Joe Alessi Master Class Quotes (Part 1 of 3)

Last week the principal trombonist of the New York Philharmonic, Joe Alessi, gave a fantastic master class at Towson University.  He is easily one of the best musicians I have ever had the privilege of working with and I learn something every time I hear him either perform or speak about music.

Check out this Joe Alessi interview I did with Lance LaDuke for The Brass Junkies.

I knew that I was going to get a lot of great material from a two and a half hour master class but the amount of information that I left with exceeded my very high expectations.  Joe is a rare person who is so highly accomplished on both the playing and teaching sides of our industry.

A special thank you to Craig Mulcahy for giving me the heads up about the class the day of and to the two students at George Mason who rescheduled their lessons so that I could make the trip up to Maryland.  I am very happy that I made it!

I was able to get so many great quotes from this class that I will post them in three parts over the course of the week.  I attempted to write them down verbatim but did not record the class so there unintentionally might be some slight variations to his wordings.  If there are any discrepancies it is his own fault because he kept making great points! I hope you enjoy these as much as I did.

Be sure to also check out Part 2 and Part 3.

• "I'm always trying to find new ways to do something."
   

• "Sometimes you revisit old concepts and change them slightly."
   

• "To play a brass instrument well is a very simple process.  To play one badly is very complicated."
   

• "Try to find a good model breath that has nothing to do with playing and instrument, like a sigh."
   

• "Take a breathing event that relaxes you and model your playing after that."
   

• "People often ask me for a quick fix on how to get better.  Here's one: anytime you pick up your instrument during the day, which should hopefully be 7 or 8 times a day, play one note that's the most beautiful note you can.  And not just a quarter note but three or four beats.  Then just clone it over and over."
   

• "The first 10 minutes you play in a day is how you play the rest of the day."
   

• "The more I play the more quickly I have discoveries about my playing."
   

• "A lot of practicing can be done away from the instrument."
   

• "You gotta be able to sing it and conduct it.  When you know how something is supposed to go, when you pick up your instrument, you can make that happen."
   

• "In high school I was a practice nut about fundamentals."
   

• "If something is simple and slow, I try to find something interesting about it."
   

• "When listening to entrance exams at Juilliard and the New York Phil I look for even playing and consist tone.  Consistent pitch and consistent rhythm."
   

• "Consistency is what you practice when you are in the practice room."
   

• "When playing orchestrally there is a certain way you have to play and that's to have an immediate attack."
   

• "An accent looks like a small diminuendo.  What you're playing is a reverse diminuendo."
   

• "You need to record everything you do."
   

• "You need to document everything you do and you need to listen to it.  I don't care if it's three notes.  Record it.  No, I'm serious."
   

• "If you play a jury, record it.  If you take an audition, ask the people if you can record it."

3 Great Master Classes Quotes I've Heard Recently

Every time I attend a master class I always have my laptop with me to take notes. I find that note taking is by far the best way for me to retain the information and retention is the first step in implementing it into my playing and teaching. I also attend as many master classes as I possibly can.  As with all of the people who I idolize in the music business, I try to never stop learning.  Hearing another professional's perspective on how they approach both the physical and mental aspects of music for an hour gives me a surge in productivity every single time without fail.

It also seems that every time I attend a class there is always one quote that sticks out above the rest a few months later.  That is the quote that has done the best job of daily working its way into my playing and teaching.  Here are three such quotes that I literally think about on a daily basis:

Joe Alessi: "You have to worry about the right sides of the notes just as much as the left sides."

The next time you hear Joe play, either live or on a recording, check out the care with which he ends every single note.  Then proceed to pick your jaw up off of the floor.

Carol Jantsch: "When slurring up to a note focus on the end of the first note rather than the second note."

Try this yourself.  I always found it intuitive to focus on having a clean start to the note I was slurring up to.  Now that I have taken Carol's approach instead my slurring improved immediately.  As in immediately.  It's a great trick.  This is one of the many things she does to make her playing sound so effortless.

Marty Hackleman: "Even if you can play your ass off, try to make it easier."

If you watch Marty play the horn, there is no wasted energy of any kind.  It is pure efficiency.  This is why he has the endurance of horn gladiator even though he is approaching 60.

Hopefully you will find these quotes as helpful as I have.  Not a day goes by that I don't think about all three of them in my teaching and playing.  Is there a great quote that you've heard in a master class recently? Help us all out and leave it in the comments.

My Dad and His Sousaphone in 1957

A Great Example of a Professional Setting Goals

Setting goals is an absolutely essential part of becoming a great musician.  I discussed this subject in a previous post over the summer.  Every professional musician I know sets goals for themselves.  It is simply an imperative part of the job. I have found through the years that it is easy to get students to understand the importance of setting goals.  The challenge is getting them to understand how to go about it.  Lance LaDuke, the trombone/euphonium for Boston Brass, wrote a great post on the S.M.A.R.T. system of setting goals.  He does a great job in that post of describing in detail exactly what you need to do to set goals effectively.  As his colleague, I have seen him put this system to good use to improve both his playing and his other business ventures.

A fantastic blog post by Lauren Veronie really caught my attention this week and got me thinking about setting goals again.  Lauren plays the euphonium in the US Army Field Band and is a wonderful player.  She has a number of solo performances coming up in the near future for which she is currently preparing.  In her recent blog post she discusses in detail the passages that she is practicing and exactly what she is trying to improve.

I am impressed with the specificity of her goals.  She has identified the problem, stated a specific finish line and decided how she is going to get there.  I think this is a great example for all students of how to set goals.

But be sure to keep something in mind: she's already got a gig! If you are in music school or taking auditions right now you must understand that it takes planning and goal setting like this to win a job.

If you aren't preparing with this kind of intensity someone is somewhere.

Marty Hackleman Quotes from 2011 Master Class at George Mason University

Last night, Professor Marty Hackleman gave an amazing master class at George Mason University.  Marty is the principal horn of the National Symphony and a former member of both the Empire Brass and the Canadian Brass.  In my opinion, he is one of the premier teachers and performers that the brass world has ever known. I have put a few of the quotes that really spoke loudly to me in bold.  What quotes jump out at you? Please comment with your favorite quote and how it relates to your playing.

Here are the highlights from the class:

• "It's not that you work, it's how you work."
   

• "How simple can you make the problem?  How simple can you make the solution?"
   

• "We don't see the causes.  We see the symptoms."
   

• "All that you want to do is make it slightly better than yesterday but not as good as tomorrow.  And you enjoy the chase."
   

• "When you do a daily routine, don't sit in front of the TV wasting your time."
   

• "Think of your routine as a physical brass mediation.  Enjoy the time alone."
   

• "The routine is a question of how you play and not what you play."
   

• "A lot of times when you have a problem with your playing and you think you know the solution try the exact opposite.  85% of the time it will work.  And that comes from personal experience."
   

• "I only breathe as much as I need when I'm warming up and I focus on quality over quantity.  But if you're playing a different instrument, like the tuba, it may be different."
   

• "It is more important to practice efficiently than a lot of inefficient practicing.  If you don't feel like it, stop.  Get a cup of coffee and then come back.  Then suck it up and make yourself feel like it for even 15 minutes."
   

• "Even if you can play your ass off, try to make it easier."
   

• "Make it as simple, natural and easy as you can."
   

• "Don't save the high notes until the end of your routine.  They shouldn't be that precious.  They should be a natural extension of everything else."
   

• "I failed first.  Everybody failed first.  But do you stop at failure?"
   

• "You'll be surprised that if you ask yourself to do something regularly, you'll find a solution."
   

• "If tension is creeping into your playing, your routine is where you find that out, not in rehearsal or in performance."
   

• "Support isn't caused by air.  They are separate things."
   

• "You want to use your routine to make yourself better, not just make yourself functional."
   

• "I know (my routine) works because at almost 60 years old I believe I can play better than I've ever played in my life.  And it's not luck.  I promise you."
   

• "First thing is you have to make sure that your horn sounds like what's in your head."
   

• "You have to be more responsible about being a musician and not just a horn player."
   

• "We make crescendos and we don't come all the way back.  If you come all the way back you have somewhere to go again."

Thank you Marty for such an insightful class! Everyone is welcome to attend his next class, free of charge, on Monday April 4th at 7:30pm at George Mason University.

Things I Did in College Which Most Prepared Me for My Career in Music: Got Out of My Musical Comfort Zone (5 of 5)

I was raised as a classical player.  I still consider myself a classical player who happens to be able to play some other styles of music.  Growing up I wanted to be the tuba player in a major symphony orchestra.  In fact, I wanted to be in only the Boston Symphony.  It was a great plan but before Chester Schmitz retired I was called by Boston Brass to fill in at the last possible minute on a gig.  When I got there, half of the show was jazz which included walking bass lines, playing a solo and even singing a tune.  Thankfully, I had teachers along the way that had made me encounter all three of those things in performance before I was asked to do them in front of 1200 music educators with Boston Brass. When I arrived at Northwestern University, I already had a very wide range of musical tastes.  In fact, in high school I listened to just as much Led Zeppelin as Tchaikovsky.  There was a very large disconnect however between the number of styles of music that I listened to and the number that I played on the tuba.  This was not any sort of conscious decision but simply a product of being raised as a classical player.

I was lucky enough to try playing a little bit of jazz in both middle school and high school.  I played the bass trombone parts in jazz band down an octave which did a lot for developing my taste for jazz but my performance of it was still very limited.  My middle school band director, Bob Mealey, did introduce me to improvisation in a brilliant way which I will write about in a future post.  But my exploration of non-classical music did not expand outside of jazz band rehearsals and performances.

That is until I got to college.  Once I got to Evanston I was surrounded by music all of the time.  Chicago is one of the best cities in the world for live music and I was suddenly introduced to a whole new set of friends with their own tastes and CD collections.  It was an exciting time.

One of the best decisions I ever made was to formally pursue learning how to improvise.  I ended up getting the number of a fantastic tuba player and teacher in Chicago named Dan Anderson.  I took the El down to DePaul and took a few jazz lessons with him.  This is where I really started to get the new language of jazz in my ear.  Just like learning how to speak any other language, you have to immerse yourself in it.  Dan showed me the different articulations, weights and note lengths that are all a part of "speaking" jazz.  I only took a few lessons with him but they were invaluable to me moving forward.

Next, I enrolled in Jazz Improv class with Tony Garcia at NU.  He had a very organized and systematic way of teaching the art of improvising which I responded to well.  Even if the class had only been listening to the examples he played for us and discussing them it would have been one of the most beneficial classes I took during undergrad.

I also began jamming with my friends with some frequency.  It didn't matter what instrument combination we could come up with.  We would all pile into a practice room and play.  Sometimes it was over a chord progression like the blues and other times it was just free improvisation.  The ability to express myself through different sounds, even when they were completely off the wall and unconventional, ended up helping all aspects of my tuba playing.  All you have in free improvisation is your storytelling.  There are no right notes or wrong notes.  No in tune or out of tune.  Just a story.  And most students of classical music (like me) can learn a lot from that.

Probably the pinnacle musical experience of my undergraduate studies was the last tune on my senior recital.  It was an arrangement of Bathtub Gin, a song by the band Phish, for trumpet, trombone and tuba.  My dear friends John Butte, Ben Denne and myself had one simple plan.  We had arranged the "head" to start the tune.  We would then let the music go any direction it wanted to go and then we would bring it back around again to the head.  We hadn't planned the length or anything else about it.

It ended up being 10 minutes long and it was BY FAR the audiences favorite part of the recital.  Afterwards, my teacher Rex Martin was as excited about that piece as he had been about anything I had played for him in my almost four years at school.  It was an amazing experience and a wonderful way to put a bow on my studies at Northwestern.

Next, I went to graduate school at Arizona State.  Sam Pilafian, my teacher there, was already a very accomplished jazz tuba player and he wanted to get me exposed to it as well.  His guitar and tuba duo, Travelin' Light, was one of my favorite bands ever.  I think I literally wore out their first album.  When I got to school Sam told me that I was playing in a Dixie band called the Dixie Devils.  He didn't ask if I wanted to play in it.  He just said I was.  Even though I was terrified because I had never done anything like it I simply opened my mouth and the word "okay" popped out.  What an experience it turned out to be!

I was forced to read changes, navigate the road map of tunes (which would change on the fly!) and be ready for a tune to end in any of five different ways.  There were hand signals at the end: stop on a dime, firehouse ending (four bars of tonic instead of one at the end), repeating a II-V turnaround.  The first rehearsal required more 'thinking on my feet' than the previous 13 years of playing combined.  I messed up a lot.  And I played it right a lot.  It was a very freeing experience to be forced to not know exactly how a tune was going to go.

It was also invaluable to be in an ensemble where I was BY FAR the greenest member.  Everyone else was used to playing in jazz combos and other Dixie bands.  The best and fastest way to learn as a musician is to surround yourself with people better and more experienced than you.  I was forced to raise the bar constantly just to keep my head above water.  I have never found a way to improve my musicianship on more levels and at a faster rate than by playing with the Dixie Devils.  I wouldn't trade in that experience for the world.

You never know what direction your career will take and I sure am glad that I was prepared for that day in 2000 when Boston Brass called.  And since Mike Roylance is both young and awesome, I don't think the Boston Symphony will be calling anytime soon.  Luckily, I was prepared for my opportunity through preparation and being forced out of my musical comfort zone.

The 5 Tuba Players Who've Influenced Me Most: Chester Schmitz (1 0f 5)

There have been enough tuba players who have inspired and influenced me that to recount them all would fill this blog for a full year. But I have whittled the list down to the five players who have had the biggest impact on me as both a teacher and a performer. There is absolutely no possible way that I could ever rank them in order of importance. Each of these men has had an incredible impact on me as both a musician and as a person. I will simply put the posts in the order in which I was introduced to them. One common thread among all five is that I was introduced to each one of them before the age of 18. I was very fortunate to have my path cross with so many great musical role models at such a very early age. I also owe my parents an incredible amount of gratitude for being so supportive of me and facilitating, both financially and logistically, my contact with these men.

Chester Schmitz

I have simply never heard a better orchestral tuba player than Chester Schmitz. For 35 years he was, for my money, the most consistent orchestral player in the world. Chester was the first person I ever heard play a tuba, either live or recorded. I must admit I don't remember it though. My parents took me to my first Boston Symphony concert when I was two weeks old in the summer of 1975 at Tanglewood. As I mentioned above, my folks made sure that I was exposed to great music from a very early age. But this was not because of any plans they had for me as a musician. My father is simply a huge fan of classical music and my parents have enjoyed attending concerts at Tanglewood for decades.

By the time I had graduated from high school, I had the privilege of attending about 200 BSO concerts both in Boston and at Tanglewood. There was not a single instance of me going to hear that orchestra and being disappointed by Chester's playing. Not once. And for almost all of them I was hanging on his every note.

The thing that amazed me about his playing is that it always seemed just right. The loud and bombastic parts were just that but never even a little bit too much. He could also make more music with a two note phrase in Brahms 2 than most musicians I've encountered could with a full melody. I got to hear him perform so many different programs with the symphony that I ended up getting a rather full education on the huge orchestral repertoire of the tuba.

I will also never forget the kindness that he showed me each and every time I snuck backstage to say hello.  There were countless times that I would elude security and make my way to his locker.  He made time for me in every instance without exception and never seemed in a hurry to be somewhere else.  That left quite an impression on me as a young man.

For hearing tuba for the first time ever, you can do a lot worse than having it played by Chester Schmitz.

The Listening Library

I am posting this from my hotel room in Taipei, Taiwan! The trip from my house in Washington DC to Taipei, door to door, was over 26 hours.  I had the chance to listen to a lot of great music on my trip and I thought I would comment on it here.  I love hearing what other musicians are listening to so I am going to make this a regular feature of the blog.  I did something similar to this a long time ago but was recently inspired to try again by the blogs of both John William Banther and Sam Davis. All of the music that I listen to, both good and bad, is data for the “tuba in my head” that Arnold Jacobs used to reference all the time.  I use every performance, regardless of musical style or what instrument is being played, to shape my next performance on the tuba.

Here is what I listened to on my day long trip to Taiwan with some brief commentary:

'The Suburbs' - Arcade Fire

This group was new to me last year. I had heard them referenced by a number of people on my twitter feed over and over again.  Since these were people who liked a lot of the same music I did I decided to give them a shot.  They are a fantastic pop/rock band from Canada that is deservedly receiving a ton of critical acclaim these days.  This album has beautiful melodies throughout, occasionally haunting ones.  It is definitely a little on the dark side of pop music but it is original sounding, very well produced and performed, and is a rare album these days that is just as strong on the second “side” of the “record” as the first.

'Orchestrion' - Pat Metheny

This is another album from 2010 that was recommended by a good friend and great music writer Sam Davis of Dog Gone Blog.  Talk about an assault on the senses.  The opening title track of this album features gentle, virtuostic lines interwoven throughout creating a thick sonic tapestry.  When music is this technically difficult the ultimate compliment I can give it is to say that is sounds effortless.  Pat Metheny, for my taste, is one of the best in the business at making amazingly difficult music sound natural.  The last 3-4 minutes of the opening track is worth the price of the entire album.

'Picaresque' - The Decemberists

Another great band that I discovered through Twitter! This was the first time I ever heard this album but it came highly recommended from a friend.  I am not a big lyrics guy but this band's music tells some very interesting stories.  Their music is a combination of folk, pop, rock and occasionally steroids.  Any band that can play such tunes with this kind of intensity and drive featuring almost no distortion at all is doing something right.  And that can be followed up by a tune with nothing but accoustic guitar and vocals. Tons of variety in both song writing and instrumentation.  If nothing else check out the track '16 Military Wives'.  This ones got some horns thrown in and an uber-catchy chorus.

'The Bends' – Radiohead

Did someone say distortion? I was evidently living under a rock when Radiohead came to prominence in the '90s which I am ashamed to admit.  I had barely heard their material until a little over a year ago.  The first album I listened to was 'OK Computer'.  There have not been many if any rock albums that spoke to me as loudly as it did on the first listen.  I was a combination of fist pumping and speachless the first time through.  I had not heard 'The Bends' until this flight and was predictably blown away.  And talk about a sonic tapestry, while completely different from the one I described in 'Orchestrion' this band has the ability to make you feel like you are taking a bath in their sound.  Thick, lush guitar licks with tons of feedback combined with brilliant song writing and the haunting voice of Thom Yorke and you get what is becoming one of my favorite bands of all time.

'Continuum' – John Mayer

I couldn't stand this guy for a long time.  Every time I heard him interviewed I cringed.  But my wife is a huge fan of his music so I was finally able to give his music a fare shake without bringing his 'tude into the discussion.  When I opened my ears I found a smoking guitar player, great singer, and even better song writer.  If you buy this album on iTunes it comes with a fascinating 10 minute video on the making of the tune 'In Repair' with one of my favorite musicians Charlie Hunter.  I dare anyone to watch that video, see the process of how the tune got written and the collaboration of the artists, and not find it pretty darn interesting.  Regardless of what you think of him as a person (there are plenty of words that come to mind that I won't print here) he is as gifted a musician as there is today in the pop world and I believe his songs will be around a long time from now.

Live Recording of Phish from 12/28/10

Anyone who knows me knows that Phish is my favorite band.  By far.  And by band I should clarify and say my favorite group of musicians playing any style of music in the world.  There artistry speaks to me like no other music I've ever heard.  This was one of five shows that the band just played over the New Years Eve period.  They are a very difficult band to sum up in a paragraph but the reason I keep coming back is that you never know what they are going to play or how they are going to play it.  This show featured a song, Harry Hood, that I have personally seen performed over 30 times in concert with each one being different.  But after playing this tune live for over two decades, they came out of nowhere with the most unique and interesting version I've ever heard.  Rather than the fluid, melodic soloing that the guitar player, Trey Anastasio, always plays this tune with he approached the solo section with a very choppy yet fluid stacatto approach which left a ton of space for the other three musicians to explore.  It is nuance like this that makes me keep coming back to this band over and over again.  As a result of Phish, I try to bring the same fresh approach to classical pieces I've been playing for years and it is always a rewarding experience.  You can buy a soundboard copy of the show here directly from the band. A portion of the proceeds goes to a fantastic charity, The Mockingbird Foundation, that donates all of its money to music education.

Things I Did in College Which Most Prepared Me for My Career in Music: Played for Every Professional Player That Passed Through Town (4 of 5)

Something I was taught at a very early age was to try and play for every single professional that came anywhere near my hometown.  Sometimes this was in master classes and other times this was in private lessons.  Performing in front of as many professionals as possible was immensely important in me gaining the confidence to play at my best in a wide a range of circumstances.

Master classes are the easiest place for a college student to gain access, even if only briefly, to a professional traveling through town.  It was my experience that a visiting artist could say the exact same thing that my teacher had been saying all along but in just a slightly different manner and it would make everything click in my mind.

I am always telling my students that all performing and teaching, both good and bad, counts as “data” that helps to mold me as a musician.  If I hear a concept put in a way that makes a lot of sense I am of course sure to share that with my students.  Likewise, if someone teaches something in a manner which doesn’t click with me or that I disagree with it only serves to strengthen my own point of view.  Keeping this in mind, any master class that I ever attend is worth my time.  Always.  And any great teacher will address exactly what you personally need to hear if they hear you play.

When I was a young student I was taught a great trick when someone was listening to multiple students play in a master class.  Always volunteer to play first.

There are a few reasons for this. First of all, when conducting a master class it can be very difficult to keep track of time when working with students. If a teacher does not manage their time well the student playing at the beginning of the class will always get more time and not less time.  It is very difficult to stick to time slots as a teacher and the people playing at the end are always the ones that are affected.

Another equally important reason is that it is natural to be distracted and nervous until you get in front of the group to play.  You are going to retain very little information that is given to the players who play before you.  If you volunteer to play first, you can simply relax, take notes, and learn from all of the people that come after you.  Sometimes the information that is shared without you being on the hot seat can make the biggest impression.

I always raised my hand immediately in every single master class whether I felt like playing that day or not.  As a result, I played in every class, got at least as much time as everyone else that played, and was able to focus on the teaching and not myself for the remainder of the class.

Finally, it is great to be able to get a private lesson with someone passing through town.  Speaking from experience, my schedule rarely allows time to meet with people individually but there is a trick to increasing your chances of hearing a “yes” when asking for a lesson.

First of all, contact the person before they come to your town or school.  This has never been easier with email, twitter, facebook, etc.  If you can’t find them through any of those channels then simply ask your teacher if they might know their info.  It is a lot easier for me to schedule my day around giving a student a lesson if they contact me ahead of time.

Second, you should always offer to pay someone for their time.  Frequently, when a student asks a traveling professional for a lesson and offers to pay them they will teach them for free.  This is not always the case but it definitely sends the wrong message to not offer to pay someone for their time.  Even if you are very up front in stating that you have no money and understand that you wouldn’t expect them to be able to teach you, this will be received well.  It might not get you a lesson, but you will leave a good impression in a business where are impressions are imperative.

Marty Hackleman Quotes from George Mason Master Class

On Monday evening fellow George Mason teacher Marty Hackleman, principal hornist of the National Symphony, gave a wonderful master class to all of the brass students.  In my opinion, Marty is probably my favorite horn player to either listen to or perform with in the world.  I have had the privilege of attending a number of his master classes throughout the years and every time I walk away with more information than I could have dreamed of obtaining in one session.  Marty truly is the (sadly) rare combination of master performer and master teacher.

As I did with the wonderful Carol Jantsch master class earlier this summer I’ve collected a number of great quotes from Marty’s class that I believe any musician will find insightful.  I couldn’t possibly get to all of the quotes but these were the highlights.  He gave the audience and the students who performed a lot to digest in a very easy to understand manner.  It was a great experience for everyone.

• "You’ve got to start thinking outside the box.  When you have a problem (with your playing), really admit it and address it.  You have to be honest about it.  You are only as strong as the weakest link in your playing."
   
• "We all have to be fearless.  You can’t ask a brass instrument.  You have to tell it.  It’s like a dog.  You have to be consistent and it will love you."
   
• "Do something more.  There’s no right or wrong…just be convincing.  You’re still apologizing for playing the trumpet."
   
• "As brass players, we see a long note and think 'I’m home free…I’ve just got to hit the beginning of it.'  Don’t let it sit."
   
• "Playing a valve instrument it is very important to worry about timing the articulations and the sound between the notes.   Sometimes you have to tongue when the valve goes down and sometimes when the valve comes up."
   
• "On a trill, you have to finesse the sound in between the notes."
   
• "Are you completely in love with your tonguing? I don’t think so.  You’re just used to it."
   
• "Don’t just glide through it.  With a little bit of care you can make it sound beautiful."
   
• "How simple can you make it?"
   
• "On brass instruments, we want to bring our instruments up to the level of the music and not the music down to the level of our instruments."
   
• "I think there are a lot of musical ideas in there but your trombone is not letting them out."
   
• "I won’t bite and if I do, you won’t get much of a mark."