Episode #19, Vincent DiMartino

 In today's episode of the Modern Trumpet Podcast, we talk with special guest Vincent DiMartino about his career.

Welcome! We’re dedicated to helping trumpet players learn how to make a living at the trumpet and hear from professional players who are doing it. In addition to this podcast, we are writing a book called The Modern Trumpeter, A Guide to Building a Versatile and Successful Career. This book will be available at the end of 2026. With insights and stories from dozens of professional trumpet players working in jazz, classical, commercial, and military settings, this book gives you the tools, mindset, and insider knowledge to turn your talent into a sustainable career. Insights, stories and behind the scenes of the music industry are provided by the likes of Wayne Bergeron, Bobby Shew, Bria Skonberg, Bijon Watson, Marcus Printup, Glen Marhevka, Dave Richards, Jay Webb, Jerry Hey, Brian MacDonald, Kiku Collins, and many more!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Hey everyone, welcome again to the Modern Trumpeter Podcast. I'm your host, Jaden Boyneau, and today's guest is one of the best trumpet teachers in the country, Vince D. Martino. Vince D. Martino is one of the country's most sought-after trumpet performers and educators. Since graduating from the Eastman School of Music in 1972, Professor Dee Martino has taught at the University of Kentucky until 1993. At that time, Dee Martino began a new appointment as a distinguished artist in residence at Center College in Danville, Kentucky. There he has taught trumpet, brass, and jazz ensembles, and jazz history. He has served as the music chair and is currently coordinator of the Center College Instrumental Program. He was a distinguished master professor of music at Center College until his retirement in 2012. He had been the lead and solo trumpet player in the Lionel Hampton band, the Chuck Mangioni band, the Clark Terry band, and the Eastman Arrangers Holiday Orchestra. He's also performed with some of the country's finest college jazz ensembles. He has been a member of the artist faculty of the highly acclaimed Skidmore Jazz Institute since its inception. He has also served twice as president and vice president of the International Trumpet Guild, as well as member of its board of directors for two terms. He serves as chair of the board of directors for the National Trumpet Competition in Washington, D.C. And for those who don't know, we are in the process of writing a book called The Modern Trumpeter: A Guide to Building a Versatile and Successful Career. It will be available at the end of 2026 and we'll dive into what it really takes to make a living as a trumpet player in today's modern age. With insights and stories from over 50 professional trumpet players working in the music industry today, this book gives you the tools, mindset, and insider knowledge to turn your talent into a sustainable career. Insights, stories, and behind the scenes of the music industry are provided by the likes of Wayne Bergeron, Bobby Shue, Brias Gomberg, John Watson, Michael Sachs, Bob Malone, Louis Dowdwell, Marcus Print Up, Glenn Marhevka, Dave Richards, Jay Webb, Jerry Hay, Brian McDonald, Kiku Collins, Lisa Whitaker, Vince Di Martino, Tony Cadlick, Willie Marillo, Amy McCabe, Randy Brecker, and many, many more. Now here is my interview with Vince DiMartino. Hey everybody, welcome back to the Modern Trumpeter Podcast.

SPEAKER_01 2:27

Today we get to speak with Trumpet Legend Vince Di Martino. Vincent, thank you so much for having us. Pleasure.

SPEAKER_04 2:44

All right. Well, I started just like most people, I started into public school music. I uh was in a little class in in elementary school. I think it was about the fifth grade or so. So I was about, I don't know, I was about twelve, I think, when I started. And I liked it, you know. I they didn't they didn't offer drums, so they said, Well, you want to play trumpet? I said, Okay. So I I pick up the trumpet and I liked it. I mean, I I I always was a kind of a practice person, you know, no matter what I did, whether it was schoolwork or anything. I think that's really good, kind of a good start for everybody, not necessarily trumpet, but just getting really excited about something and making sure that you want to get up every day and do that song. So I liked the trumpet, so I practiced it. And I really didn't take a lot of private lessons, if any, really, un until I went to college. So my high school band director helped me a lot because he was a trumpet player, but I really didn't take private lessons, they were expensive, and we didn't have much money, so I just figured I wouldn't ask for that, you know. I practiced a lot and I listened. And I think I think that's really the key. Well, if you're liking what you hear, then I think you'll want to practice, you'll want to sound like recording. So I basically, my one of my neighbors was a bass player. He worked for uh actually a sphery gyroscope company, and he was a big like engineer kind of guy, but he also played the bass very well. And I used to listen to his little band over the fence from where I lived, and he'd invite me over and I'd hop over the fence and listen to them practice. And I liked that. And uh when I started to get serious, he told me, he says, Well, you know, you really get some records, and then you know, in the future you can be in a band like this, and etc. So he gave me my dad a recommendation that I get some Raphael Mendez records, Miles Davis, Maynard Ferguson, and Billy Butterfield. Most people don't know Billy Butterfield anymore, but all all iconic trumpet players, and then I moved on from there and started getting like big band records, and I delivered newspapers. And my last stop on the payday for newspapers was the uh department store that had a really good record store. Spend the money a recording almost every week. Wow. So I started collecting records, and then since I really didn't have a teacher, I'd just try to play along with the records, you know, with limited success. Okay, because I was developing a total picture. I wasn't just practicing attudes or something like that. I mean, I did that too, because my my band director he he knew how to work with me, and so I I practiced. I go to school in the morning early, my dad would drop me off on his way to work, and I get in there and I'd warm up at school in the in the hallway because nobody was there when I got there at 6:30. And and I also studied. I studied like my homework, or I wonder if I was gonna have a test or anything like that. So I kind of you know alternated doing that. And if I'd have had like a phone with all the music on it too, that would have been really helpful. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 5:57

Still didn't carry those like to the practice room. So yeah, uh, spend your time. And as far as you know, like listening and practicing, I mean, I I really listened more at first than I practiced, and then I started practicing really a lot right in junior high school, you know. So I I don't know why, because I I guess because I liked it so much, and I played with the records. And when I was gonna go to high school, you know, I said, Wow, gosh, I can't play with any of these records. I'm gonna be like the worst trumpet player in the whole school. You know, because I never really went to a to the high school. I I just you know did what I was whatever school I was in.

SPEAKER_01 6:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 6:35

So when I when I went to audition for for the band spots my first day, you know, I came back and I said, gee, mom, like all those people, they're worse than I am. Because I just thought I wasn't that good because I couldn't play what was on the record.

SPEAKER_01 6:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 6:51

You know, so I think that's a good that's that's a good motivator too to to listen. And today you have we have YouTube, you know, all the different videos you can you can watch, you have all the different services that you can just put somebody's name in and a and a recording will show up.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:07

You know, when you're when you go to master classes and things, which I suggest highly, is that you attend things where people are performing and talking about practicing and learning. And you can apply all those things to everything you do. It's not just trumpet. You know, it's if you're not practicing all day, meaning learning how to do things other than play the trumpet, well, you probably the methodology is going to be weaker. So I think, you know, I I used to practice cutting the lawn better because I didn't want to do it. So if I do it less time, that's better.

SPEAKER_01 7:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:42

So I you know, I always had little things that I always try to apply what I learned. Then when I got to high school, my band director knew he could tell, you know, he was a very great band director. And all he knew was that he would show, I'd be practicing. Uh the custodians would let me in so I could go in. We had like two doors, you know, that yeah, and it was there so that he would let me in there, and then I could practice like a little practice room. Oh, that sounds really good. And Hardman book, you know, which he told me to get. And uh he'd say, Well, that sounds really good, but let's hear you play this, and I'd you know, I couldn't do it. He'd say, Wow, that doesn't sound too good, and then he'd just leave because he knew that that was just not something that I could deal with. Yeah. I'd have to be able to do it. So I practice and practice, you know, and at the end of the week, I I've you know, I'd start to get a a beat on it. But boy, that's that's a lot better. Turn a page and go, Well, let's see, you play this one. I you know, I couldn't do it. So he had my number, you know, he knew that I was a person that was very I wanted I wanted to do things well, you know, I wanted to be a good student, I wanted to do well in all my classes and all those things, you know. So took advantage of that. And and there was there was quite a few of us in our in my band, you know, maybe we had a very small band, it was maybe 50. Uh-huh. But there was about eight or ten of those people that really practiced. Okay. We we he knew how to work with us. And he also understood why other people were in band, and that's really important. Even if you're just a person that's well, how come nobody else practices? Or well, some people don't have that interest. So don't stop you from practicing. I mean, it never stopped me. What stopped me was what I couldn't do. Yeah, I'd get right with it. That stopped me in my tracks to know that I needed to know how to do that. So, yeah. So basically, I I think that's really, really important. That's that's an important background factor to be to be uh you know aggressive in learning. Today you you can you can sit anywhere and have all the resources you need just by being on the internet, yeah. Right. If you just let people play and say, Oh, that's great. Well, I mean it's true, but I can do anything for you that unless you get to it and say, Well, gee, I want to sound like that and I know what to do. And if you can get a teacher, get a teacher as soon as possible. I mean, one of my students came to me and said, I have this student that's so fantastic, he has everything learned all the time. And that student was Caleb Hudson, and he was a student of one of my students.

SPEAKER_01 10:17

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 10:18

And he said, He said, No matter what I give him, he always comes in with more.

SPEAKER_01 10:22

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 10:23

It's always like flawless. He just well, because that he was that type of person much more than I was, you know, even so he he was a very great example of what you can do if you work really hard. So I I think I think that's the key to everything. It doesn't matter where you are. I mean, some of the greatest musicians came from towns you never heard of, countries you never heard of. So there's no uh I have to be in New York to get good, you know. That's anything like that.

SPEAKER_01 10:47

Yeah, absolutely. That's that's definitely been the case. There's been so many people I've talked to where it's like they came from somewhere, and you're just like, who, where? And then they're like, Yeah, they'll be they're like, Yeah, my band program was tiny, and but I loved playing the trumpet and they did it, you know, they've made it in. And I'm like, wow, that's you could awesome.

SPEAKER_04 11:07

Like Al Bazuti, Missoula, Montana, you know, Judy LeClaire, Parkersburg, West Virginia. As a matter of fact, she was in a tiny little town. I can't remember the name of it. But everybody, Joe Mussello, he was from uh Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania. Little town I went there and visited was a tiny place. Yeah, came up on the way to Eastman. He went to Eastman with me. You know, all these people they come from very small places in a lot of cases. So there's never an excuse. Well, you know, I lived in a small town, I couldn't do anything. Well, you know, you you chose not to do anything.

SPEAKER_01 11:39

Yeah, yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_04 11:41

That's always a choice. And stick around with people that are engaged in doing things.

SPEAKER_01 11:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 11:49

A lot of my friends weren't musicians, you know. Some of them I called up on the phone and uh we said, Wow, that that trigonometry problem that I have, it's really bad. What did you do? Um I tried this, and you know, and so you're constantly engaging with other people that are trying to do something similar to what you're doing. So that's a good thing. We had garage bands. We used to house every week and sort of play out a little books, you know, that had some tunes in it and stuff, you know. Yeah. Even little brass ensemble once in a while, because we didn't really ever have anything like that in school.

SPEAKER_01 12:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:25

Yeah. So I I think all of those things. So most of it's all self-motivated and and your teacher, and of course, another important part of of you know the this the system is paying attention to what people set tell you. Somebody can do something, ask them about it. You know, you have to be kind of fearless.

SPEAKER_02 12:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:45

To be say, Well, that's a stupid question. Well, yeah, maybe. I know.

SPEAKER_01 12:49

Yeah, that's a good point. I and that's I'm all uh the more I play, the more I'm like, man, I have more questions about the trumpet. Sure we do. I still do.

SPEAKER_04 12:56

I mean I'm working every day. I I've got a big kind of blister on my lip. I've got to play tonight, so I'm just warming up really easy, and I'm also figuring out how I can avoid you know, it hurting too much.

SPEAKER_01 13:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 13:10

I think about is what I'm playing and not how my lip feels.

SPEAKER_01 13:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 13:15

Well, all those things, you have you know, you have lots of daily and weekly things that uh you have to give consideration to, but you don't use them as an excuse not to play.

SPEAKER_01 13:24

Unless it's sure Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 13:28

Yeah, but in in general, you know, we usually have to do some workarounds just to just to you know get through the week.

SPEAKER_01 13:34

Yeah, yep. It's a it's a demanding instrument. And there's some they all have their ups and downs. Yeah, oh yeah. And it's it's it's fun to hear that uh people such as yourself and a lot of people I interviewed, they're like, Yeah, this is a hard thing to play. And it's like from like an outsider's perspective, it's like they got it, they have it figured out a hundred percent of the time. They they are the the masters of the trumpet yes, but also they're they're human too. They're more they they have all that stuff going on too. They've just figured out how to deal with it better.

SPEAKER_04 14:04

Get up the next day and you start over.

SPEAKER_01 14:07

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 14:07

You forget about maybe not the issues you have, but the anticipation of failure you get sometimes from just not feeling good.

SPEAKER_01 14:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 14:17

I get up and and put that aside, and and uh, you know, every day it's like it's a new day. Everybody all of these songs that you hear, the words, it's a new day, it's this thing on that, and all those things are true. The poetry of of our everyday life.

SPEAKER_01 14:30

Yeah, agreed. And so when you came to college, where did you want to study? Where did you go? How far did you do masters and doctorate as well? And kind of take us through that experience and that journey.

SPEAKER_04 14:45

Well, I I didn't decide I was gonna go to music school until the summer of my junior year. I was gonna go to medical school or something, you know. But I was an exchange student, my high school sent me to uh Columbia, South America, and I I you know went to school there in the summer and experienced a different culture, and I I didn't really have anything to play in there, you know, and I wasn't used to that. So I found a place to play in uh in Bogota was called Freddie's American Jazz Bar. I went there and I asked if I could, you know, play a little bit. I I mean I had some experience. I started playing jobs when I was 14 a couple of years after I started playing. So uh I had some you know playing experience, and uh the band at this place uh said, Well, gee, you know, you're welcome to come back anytime. Matter of fact, you can come every week if you want. I said, Well, we have all these exchange students and and we have to meet once a week, so maybe we could uh meet here. We didn't tell the families we were staying with that we're going to Freddie's American Jazz Bar, but so but I said, you know, they'd have to be able to sit somewhere and maybe have some food and stuff. And I said, So if you feed them and everything, I'll play. And they said, Okay. So they had a table, you know, set aside for just those students. It was a big round table and all, and they filled it with food. I just sat there and I played with this band, and we did it almost every week, every other week. Sometimes we had we had other things we had to do as a group.

SPEAKER_01 16:10

Sure.

SPEAKER_04 16:11

It was great. And I came back and I I said, you know, I really like to go to music school, and I really wasn't sure. But I said, Well, you know, there's Potsdam and there's Fridonia in New York. And then my uh my math teacher found out that I wanted to go to music school, and she's told me she's well, you know, there's a school in Rochester, New York. I'm from Rochester, and it's a fantastic music school, Eastman School of Music. I've never heard of it, you know. And I didn't know how I was gonna get up there and audition, you know, or if I'd even like it.

SPEAKER_01 16:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 16:41

So they they paid for me to fly up there. Wow. Money in my high school, they paid for that. Wow. Once I went to Eastman and sat in the hall and listened to the trumpet players and the ensembles, I said, Well, I don't know if I can get in here, but this is where I want to go to school. So I was lucky and I got in, and I I basically I was like the most uneducated musically in you know professional terms.

SPEAKER_01 17:09

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:15

That's where I want to go to school. I want to go to school where I'm gonna be the worst trumpet player.

SPEAKER_01 17:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:20

I that was a good move on my part because I was offered scholarships in a lot of other places, but you know, I said, Well, you know, that that one that the groups didn't sound very good, or I didn't maybe I didn't line up with the trumpet teacher, and but and all I did was stay there, and I said, Well, obviously, this is a different kind of place, you know.

SPEAKER_01 17:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:40

I I went to Eastman for four years, and my teacher was great. He realized all the things I didn't know, and he humored me by letting me play things that I found in the library and I thought you know I was really excited about and wanted to play, which I I couldn't really play, just like records in high school.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:58

But he let me do that, and then he showed me other things that I needed to know. He'd let me do that for 10 minutes or 15 minutes, and then he'd take out things that I wanted to work on, and that worked out great. And uh I got out of school in 1970 and I taught a year in Rochester, New York, and then I I decided I wasn't gonna do that because I didn't really like it, wasn't teaching high school, it was just this the system of how that worked. I you know, it just was so limiting in what I could do to help people. I I just didn't feel that's what I wanted to do, teach. I want to be just like my high school band director. And so uh I decided that I'd just play. And about that time, I'd also, when I was in Eastman as a student, I uh played with Lionel Hampton in the summers to make money for school summers. And I was lucky enough to get that job. And uh so it was obvious that I I wasn't a bad player, but I was very inexperienced. I met a and when I was in Kentucky, I met a person that uh came to hear me, and he happened to be the head of the the music school at the University of Kentucky and asked me about my education. You know, he talked me on the intermission from the thing we were playing. Uh a couple years later, their trumpet teacher left and asked me if I would come and do a one-year replacement. Wow. Because I realized that the place was they needed somebody to help the students, you know. There was a lot of things that I noticed that the students hadn't experienced before and that I wanted to I could help with that.

SPEAKER_01 19:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 19:31

Good place to be. It didn't have to be in New York City like most of my friends. Yeah. And I stayed there and then I could went back to get my I didn't even have a master's when I got that job. So I just had to get a master's. So I went back to Eastman and uh I it was great because my my teacher was uh getting ready to retire and I got to spend time with him again. And he I think he really enjoyed all that I'd learned as a teacher and as a student then too. Yeah, so so you know, those things, it's really good. Uh I think it's really good if you take some time between getting your master's and having been an undergraduate, unless there's a necessity to go right into it or you like it where you are, it's easy just to go ahead. But I I'm kind of glad I I had that job to make me figure out things that I hadn't spent much time on as an undergraduate and I needed to spend time on. Yeah, really good thing. And then I started to teach at Eastman in the summers and and work on my my master's d degree because student I was teaching there, and so I took courses, and then I had to finally take a year off and go back to Eastman for the whole year because there weren't any more courses for me to take in the summer.

SPEAKER_01 20:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 20:45

And then I got my master's in uh jazz and contemporary media. Uh, the class that I graduated in was the very first uh degree class at Eastman, and that was in uh 1978. Wow. I went back to University of Kentucky and I stayed there till 1993, and then and then uh after that I went to Center College, which I enjoyed immensely because it was very small, and I had lots of time to spend with the students, and I taught like jazz history, and I did all a lot of different ensembles and things. You know, I did the jazz ensemble at University of Kentucky too, as well as teach trumpet, playing the fact of Nebraska Quintet. But I really enjoyed the the uh the great diversity of students that were there in as far as where they were from, different country, different cities, different backgrounds. So I mean that for me was fantastic.

SPEAKER_01 21:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 21:36

I spent nineteen years there and then I'd done 40 years of uh college teaching.

SPEAKER_01 21:41

Long, long time. A long history.

SPEAKER_04 21:44

It didn't feel like that actually, because I enjoyed going every day. Yeah. Oh, I gotta go to school. I've seen people like that, and I don't really like to work with those people. Yeah. So it's like a job, and I really suggest that everybody finds something that if you like to wood carve you find something that you can do with that that that can be your job you know or find a job that you you like and then spend the majority of the rest of your time with your family and your hobby that's so important to you which might be trumpet.

SPEAKER_01 22:17

Yeah yeah yeah it's it's true it's so interesting to see how many different paths to music there are and like everybody's story has been so unique and so different and so kind of backtracking a little bit in your case so you got asked how long were you teaching at Kentucky before going back for a master's about five years.

SPEAKER_04 22:38

Five years because I had to I had to get the master's before I could get tenure because it was the only requirement I didn't have to go back and get my doctorate because I asked about that I said you know I said it's really hard for me to take off and not teach my students I said you know I I don't really want to go back and get a doctorate. And yeah like the thing like people were calling me from all these places about asking me questions about how I did certain things and I was going well what would I do if I went to school there? I'd learn because I'm I'm a lifelong learner I I find something to learn every day.

SPEAKER_01 23:14

That's great.

SPEAKER_04 23:15

Yeah. But at the same time I said I could be teaching I could be where I want to help people you know and I know I could be helped whatever institution I went to but I could be here helping people from Winchester Kentucky you know or you know Ashland Kentucky or Viper Kentucky Viper has a stop sign. And it's small. So I wanted to you know write a kind of a I have a book that I've never published and I give it to people and it really is something that I would have loved to have when I was not taking lessons because I didn't know how the trumpet worked I just was lucky and I kind of sounded okay on it you know yeah and so if you lived in Viper Kentucky I'll send you this book you'd get a good start. Yeah like I say if if you if you have access to a teacher do everything you can to get with that teacher there's some people that are the greatest beginner teachers in the country I can name four or five of them I would be doing a disservice to the others yeah and I'm not really that great at it but I can almost spotlight I say oh you studied with so and so how did you know that I said because I know the way they teach students I've those students before yeah you're lucky you studied with that person. And those people are everywhere like Rich Bird my student in Kentucky who taught Caleb Hudson he's a fantastic teacher you know I and he asked me well you need to teach this guy he's really good and I said no I don't fantastic with you and it's probably gonna be one of the best students you've ever will have in your life yeah I said I have had a fair amount of really extraordinary students like you I said and you know enjoy it. Yeah that's another part that's when you learn the most when it's not about you it's about helping people be an asset to your community you know then I went back to Eastman and I came back but I had all these things the library I I I spent time in the library because I knew nothing. You know I listened to records you know and a joke at Eastman used to be hey guess what I found a record that you hadn't signed out in the library about you know trumpet mostly trumpet records because that's that was my teacher that would always been my teacher and luckily the beginning of the card catalog which most people don't know what it is anymore the card catalog was listed it started in A one of the first trumpet players that I heard that I thought was fantastic was Maurice Andre. I bought every recording I went to Canada on weekends from Eastman get all the imported records from France and Russia and we'd make a trip we oh all of us was great on a Sunday this record store was open it was called Sam the Record Man and it was in Toronto and it was that's about a four hour drive so we would drive to Toronto really early on Sunday and get breakfast and stuff when we got there or lunch whenever we work and then we'd go in there and just annihilate whatever money we had spending buying records and well why don't you buy that one and then we'll trade in a while so that we can you know listen to more records and stuff. Yeah you know and that's that's a a a thing we it was sort of a substitute for not having iPods. Yeah all those things are so important the library I mean when I went back as a grad student I went to the library gosh every day and I would go to the trumpet section I think the number was like 259 I can't I can't remember now because my my trumpet library is as big as the one at Eastman almost that's incredible. Yeah but I but I would go there and I'd take something out and look at it I go oh this is this looks really good I don't know what this is then I go find a recording of it I say oh boy this is hard well I'm gonna bring this to my lesson and that's when my teacher would humor me you know yeah also I also copied a lot of music that was in the public domain buy music I spent all my extra money whatever there was in the music store across from Eastman School of Music was called the music lovers shop they were a typical you know like a town music store only they were right across the street from Eastman so they had like rudels of every kind of sheet music oh yeah buy something every week what I couldn't buy because it wasn't in print I'd I'd copy at the Eastman Library because you could copy public just like you can now with the slip you know the uh press on the yeah and I still use the Petrucci thing every week here.

SPEAKER_01 27:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 27:53

Searching cornet solos things from the 19th century uh music print that deserves to be uh taught and used and recitals and things today it's it's a little different. I I find that the learning even though there's access to everything in the world most people come out of college knowing less uh like of specific solos and things you know trying to get people to expand what they teach basically because they haven't had access to a lot of this music that their teachers knew and now they might not know it because they hadn't covered that when they're at school.

SPEAKER_01 28:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 28:31

Trying to fill in the blanks for me too. Yeah so I I think you know get my master's later helped and then I I just kept at it you know yeah and that that's man I have so many questions this is great.

SPEAKER_01 28:43

I love it. So when uh so you said that the University of Kentucky before they could offer you 10 that you needed a master's and went back and got that. Yeah I was gonna ask about that because it seems like it's the tide the it's just changed the tides of tides have turned where yeah you need a doctorate pretty much to get a f a full time gig anywhere and more and more students are graduating with doctorates and there's less and less jobs available it seems what are your thoughts on that should musicians be going for doctorate degrees should they be doing other things just that whole thing you know that helps you get at least an adjunct job you know what I mean if you're a symphony player and you're gonna put all your marbles in in the same place you you don't have to get a doctorate you don't even have to get a master's yeah you could teach if you're Mike Sachs and let's say he didn't have any degrees he's the principal trumpet in the Cleveland orchestra and when you hear him play you want to study with that person.

SPEAKER_04 29:44

Yeah yep so they don't need that degree because they have what what's called in the academic jargon or equivalent. Mm-hmm yeah equivalent is like you play first trumpet in the New York Philomonic you're in Dubuque Symphony and it's a rather big orchestra you know if you're playing in a really small orchestra unless there's nobody available geographically it's harder to get an adjunct job without you know some pedigree degree yeah so so but but that doesn't mean that you should do any of those things because I mean I I always suggest that you get a degree no matter how well you play trumpet. Even my student that taught Caleb Hudson he wanted to get his DMA and I said well I said you know he says well don't you think I'm good enough I said well no you're more than good enough I said but you you know you have a family um and you want to get a job right away my job is to advise you what is the best route for you to take or at least another possible route I will gladly take you as a DMA student but I suggest what else what else do you like? Well I kind of like composition a little bit in theory I love theory. Okay well why don't you get a PhD in theory? You're gonna have the same trumpet teacher here that's me you like that I have a degree in theory and every college who has any music program at all needs an academic theory teacher or andor history teacher somebody to direct the choir somebody to you know run a sports band whatever I said and there's maybe only five or six trumpet jobs in the country open a year and there's probably 50 of those other jobs open and you yeah and if you send a recording to this academic and and people say yeah but they don't ask for a recording they don't want to hear me play I said no I know that but somebody on that committee will listen to it because it's there. And when they hear you play they're gonna say well we don't have to hire an ad job this person is more qualified than the last person we had you see what I mean so then you've qualified yourself and you still can get a a permanent trumpet job once you've been teaching in a college or university for a fairly you know three or four years then the reverse happens. Wow she can really play the trumpet this is fantastic and she has a PhD in music theory so they're thinking they can help with the theory too yeah yeah yeah yeah and then it it creates an and also even let's say you get a job as a music educator I have a music ed degree I don't have an applied degree you know except the jazz one is I guess an applied degree yeah I always wanted to teach so it could be that you you have a teaching job so what else could you do? Well you can play in all kinds of ensembles in your area you can play weddings you can play funerals you get in a cover band you can play in the local orchestra in the town band like I did for 25 years or or more in Danville Kentucky and who sat next to me in the town band Gabriel Di Martino and he teaches at East Carolina University okay Caleb Hudson sat next to me in the town band he played his first solo with the advocate brass band in Danville Kentucky okay so you can you can be an asset to your community you can give lessons to people in an area that maybe a teacher wasn't accessible. Like you know so see there's so many ways to put together a really meaningful career. Yeah you know you're not a you know I I always tell students you don't have to be a professional trumpet player to play professionally at a very high level run across people in the most unlikely places I go here in in Tampa Florida right there's a guy he plays all the solos like Wayne Bergeron plays on his trumpet and I say well wow who you play with well I I just play for fun and uh I manage uh 62 branches of the OZK Bank and you hear this guy play you don't you don't think that when you hear that yeah people here too I mean I played with people in Rochester New York when I was a student that they played fantastic because I always played outside the school a lot because I had experiences like that most of the students that came to Eastern had more orchestra experience and some jazz maybe a little jazz yeah I got involved with the local people and there was some really fantastic players one one guy he was on the original Xerox design team that's crazy I learned a lot from this guy playing in a section with him they made me play first trumpet I said I can't do that I've never played in a show before all kinds of things so that I was learning I was happy yeah and so so you know your life doesn't have to be a ladder people think that's some some ladder and I mean you know some of the jobs that are are not very glorious being in New York City and Los Angeles you know you might play you know do the same thing all week playing trumpet and I really don't like doing that I never did I like playing live music too all the time yeah some of the some of the Broadway show players are fantastic but they go out and play other things yeah if they're able to send a sub they they get a chance to play something with a bunch of their friends that they haven't seen in a fairly long time maybe sometimes because they're both playing shows and playing shows is not an easy thing. Yeah oh yeah shows the week really challenging book I mean you you you gotta be on it all every night yeah so so you know that's a that's a different kind of frightening it's a great job too yeah if that's the environment you re you want you know that's your dream job yeah you then you're happy I mean I've I've gone to a lot of shows and just sat in the pit and listened to my friends play and or when they're playing it's alive. Yeah yeah and I go boy I don't know if I could do this times a week or but but you're in a great place and so there are lots of different perspectives that you know that that make up this puzzle that is your life. Yeah family you know that was another thing I never really wanted to be away long. I didn't like traveling on a bus. I still don't like you know flying places a lot. Matter of fact this last few weeks you know I've been in Utah Birmingham Alabama I've been down to Naples which is about two hours from here I did a recording I did a live TV kind of thing there. And you know for me that's like now I'm you know 77 I'm going I think you took on too much you know yeah yeah because yeah because I would get a little tired which I normally didn't I just keep going you know now I'm down here and I do a lot of things still up yesterday I played in an assisted care place with a fantastic piano player which I volunteered to do because he's a fantastic piano player.

SPEAKER_01 36:59

Yeah that's great.

SPEAKER_04 37:01

Been in assisted care places because family members have been there and I know how to do things in there and I I stayed afterwards and and talked to the pianist a little bit and then I talked to the people there. We have a lot of things in common. Yeah I that was a a day well spent yeah well spent than somebody coming and saying well I really didn't have time to practice and this attitude is really and that I'm going well what do you want me to do about that? I can't nothing I can do about that. Yeah I spent an I spent an hour with some older people just a little bit older than me but you know that's really important. I spend time at the hospital that I've been going to for four years down here you know for a cancer treatment and I'm doing great but I love going there. I play in the hospital band that's a big part of what I do. I love it. It has tremendous value. Spend time doing things that have value if if trumpet is the only thing that has value to you and then you can't do it anymore what are you gonna do? Well you hopefully you'll try to find something that has some value. Helping people always is a has great value. Yeah you can find yourself involved in things like that. So going back to the the perspective that you developed that has to be important. So your family your job so to speak mine has never been a job it's been something I love to do every day. Yeah and being an asset to your community you know like I say I play funerals in Danville Kentucky and people come up and say you know this is one of the toughest days in my life but you made it so beautiful you played that what was that you played oh I said that was written by a Norwegian fellow and I heard it when I was in Norway and I brought it back to the US and I tell everybody about it. It's it so emotionally gets you you know and and yeah so beautiful and and so I think that's one of our responsibilities too is to to make the world better in some small way. You don't have to you don't have to be on TV to do that.

SPEAKER_01 39:00

Yeah yeah that's true.

SPEAKER_04 39:02

If you touch one person that's as successful as reaching a million yeah you know in a sense because you're working one to one you know or or more yeah that's beautiful I mean when I go play I love playing for audiences. It doesn't matter if it's two people or one it's five thousand or football halftime show you play for eighty thousand you know you know it's an interaction of some sort and people don't have to have music training to love what you're doing. My mom never had any music training and she would always pick out the places that I felt were the most emotional places. She could feel it and p everybody can feel it. Yeah they always say I don't know a lot about music I said well you came to the concert didn't you I said you know all you need to know it how it you get in how it gets involved with you and how it matches to your everyday life. Yeah of your everyday life that's what music does yeah you know it gets more excited less excited or stays the same that's what I understood that's the only reason I can play this formula you know it's it's just a very simple approach to music. Now that doesn't mean it's easy. Sure yeah you see a craftsman they they sculpt something and all I see is a big rock at first but they don't see that yeah see the sculpture inside the rock and when we practice that's what we're seeing if you if you only see the rock and say boy it's hard to do something with this rock well that's not gonna make it yeah so and the and the the the performers that are successful and like I say they're not all they're just people that play professionally not professional musicians sometimes yeah they can do it just as well yeah so so putting that in perspective for your individual self do not feel that you're a failure because you haven't climbed this public ladder of adulation I mean I'm happy I can walk down the street and nobody knows who I am yeah that's that's an important thing in life is anonymity when you want it. Yeah you know so so and also being recognized as an asset to your community that's when I I don't mind being known. Yeah yeah the other day I was at the community band rehearsal and I played two solos Sunday with a wonderful community band in Naples and uh they said no no no you don't don't move all those chairs and stands I said well I got here early I warmed up what do you want me to do watch you do it I don't want to watch anybody work if I'm standing here I've seen too many people do that haven't you you know they asked well I got something I have to do you know they don't want to move the chairs and stands well nobody's yeah in my estimation I I think you you you have value when you become an asset to that immediate need yeah there's three people trying to move 75 chairs and stands well I only have to move 25 a piece of cake yeah much easier it's it's what I want to do you know I I I and then I feel when I start playing I feel great. Which what band directors do anyway we move chairs and stands and then we get back to other things that we like even more.

SPEAKER_01 42:18

Yeah I love it. More questions let's see so so one of the so I kind of going back to what you said about like you know we don't need to there's not like a always like one ladder for everybody to go to I love what like how you were approaching with Caleb Caleb Hudson's approach of like well you like theory okay well do that you know like what are some teacher it was his teacher it was his teacher oh his teacher okay that makes sense there we go what other instances or how how can young trumpet players think creatively like that because I think in a lot of instances it's I just want to play I just want to play and it's like okay well that's great and well here's how you can play but at a certain point then if you want to have a family that's another thing you have to factor in or if you don't like this part of the business like you have to factor that in but in addition to like the feel like playing the music for the sake of the music and whatnot there's you know you still need to treat it like a business and still pay the bills at the end of the day. And so thinking about kind of like that side what are some other recommendations you have for young players to think about consider and do to be successful paying the bills and providing for their families in addition to doing it for the love of of the music?

SPEAKER_04 43:33

Well I I think the most important thing is to be alert watch what people are doing watch their notice notice their love of what they're doing. And if you like that well you can get involved in that you still can practice I mean anybody who practices an hour or so a day can play at a fairly high level after they've had a concentrated period where they might do more than that. Sure okay yeah I was in junior high school more than an hour a day but I I don't think that That's absolutely necessary to have a positive career, uh, whether it's your first thing that you do or your fifth thing in music.

SPEAKER_01 44:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 44:10

Play and then volunteer, find out what you like. If you always say, I think I might like to be a player, and then you go into it and you find out you don't like it. Volunteer. I volunteered. I mean, I played I played funerals when I was in high school. My dad was in the American Legion, and I played a little band that we would go around to, veterans' homes and uh different types of hospitals, you know. I did that. And I also volunteered to play in local community bands. Once I could I I was a bad reader when I started because I spent all my time, most of my time just you know listening and playing along with recordings. I I figured it out after a while, you know. I figured out I needed to learn how to read. And then, you know, if you see people playing soccer, go play soccer. Yeah, yeah, because you don't ever know, you have to develop a broad diversity of things to make choices about all of the things you've experienced. If you only experience the one thing and it doesn't work out early on, well then you then you're usually end up. I don't know if I want to go to college or I'm just gonna get a job doing this, and every job you can do it professionally. I've seen plumbers that are unbelievable, and I've met other ones that even don't can't figure out how to put the pipe together. Yeah, I mean, there's professionalism in every job, and if a job you can be professional in, and that like I say, it it cutting lawns is professional. Don't think I'm thinking about some high-falutin executive job or something, you know. Yeah, yeah, like I thought I was gonna be. I told my mom, I said, No, I don't want to do that. I I just wanna I just want to go in into music because you know when I was away I didn't get a play. She's okay. And I said, You're not upset that I'm not gonna be a dentist or a doctor? No, why not? She's well, everything you do you approach with tremendous intensity, and that's gonna make you successful. I said, Yeah, okay, you can tell that I'm not gonna be a doctor. I mean, I I was worried, yeah. But my mom had it, she was very practical in how she did everything. Yeah, very good at it, very good at everything. Yeah, you know, and she never really finished high school, my both my parents, but I learned a tremendous amount because of the work ethic. Yeah, there's no substitute for work ethic.

SPEAKER_01 46:26

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 46:28

I delivered newspapers, you know. I I was in the mailman one summer. I I mean I'd always had some sort of job, so I even think that people shouldn't go right to college myself, you know. Where I was in out there in Utah, yeah. Everybody before they go to uh BYU, they they do some sort of mission. Whether it's just you know, so they're varying degrees, some of them are not totally religious missions, they're yeah, yeah. And I said, I've always said that. I said you should get a job in an area that you think you might like. And if it's in music, great. If it's not, okay, well, find something you do like doing. When you do go to school, you're gonna have a much better perspective on what you think you'd really like to do, or the combination, you know, permutations and just going for this degree, and you know, you're a junior, all of a sudden you realize that wow, I don't know if I can do this, you know. Yeah, because you haven't you never were really that committed necessarily, or you were having issues doing it, and it was too difficult, or whatever. You know, I don't I don't ever regret people trying to do what they want to do, but there comes a time when you have to do have to make a decision earlier or later. So so the more you know before you go to college, the better. Yeah, you'll have a you know a perspective that isn't necessarily all or none, you know.

SPEAKER_01 47:51

Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_04 47:53

So you know, I I'm looking back, I mean, I never I was so naive, I never thought I would be a failure. I wasn't arrogant or anything, I was clueless, you know. I never thought about, you know, people thought I was a good student, people thought this, they thought that. I said, Well, I'm not I'm not that worried, but I don't still don't really know exactly what I'm gonna do. Yeah. And the future, the future of the music and trumpet. If you know a lot about music and you can't play the trumpet, that's all you can play. Well, you're not gonna participate in it. But if you practice your trumpet and you play as many different types of music as you can, you don't have to know what music's gonna be important in 20 years. Yeah, you'll be able to participate because your trumpet is ready to participate.

SPEAKER_01 48:36

Yeah, yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_04 48:38

I always had two sessions a day when I practiced, and they both are related. Timothy Doch Schützer said in some of the A2s he wrote and I he said, You can't practice music without practicing technique. You can't practice technique without practicing music. Constantly work together, and eventually the music is more prominent all the time in your head. Yeah, all the rest goes in the background to some degree.

SPEAKER_01 49:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:03

Then you gotta kind of push away a little bit, do the music, do the uh the technique to get the music to be right, and then you put it back together and you're probably back where you were.

SPEAKER_01 49:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:14

In a lot of cases, that's what people call genius. I believe that yeah, yeah, made it to that category myself, but a lot of the people I know, like Caleb Hudson, Terry Everson, you know, I I can name people Alpha Zutti, Jeff Tizek, friends that I've had. Yeah, they they have a way of working that is super efficient.

SPEAKER_01 49:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:38

And their growth is unbelievably fast. So I've gotten older. I've you know, it they always say it's good if you start young. Well, it's true. I started later than they did. So I don't think I'll ever reach that kind of a thing, and I don't need to.

SPEAKER_01 49:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:53

Perspective is where I'd like it to be.

SPEAKER_01 49:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:56

I you know, I I I I like doing so many things and different kinds of music. If you play one kind of music and you concentrate it on your whole life, you're gonna be really, really good at that. You know, yeah. Playing 20 types of music, you're gonna be competent at most of.

SPEAKER_01 50:10

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 50:11

You know, and you'll still play the trumpet really well because you're using it to do any or all of them.

SPEAKER_01 50:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 50:17

So that's where the trumpet becomes really essential. You know, if you have one tool in your in your it better be a tool that can fix everything.

SPEAKER_01 50:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 50:27

You know, that's but that's still playing the same thing. And so you have to have that multi, you know, that what do they call those tools? Multi-purpose tools.

SPEAKER_01 50:36

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 50:37

Do the job if you're only going to carry that one, you know, tool. So I I think you know, that's a pretty simple way to look at something that isn't simple to do is create a wonderful, meaningful life for your your family and yourself and your friends and your students and every person you have contact with.

SPEAKER_01 50:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 50:56

I I when I was younger, I was a lot more negative, you know. I only have a few people I really don't want to be around. And most of them is because they're so negative or they're they're arrogant, you know.

SPEAKER_01 51:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 51:09

Why would you want to be around a person like that?

SPEAKER_01 51:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 51:13

What purpose could that serve except making you unhappy? So I just ignore Yeah. I don't I don't uh not give them if they ask for something, I'm happy to give it to them. I'm not gonna spend a lot of time with those people.

SPEAKER_01 51:25

Yeah, yeah. That for sure.

SPEAKER_04 51:27

That well, I've chosen to work for them and will do everything in my power to do the best job I can.

SPEAKER_01 51:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 51:33

And then I can choose never to work for them again.

SPEAKER_01 51:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 51:37

You know, you have to make it easy. Yeah. So so you know, y we all can't be positive all the time, but it's good to spend most of your time being positive and being around people that care about other people and are positive thinkers and workers.

SPEAKER_01 51:52

Yeah, that's it's true. I th I and I could tell that that's you from uh from the concert uh at uh BYU. I was like, you're walking out and you're just just having fun. I'm like, these he's just loving it up there. I was like, this is great. I get I can tell.

SPEAKER_04 52:06

That the audience appreciated a lot because most audiences are good, but they were extraordinary.

SPEAKER_01 52:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 52:13

Right away, I said, gosh, I didn't think I played that well. I mean, I was good, but you know I I was you know I was shocked, and they were just great. Of course, the band was really great. Yeah, positive energy and playing in a beautiful building with an organ that cost millions of dollars, and yeah. It was just remarkable. You know, it was a remarkable experience. The kind of experience you can have in your own town.

SPEAKER_01 52:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 52:42

BYU. In the smallest church, playing a little recital, playing the church service, you know, like I said, it that's the same um a microcosm of the same thing.

SPEAKER_01 52:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 52:54

You know, it's important because you can do it. You might be the only trumpet player within 50 miles that can play taps.

SPEAKER_01 53:00

Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_04 53:02

So you've uh satisfied the same need that uh John F. Kennedy Jr.'s funeral did. You could be the you could be the same person.

SPEAKER_01 53:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 53:14

So it it isn't any less important.

SPEAKER_01 53:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 53:17

And that's another thing about performing. It it's important, but it isn't more important than the giving. And when you when you decided you're giving and you're not so worried about playing, you play better, you know?

SPEAKER_01 53:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 53:30

I used to get so nervous, I I could barely play when I was really young. And then one day I just said, Well, you're gonna have to figure out how to do this. So I'm solos. That's something I would suggest to everyone. Play something for somebody every week. So it's not just to everybody you can play, it's to be able to play for people in a perspective that really allows you to be the person you are as a musician.

SPEAKER_01 53:52

Yeah, yeah, I love that. It's true. There's been times where I've taken different auditions and some I practice, but I didn't play in front of anybody, and I walk in and just fell on my face.

SPEAKER_04 54:02

You know, failures, you know, failure breeds success in a certain funny way. Yeah, you know, it's like it's like the trial and error method. Well, I don't think I'll try that again. You know what I mean? Meaning maybe my head was in the wrong place. So you you kind of put that way of thinking aside a little bit, and then you go, okay, well, how can I, you know, do this? So I like I said, I used to go up to the organ floor at Eastman. Had a whole floor of like, I don't even know, a dozen or so practice organs, and then they had a recital hall and all kinds of stuff. But the organists they played in churches, yeah. Wanted it all the way through. And so I'd go up to the organ floor, and I knew a few of them because they were friends. I'd say, Hey Brent, do you think you could play through this piece with me? I want to play it for my lesson, and I want to feel what the rest of it feels like, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 54:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 54:55

Then I then I know when to get more excited and less excited. I've heard it's a recording, but it's not live, it doesn't do it for me as much. So I go up there and then Brent would be playing his organ, you know, and he'd say, What are you doing on Sunday? Nothing. Well, why don't you come and we'll play this at church? It sounds good. And I'd go, and why I'd be really nervous. Well, you know, it's the hardest part is the whole sequence of events, like when you do a church service. You play the the uh what do you call it? The prelude, and uh that's not too bad. Then you sit there for 20 minutes, then you have to do the offitory noise. Waiting to think about, you know, my lift feels terrible. I played with a Latin band last night at two o'clock in the morning, and now it's eight o'clock, and I'm playing Prayer to St. Gregory.

unknown 55:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 55:45

Home notes, you know, nothing real high, nothing real. It's hard when you, you know, you get in the middle and you're waiting, and yeah, and but you get used to that. And you it got easier too because they in they invented whisper mutes. I used to use a harmon mute with a little piece of paper stuck in it so it didn't make too much noise at all. But it didn't, you know, it didn't work that well. Yeah. And that was great because I could play along with the obos in a in an orchestra when I had to play the trumpet chelsea. Great. My picklow trumpet with a whisper mute, and then I'm kind of warmed up and I got the pitches in my mind, and everything. So, you know, you just get better and better. If you don't get it because the experience was, you know, frightening, let's say.

SPEAKER_01 56:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 56:32

You can't just sit home and play. I mean, what do you do with it?

SPEAKER_01 56:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 56:37

Oh, I played so much better in the practice room. Well, yeah, but they don't hear you in the practice room.

SPEAKER_01 56:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 56:42

Maybe your friends do, you know. But so so I started to do most these volunteer things a lot.

SPEAKER_01 56:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 56:50

Of course, volunteering, I still volunteer more than I'm paid. I know that's hard to believe, but at at this age too, especially because I don't have to work as much, you know, to all I I'm retired. Yeah, but the rich the the joy that you get out of just doing it. So if you play a a solo, so to speak, whether it's just the hymns at a church or you're playing for the you know, the Kiwanas Club or the Rotary Club, whatever, it it doesn't matter. You're playing in front of people, you're learning to to do the sequence of events. Yeah, play something, sit down, have to wait, maybe play a little something else, play the people out. Okay, that was a lot better than last time I did it.

SPEAKER_01 57:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 57:34

Then you can evaluate it afterwards, but you gotta do it in order to evaluate.

SPEAKER_01 57:38

You don't want to say, Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_04 57:40

Like last time, so I'm not gonna do it. Then you're anytime everybody asks you to play, you're always gonna be nervous. Yeah, also being nervous is sometimes also related to your lack of success in the practice room. And then you're getting up to that place where it's hard, and you know what I mean? You're going, Oh gosh, I've the last three times I missed that high B flat, and I don't want to miss it. Oh god, I missed it again, you know.

SPEAKER_01 58:05

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 58:06

Yeah, you see, you kind of talk yourself out of it almost, you know?

SPEAKER_01 58:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 58:10

And I don't know if you if you play my my piano teacher, who I was really bad at piano when I was terrible. I don't know how they stood me, but he's I play and I go, Oh man, like you know, my left hand, my it I'm always holding a trumpet all day, and it always doesn't feel good when I play. She says, Well, Vince, now have you done it a hundred times? And I'd always go, No. She says, Well, then you shouldn't expect to do it well. I'm holding the trumpet, but I'm not good. She says, Well, you need to do it more. So I practiced the left hand alone, and I did get better. I didn't practice as much as I did trumpet, but it but I, you know, I got a little better.

SPEAKER_01 58:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 58:50

I think that's a a a fair thing for for the for that more emotional practice that you have to do to get on the stage. Or you can be like a lot of people and spent your whole life there since you were a kid.

SPEAKER_01 59:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 59:03

And some people do that. You know, I I did in a sense, but they were more functional things. And once I got to Eastman, I almost developed stage fright there because I never was nervous playing at all. Just they were, you know, I was at Eastman, and man, all these people have much more experience than me. He studied with Vacchiano, he studied with Phil Smith, or this guy studied with oh my gosh, you know. Yeah. They sounded appropriate, you know, because they had experience. And I, like I said, I didn't even know what a C trumpet was, so I was definitely at a disadvantage. So, but that's okay.

SPEAKER_01 59:39

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 59:40

I I pursued a path to learn those things because I'm devoid of experience, you know.

unknown 59:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 59:47

Except in certain perspectives. Yeah. You just get back on the horse, you know. You don't once you you're trying to learn a bicycle, you don't say, Wow, I fell off, I'm not gonna do this. No, you fall off like another 50 times before you even get a decent run, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:05

Yeah, oh yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:06

In the meantime, you got bandages all over yourself, you know, and hopefully you won't fall off as much now.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:12

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:13

That's all, you know. So it's a little, you know, matter-of-fact in some ways that you need to do these things.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:19

I have a couple a couple other questions. Number one, something that's been more prevalent for me, uh talking with so many people is like, you know, the history of trumpet players and learning who came before and the importance of you know, these names and stuff. Who are some of your early influences, some of your favorite players to listen to, regardless of genre?

SPEAKER_04 1:00:39

Well, it starts with some of the local people. There was a band uh in Lindenhurst, New York, which was the next town over from West Babylon, and there was a trumpet player named Warren Torrens, and he was a high school student at the time, and I was like younger, you know, I was in an eighth or ninth grade, ninth grade, I think. And I heard him play, and gosh, he had the most beautiful sound, you know. And many years later, I met him in. He was one of my students, he was the one of the teachers in the school district he was teaching it.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:13

Interesting.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:14

I said, Is that the Warren Torrance that was in Lindenhurst, New York? Yeah, oh yeah, he was from out in Long Island somewhere. I said, Oh my gosh. I said, You tell him. And actually, before I saw him in a you know, like a a a call. I met him on a phone call, but I meet him, I didn't get to meet him before he passed away. That was a shame because you know, he said, You remember that? I said, No, I I remember your sounds. And I said, You played Man and Veen. How did you remember that? I said, Our minds are really interesting things. They remember things that were so you know engaging, you know?

SPEAKER_01 1:01:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:51

Things, all of that stuff. And I said, I remember and I still could sing the soul, and I played it later on, you know, when wind ensembles. Yeah. You know, of course I went to uh I listened to all the records, like I say, Rafael Mendez, Vayner Ferguson, you know, Doc Sevinson, my main really influence. That's how I really started to play all those crazy solos by Fisher Tull and John Mars Chants and Virgil Macarena and all the you know old favorites.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:25

I just listened to him. I got every record that he almost every record that I know he made.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:31

And I listened to those records. I just listened yesterday to Rhapsody for Then. You know that?

SPEAKER_01 1:02:38

I don't know that one actually.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:40

It's uh it's called the record, I think it's called Rhapsody for Now, I think it is. And it's like a medley of there's Rhapsody for Then and Rhapsody for Now is on there and a couple of other, you know, kind of tunes, much dated stuff, but he his tone is so gorgeous, so beautiful. And it's in other words, it was something that was close to me as a listener. He was playing for me, so to speak. So he's one of my main, and of course, you know, all the really great orchestra players like Bud Hurst had.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:08

And and you know, anybody that sounds really good. Yeah, you know, Mel Broyles, Gil Gil Johnson. Matter of fact, I I did a masterclass once in a real dark church, and you know, it was we were just up in the front, and uh there wasn't anybody else in the church but maybe 10 or 15 trumpets and me and the teacher. Yeah. Talking about, I said, you have to have some imagery. I said, like for instance, I said, Yeah, you just you just played the pines of Rome solo. For the pines of Rome, I said, I have an image for that. I'd say I hear this trumpet off in the distance, and he has a tone that almost sounds like his instrument is made out of wood. Gilbert Johnson in the Philadelphia Orchestra. And well, after the master class was over, this guy walked up the aisle and it was Gilbert Johnson. Oh, wow. And I was in Miami and he was already teaching Miami, and I, you know, I wasn't thinking about that at all.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:01

But somebody had invited him, and he was way in the back in the dark. He was probably didn't want to make me nervous. I said, Oh my gosh, I said, if I would have known you were here, I would have really been nervous. No, he says, I thank you so much for mentioning that. He says, That's one of my favorites as well. And you know, his it's that strong when you have that strong, good alive concerts, you know. Yeah, all those people, Tom Stevens, you know, Los Angeles Philharmonic. Now it's John Luton is a fantastic player, and when he was in the Marine Band, John Hagstrom was in the marine band. They, you know, yeah, yeah, there's just so many people to listen to.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:43

All good examples. Charlie Schnuder, I listened to him play in the in the Boston Symphony when I was teaching at Tanglewood. I just go lay out on the lawn in the rehearsals and they Shostakovich Fifth Symphony for you know, I go, Oh my gosh, listen to that sound.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:02

He's another one of my very favorites, Roger Boisanne. I mean, and the list goes on and on. I mean, I I can't even name all of them.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:11

But but but their their sound lives inside you, and so then the the synthesis of so many sounds comes up with something else. Yeah. That is very special to you. And you know, somebody you could say, well, it has too much vibrato, it's too this, it's too that, but that's all right. It's just me. That's all.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:32

I don't I don't dislike the way I sound. Sometimes I listen, I say, Well, that was a lot of vibrato, you know, say to me. Yeah, because because uh I thought maybe maybe I just didn't hear it right or something, you know. So so it it once again it's a it's a matter of having something that you can do for your whole life.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:51

Listen, learn, and improve.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:53

Yeah. I love it. You've mentioned some players that I'm like, haven't heard that name and I'm like, okay, I gotta come back and And go back and and start start looking at the those people. And learn, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:04

I go to conference, I'm going to the ITG.

unknown 1:06:07

Yep, me too.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:08

School of Music at the end of the month.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:10

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:12

And I'm going to play a little bit, and I'm going to see a lot of students that I've taught. I'm going to see a lot of people I'd love to hear play live, and I will. And I'm going to learn a lot. I'm going to go to events.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:27

ITG, ITG and NTC are two of the most important trumpet events. And also the Historic Press Society. I love that. I did it this year in France. I learned so much because I'm kind of a relative novice in playing like Baroque trumpet and stuff like that. But I do. I matter of fact, right here. Right here is my 1740 instrument, you know. And I'm learning to play it. The slide trumpet. That's a slide trumpet and made by a William Harris in 1740. And then I have another one that's from 1850. Wow. One that's uh let's see. Uh I have a reproduction one that John Foster made. He's a fantastic baroque trumpet player in in uh Australia. And uh Caleb Hudson has uh a horn too that I gave him. It's it was one of Crispy and Steele Perkins's slide trumpets. That's so cool. So player one of the guys that started doing slide trumpet, especially and baroque trumpet.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:27

So, you know, there's so many so many, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:31

Can't even Dave Hickman. Dave Hickman spent most of his time teaching and performing as a soloist. Wow's Lindemann.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:39

Jose Cibaja. There's all these young, young players, you know, Brandon Ridnow and of course Caleb Hudson. You know, you just go on and on.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:51

And and hearing young people play is is really makes me feel energized.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:58

You you know, you're part of a heritage that just keeps getting better.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:04

Young performers today are extraordinary.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:07

Yeah, they are, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:08

We you know, like I say, it's not because you know, Maurice Andre was I still think he's you know the top of his game, always he was. And but it there's so many more influences because we have so much access to the whole world. The whole world world of players, the whole world of uh composition, orchestras, bands, jazz bands, Latin bands, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:31

Everything. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:32

New Orleans bands. I mean, it just keep going, brass quintets. I I love all that.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:37

Yeah, it's it's so I remember first getting hearing Tower of Power. What's this? And or uh any of the like the soul rebels and different things from like the New Orleans brass bandomite. This whoa, it's just world-changing for for me when I was young. I was like, this is incredible.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:55

Well, all the players, you know, everybody was once that young, they understand the trip that we're on, a lifelong trip, and uh we all become much more useful as we get older.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:08

Remember, people would say, Oh, I want to take some lessons with you. I go, Well, okay, but like I'm 23. I mean, you're like 20. I said, I know I barely know as much as you do. And they go, What do you mean? I said, Well, just think about somebody like Roger Boisane. He was, you know, seemingly a really good player. But as far as my teaching, I mean, I haven't been teaching that long. Now, if you study with somebody that sort of plays better than I do at my age, that was better when they were young, and they have 30, 40 years teaching experience. Now that's somebody you want to study with.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:44

They have the they have the physical thing that everybody seems to think is important, but they're no, I was never really a catalytic, I don't think, when I first started teaching. I was trying to figure out if I was doing the right thing, teaching, teaching them the right stuff, because I said, Well, this sort of worked for me. I, you know, I don't know. And then I had Amanda Gotala, was the very first guest I had in a summer four-day institute. I said, Well, I'm gonna find out if I've been teaching right, because he's gonna list to all my students. And I invited actually I invited all the teachers from the state of Kentucky to send tapes in of their students, and this way they didn't have to pick the student that got to play or more students that got to play. So I did like a blind test and I picked students out, and then they though those students came and they got to play for Gitala too, because I said, Well, he might never get back to the state of Kentucky, and all these other people won't get a chance. So I wanted to make sure other people had a chance. So, but of course, my students go, Wow, heck, I hope he doesn't say I taught him bad or something. I noticed all the things he was talking about that I had sort of an inkling about them, you know what I mean? Teaching some of those things, and and it solidified my thoughts about teaching. That's why it's really important for teachers to watch master teachers. I wasn't a master teacher when I started. I was a master teacher. You know, because I I had some things that I had some good ideas, but you know, I didn't really have any methodology. That's when I started to put together this like method book that I use for teaching that I used. That's a very disciplined, challenging way of developing because you have to be disciplined or you can't complete this stuff in two weeks. You only have two weeks, then you get a grade and it's over.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:29

Oh man.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:30

And people go, Well, yeah, but what if they have problems? You can play this stuff with if you have problems. It's all technical stuff. How do you play a mixed meter? How do you do this? How do you do this? How do you work on your objecture? How do you do this? But you can't just sit there and work on your omisure because it isn't working, come in every week and just do the same thing. You have no knowledge. Yeah, knowledge, you have frustration every week. No, you're teaching other things at the same time. Yeah, working on their objecture every week. I might say, Well, this is gonna help you. See, I mean, so you you know, I think that's the way to go.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:06

Last quick question Is there anything you know now that you wish you knew when you were younger?

SPEAKER_04 1:12:11

Yeah, you know, a lot more about the music itself, like I say, the listening aspect. My listening was very narrow, it was trumpet, trumpet, trumpet, you know, and I I would study stuff and I'd listen, I go, how come there's no trumpet in that? You know, I was just where yeah. I mean, I listened, you know, like when I was working, I listened to classical music, I listened to jazz music, and uh that was about it. And I I I listened to rock and roll when I was a kid, it was really good for me actually because I could identify the chords and things, yeah. And I said, Well, this there's some notes that stay the same in chords, so listening, and if you can sing in a choir, sing in a choir. Because trumpet is not something you read music, there's no such thing as reading music. That's a misnomer, it's reading sound. See, when I played jazz, sometimes I would sound pretty good, you know, for a young guy.

unknown 1:13:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:11

Classical music, it was like, okay, I gotta get this C. And so I would see a note, and that doesn't trigger your body to do what it takes to play C.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:22

Hit and miss a lot more. So basically, you have to be able to look at those notes and sing them in your head.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:29

And that's what triggers the instrument to play the right things. I mean, I can look at a piano and go, and the note's gonna come out, it's gonna be already strung up and you know, in tune, and yeah, is your your ear. It has to tune the the instrument and it has to be able to be able to uh manipulate to the it's like a golfer who uses knows when to use certain clubs.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:51

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:52

If you're using one club to hit everything, well, you're not gonna, you're not gonna go nowhere.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:59

Physically your face is gonna fall off, you know. So basically, using my my choir, the lady that taught me music theory, my high school choir teacher, she said, you know, I really could use some tanners in the choir. Would you like to sing in choir? I said, No, I won't I don't want to sing in a choir. She goes, Would you like to pass music theory? I go, I'd love to sing in your choir.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:24

That was the best thing I ever did.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:27

I really wasn't a tenor, but she knew that I could read music at least.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:34

So I was stuck between the mezzo sopranos and the basses. Man, it was hard singing in there, you know, trying to fit your note in right.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:42

One of them was sharp and the other one was in tune. You you still can't fit your note in hardly, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:49

I learned how to sing more in tune, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:52

Because I because I picked my note out of the accompaniment, if there was one, and there's no substitute for that. Because when I when I play things now, I don't really even transpose. I do. But it's done by looking at the note. If I'm playing like an I'm playing it on C trumpet, I'm playing it on an E flat trumpet. It's you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:12

I'm I'm just playing a different trumpet and using playing the same pitch.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:16

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:17

And we we know that that's correct because do tuba players transpose? No. But they play four different tubas, they learn they drinks.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:27

I saw the tuba players doing that. I knew that I had to be even better at it. Because I used to transpose and I just get a headache. I go be going, see, that's a B, see, this is that, this is that, and but you know, I was lost already.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:42

Think about playing. Because then you're singing the song, see?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:48

When you're singing the song, your body's gonna respond to that if you practice enough A2's arpeggio scales, you know, and know the styles. It's so everything is simple. Yeah, it's not easy. It's simple, simple task. Yeah, not easy to do. Combine that into one being that functions as a unit, like a robot or something almost, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 1:16:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:13

You use a joystick to work the robot, yeah. Working ten different things you can't do it. Yeah, they they work the same way. Uh radio controlled airplanes, same thing. I had a a plane, you know, like one of those uh with an engine. Yeah, gas engine.

unknown 1:16:32

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:32

You could do it. It was on it was on strings, and you move this and it moved the uh the wing aileron lower, and that's all. And you you you go around in a circle.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:46

Yeah, I mean, really.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:50

Once they developed radio control, man, my friend has a radio control here down here in Florida. He has big ones outside the planes, and a radio control thing is unbelievable.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:05

I mean, it's it's fantastic.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:08

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:09

I think you know, the technology wise, we have to put that technology into our bodies.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:15

Create the remote control see that work.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:20

So to speak.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:21

Yeah, I love that. I'm gonna have to use that in my teaching. That's good. That's what you know.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:26

When you're done playing, you're done. When you're done teaching, the ideas that you give to other people go on for a hundred years or more.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:35

And that's important.

unknown 1:17:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:39

It becomes a terminal experience, so to speak. But teaching's not that at all. It's progressive and catalytic to those you pass it on to. When I see, like that's what I was talking about before, a little bit, seeing what young people are doing today. Wow, that's exciting because their teachers have passed on and they have taken those ideas and brought them to a higher level, even.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:01

Well, thank you so much, Vince. I really appreciate you taking some time to chat and everything. I will, I will. Thank you so much, and we'll uh talk again soon.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:10

Please, please do.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:12

All right, see ya.