looks or comments for bad notes but that didn’t happen. Everyone was focused on the music and I think everyone realized that this is learning environment so things were not going to be “perfect.” Once I realized this I relaxed and enjoyed the experience. The instrumentation was trumpet, alto sax, flute, guitar, piano, bass & drums. I thought it worked well.

NOTE: I used my minidisc to record this so the sound quality is not the best — still, it gives you a chance to hear what I played.

The first tune we played was “Freddie Freeloader.”  As much as I worked on this on my own – I was really, really nervous and didn’t do well. Honestly, I did TERRIBLE.  I wasn’t sure how many choruses each person was going to do and that threw me off a little bit. All the licks that I had worked out seemed to vanish and I couldn’t get them out of my horn fast enough. I made an attempt to play a Miles Davis lick and that sounded extremely stiff. Still, I got my feet wet and things got better from there. Man… was I nervous!!!

Next we played “Summertime” — a tune that I’ve been working on for a very long time. Granted, I played a solo that should sound familiar to all who have listened to my sound files but I think I did well. I started to branch out and play something new but stuck with the safety blanket of familiarity.

“A Train” was next and it was a real challenge for me. I’ve heard it a million times but guess what? I’ve never played it. For that reason I did not record it. I struggled with the head AND the changes. I did the best that I could and considering I had never played it before. Lets just say when I soloed the train derailed a bit but kept moving forward.

I switched to flugelhorn for “Song for My Father” because my chops started getting tired (more on that later). I did pretty good but I still fluffed some notes. It is funny how you can nail something at home but totally butcher it when playing out in public. Still, I’m going to cut myself some slack because I think I will get better as I do more of it. I received a few compliments on my flugel sound. I switched back to trumpet near the end and when we started trading fours.

Finally we did “All of Me” another tune that I had never played before. For the same reason that I did not record “A Train” I did not record this.  I struggled with the head the first time around but it got better when we ran it back. By then my chops were really tired and I was using pressure just to get through it.

I was only a sub this time but I love the prospect of doing it on a regular basis. It gives me a visible goal and a reason for improving. You can do that working on your own but if you know you will be meeting with other musicians to jam on a regular basis – I think you will naturally take it up another level. The group meets twice a week and I imagine they will shed on the new tunes so they will be ready next time around. I’m already looking for play-a-longs for A Train and All of Me so I can work on the trouble spots.

There were a few areas that were really brought to my attention through this experience:

1. I love playing the trumpet and I love playing jazz. I floated all the way home when it was over. This is more important than anything else.
2. Trumpet is a LEAD instrument.  I found that the tunes sounded better when I pushed my sound more to the front but still blended with the ensemble.  I found that I played the melody on most tunes so range (a problem for me) is important.
3. I need to put Caruso exercises back in my routine. My endurance crapped out after about a hour and a half. The last half hour I struggled to finish and used pressure to get through (something I never do).
4. I need to get more comfortable playing while sitting down. When I play at home I always stand up. I don’t think I was breathing properly and that caused my endurance to go downhill.
5. I need to work on scales and chords. I soloed on the new tunes totally by ear and it was hard and it was sloppy. The chords are there to help guide me but since I didn’t know them — it was useless.
6. I would really like to play more complicated ideas but they don’t come out naturally.  That tells me that I need to improve my technical facility on my instrument.

So there you have it. My first experience playing with other musicians was a good one. I feel I could have done better BUT I think I did ok.  There is a part of me that wants to retreat to bat cave and work harder to improve but I am definitely anxious to do it again. Please share your thoughts!

Here is another improvisation sound file. I picked “Song for My Father” since it is basically a blues in F. I kept my ideas very simple but I think they sound fairly hip. I also tried to think about what I was going to play in advance rather than wandering like I did in my last Bb blues sound file. Click here to check out.

Did you ever notice that you sometimes get your best ideas when you are away from your instrument? This happens to me frequently. It will usually hit me when I’m on the train heading to work or while sitting at my desk working. I have music playing at all times and this tends to spark all sorts of ideas. The hard part is remembering those ideas when you get to the practice room. In many cases a musical idea can come and go so quickly and you will never know if it could develop into something special. After getting frustrated with this, I started calling my anwering machine at home to SING the idea into the phone. Of course everyone within ear shot thinks I’m wacked in the brain but hey… maybe I am! I don’t think a moment goes by when I’m not thinking about music.

Last night I had the pleasure of checking out Roy Hargrove at the Kennedy Center. It was a late show but man did Roy light it up. He brought some serious players with him including Mulgrew Miller on piano, Justin Robinson on Alto Sax and Willie Jones III on drums. Willie blew me away. The energy and fire that poured out of his set was amazing. Roy wowed the crowd and appeared to have a good time on stage. When he pulled out the flugelhorn a woman could not contain herself after he played a few notes. Hearing him on flugel was one of the main reasons why decided that I HAD to double when I started playing. As usual – I left the show with a new found inspiration to improve.

Looks like I will get my first opportunity to try improvisation with other musicians this coming Saturday. I’m going to sub for one of the other jazz master classes. To say that I am excited is an understatement. This for me is the first step forward and I hope it leads to more opportunities. I know I will learn something new and perhaps get a new direction to focus on when practicing on my own. Hopefully my next journal entry will be filled with positive stuff.

This week I had swing band rehearsal and for the first time, I felt confident
about playing.  I played out more and managed to hang on for dear life on
some of the new tunes.  That may not seem great to some but it was better
than my normal routine of watching the notes roar by in blur.  This time I
made a point of figuring out the first few measures in advance and it helped me
get started and keep going.  I made a few mistakes but when I did I
recognized it, remembered it and made a point not to do it again.  There
are still some tunes that I just can’t for the life of me play.  One is an
arrangement of "Tangerine" that starts pretty high (for me). 
Fortunately I actually have the music to it and I plan to work on it since it is
a favorite of the band.  At worse I’ll play the parts down an octave.

Another opportunity that appears to be coming to pass is SINGING with the
band.  All of my singing up to now has been at church (since I was 10) and
some small groups in high school.  I’m looking forward to the opportunity
to doing it.  My favorite male jazz vocalists include Frank Sinatra, Sammy
Davis Jr. (who sang like Frank), Harry Connick Jr. (who sings like Frank), Nat
King Cole and Bobby Darren.  I’m going to branch out my listening to
include a few others like Joe Williams, Mel Torm

Along with the Aebersold 1st and 2nd tracks I’ve been working with Blues in
Bb and F. You can hear me playing Bb blues by clicking
here.

My tendency is to ride the blues scale and use it throughout rather than
addressing the individual changes. They come too fast for me!  In my
opinion it makes me sound like a beginner – but that is what I am!! Hopefully
hard work will make it sound more polished. I tried to throw a lick that I
frequently here in my first phrase and it is pretty obvious and mechanical.

As with all my sound files – please offer feedback. The feedback regarding my
first improv sound file was great and I hope to get the same with regards to the
blues. I am trying to become comfortable with this format as it is perfect for
jam sessions…  everyone plays the blues!  I’m hoping to brave that
frontier later this year. I don’t think I’m ready just yet. I need more ideas.

Sometimes when I’m improvising I find that I drift mentally or zone out. So
far I have discovered that there are two kinds of mental "drifts." One
is good and the other bad. The bad is when I play mindlessly over the changes.
I’m not thinking about being creative or playing anything that will cause me to
explore.  When I do this – I might as well play the scale or just the chord
tones.  The good is when I don’t think changes – I just get into the music
and flow. I trust my instincts, abilities and let things take shape. It doesn’t
happen often but it does happen from time to time. Of course once I realize it I
start thinking too much and I usually end up screwing up!!

As promised I am posting my first serious attempt at improvisation.  You
can listen to it by clicking here.

While I have fooled around with improvisation since starting out, most of my
time has been spent trying to play the trumpet.  I definitely have a long
way to go with regards to my technical skills but I feel I must build confidence
creating melodies on the spot, especially with the jazz master class looming in
my immediate future.  It is very important to me that I can at least make
an effort to play with the skills that I have.

I am working with Aebersold Volume 1 – "How to Play Jazz and
Improvise", 2nd track.  It is modal in format as the rhythm section plays in concert F
minor, Eb minor and D minor – eight bars of each.  To me it is reminiscent
of "So What" from "Kind of Blue."  I tried to keep that
vibe in my head while playing.  Prior to tackling this track I worked on
each key using Aebersold’s Volume 24.  To get familiar with each, I played
the first 5 notes of the scale, the entire scale and then the chord.  I
also played a lick in one key and then tried to repeat it in the others.  I
also try singing a short phrase and play it back.  The key there is singing
something that I can actually get out of the horn!  Since I’ve only been
playing 3 years I have to keep the ideas simple…  that’s tough.

My biggest compliant is I totally loose all technique (articulation and tone)
when I try improvisation.  I think I am so wrapped up in what notes to play
that I forget to move air through the horn and all the other fundamentals that I
busted my butt to develop.  I can only hope that it will get better as I
get more comfortable doing it. I also recorded this clip while listening headphones which is AWFUL when you’re trying to hear yourself. I need to come up with a different way to record.

It was very difficult for me to post this sound file.  The more I listen
to it — the worse it sounds.  I take some comfort in the fact that I will
get better.  This will be an excellent marker of where I began. 
Please offer any suggestions or comments that you have – good or bad.

On another note – I’ve been having some email problems since starting this
site.  If you sent me a message and I did not respond to it, I probably
didn’t get it.  If you want to send a message again – feel free to do so as
I feel the problem is solved.  You can also email me at kindofblue32@hotmail.com.