Music to my Ears

I am a music man.

In another life I used to write, play, and perform songs. Even sang them, O.U.A.T.

Mostly on piano. I learned enough in 2nd Grade to play by ear. Sometimes guitar, then bass. I was pretty good, especially on bass, emulating my hero Willy Dixon. The other instruments good, but not great.

I was actually also a good trumpet player, in high school. First chair for three years in the band, and a near miss at All-State, due to a certain mental condition (see below).

I still play piano at times. When visiting friends who have one and will tolerate my dabbling. Some of my original songs and numbers were/are pretty good, actually. My friends still like to hear them. But I'd truly had zero chance of success as a musician: apart from questions of talent and instrumental skills for one very simple reason: stage fright.

(NOTE: I wrote a screenplay based on this: Roll Over Beethoven. Complete with theme song.

My onset of stage fright first manifested itself during my senior year in high school. I'd done a fine imitation Al Hirt's hit trumpet number, Java, backed by my Morristown (N.J.) High School band.

I was also first chair trumpet in the orchestra, as well as band. The difference was that the orchestra was primarily strings with a few brass and reeds; the band primarily brass, reeds and percussion. With some cross-over, of course.

So our conductor, Dr. E. Paul Giersch (R.I.P.) convinced me to learn Hayden's Trumpet Concerto in E-flat major. And I became damned good at it, actually.

Until Dr. Giersch convinced me to compete in the New Jersey All-State Band and Orchestra competition.

And this, sadly, was to be an entirely different experience from performing Java in auditoriums for high school and middle-schoolers. This was child abuse. Or at least, teen abuse. Which amounted to my aforementioned formerly gentle conductor cruelly thrusting me into a den of wolves.

After being thrust (OK, nudged) forward by an eager Dr. Giersch, upon hearing my name called out (he couldn't join me, which definitely would have helped, looking back), I was literally summoned into the  principal's office in East Orange H.S. or somewhere (close to an hour's drive from Morristown) where the trials were being held.

And a trial it would prove to be), in which, as I recall, a gang of four ((OK, committee), all men, no women, (which might also have helped, looking back) sat regarding me with challenging stares, if not knowing glares. Suits.

I was there, of course, to perform Hayden's Trumpet Concerto, which I had performed in the high school auditorium with good success a month or so earlier.

"Whenever you are ready," I was informed.

It seems I wasn't ready.

The trumpet is a difficult instrument, because creating notes requires an unnaturally tight pucker of the lips, called an 'embouchure,' in order to blow air out in a tightly controlled stream, creating the note(s) on the musical score. And yes, you have to be able to read music.

In the case of copying Al Hirt, I did that by ear after listening to it on the radio. Apparently I have a good ear, and was tested for and have/had 'perfect pitch', or 'absolute pitch.' Which meant I could tell if the note or tune was correct. If the note was flat, I'd know it. Or sharp. (I do have a different kind of memory, however: when I play a familiar CD of a musical performance of any kind--and my tastes include baroque, classical, romantic, jazz [Dixieland not so much, or be-bop], and rock, particularly classic rock from the days of yore. Pop and country not so much, although I kind of liked Glen Campbell).

But I digress: back to the music trial. Before a jury but hardly of my peers.

Basically, my embouchure froze. Then I did. I couldn't get a single note out. Needless to say I didn't make All State. I barely made it to the john. And the ride back home to Morristown with Dr. Giersch took about 200 hours.

Not coincidentally, I lost my position of three years as first chair trumpet, albeit to a talented upstart young Freshman. But it was humiliating, to say the least.

When I went to college (a small Midwestern college) I was quickly admitted into the orchestra, apparently with a recommendation from Dr. Giersch after all. There I won first chair trumpet once again, and was determined to overcome my recent sudden stage fright.

Part of my self-therapy was to perform in a play. That didn't work at all. Instant stage fright. Again. Which sucked.

But I still had my Giersch Redemption to do. Which I did. In the college auditorium to piano accompaniment (which helped). And I played it perfectly, or near enough so to satisfy myself at long last, and was given a nice applause.

Then I made one of those life-changing decisions in another direction. I'd been pining for my old h.s. girlfriend (who not to my knowledge had fled the scene), so I transferred to a big eastern university, Syracuse, in the coldest city ever. (OK, Anchorage and Minneapolis notwithstanding). And I transferred there leaving my trumpet behind. Sadly, I never played it again.

I do have one regret, though: Miles Davis. I never had the opportunity of hearing him (knowing only rock and roll, in those heady '60s. Heady in more ways than one). I'm a huge Miles fan in his afterlife, but I have to wonder how hearing him on top of The Beach Boys, then Beatles, might have changed my life. And in what way?

I'd still play Java, though. Great tune.

No comment about the embouchure.

E.C.