I had some fun writing this for Trumpet Magazine Online, a publication that has most of its following in Europe. I thank my students both in my T5 Mastercourse and the New England Conservatory and their hard work, which reminded me of these lessons – I often need to remind myself that they work for me too!.

I hosted a free Zoom seminar this January to try to help folks sort through the issues that come up when recording auditions. It was interesting to see what came up.

What’s the biggest difference between a recorded audition and a live audition? You have the ABILITY (double edged sword here) to record it as many times as you want or have time to with a recorded audition. When it is live, you get one shot. Most of the recorded auditions now are being asked to be done straight-through, with no edits. This takes more planning and preparation than being able to record one selection at a time. It also gives us as the listeners a better overall idea of your playing.

There are some other differences we don’t often think about…With live auditions, when it finally comes to it, we just walk in and play. Getting there takes a lot of planning – transportation, lodging, etc. but it all takes place well in advance of the actual playing.

Recorded auditions require advanced planning as well: reserving a space, setting up equipment, setting recording levels, making sure lighting is decent (“Will the heat be on in the church choir room where I am recording?”). ALL of these things need to be done as much as possible before the day of the recording so you can just show up and play. After all, it is hard enough to do that! So do this prep before the recording session as much as possible.

It seems these days like people really don’t love recorded auditions – I get it, playing for people and either knowing they are sitting on the other side of a screen or seeing their smiling faces makes a big difference.

Trouble is, there’s this thing called COVID… maybe you’ve heard of it…

Yeah – it’s a whole THING. Anyway…

Most schools and music festivals aren’t allowing live auditions, which is a shame, but try to find a place of acceptance of the current reality, and just DO YOUR BEST. That is what we’ve been doing for two years, and we will continue to do the same until we reach a new normal, and are back playing everything live etc! So, keep that chin up, and let’s find some better ways to approach recording so you can get into the school/festival/orchestra/polka band of your dreams.

Here were the things that came up in the meeting and that seemed to stress people the most, in no particular order:

• How do you know when the recording is “good enough”/done?
• How many sessions should you give yourself to get it done?
• How nice/big/resonant does the room in which you record need to be?
• What kind of mic do you use/what works well?
• How do you deal with feeling like once you press the record button everything feels DIFFERENT?
• How do you decide what to record when you’re given the choice of excerpts and solos?

Let’s dig in here…

Set up a healthy number of sessions as it relates to the music you have to record.

How to decide how many? As many as you can manage and still sound good! That being said there are some things to consider:

• How often can you reserve the space?
• How many times can you run through the list and still sound good? (the lower this number, the more sessions you should allow yourself – HINT: the harder the list, the lower this number will be!!!)

The number of sessions you schedule should also be governed by a simple rule – the better you can prepare for recorded auditions, the easier they will go.

Should you try to “step it up” when we are recording?

NOOOOOOOO!!!!!

This is the biggest mistake musicians make when auditioning or recording. If you’ve set up your sessions in an organized manner, the only thing you are doing is trying to play in the sessions the same way you practiced. This means that how you practice is critical. As much as possible, you must try to play with the ideal version of the music in your head (this assumes you have listened to enough recordings to have chosen a favorite and memorized the nuances of said favorite player). That way, when the red light is on, you just listen to that version in your head that you have been hearing for weeks/months/years and trust your body to produce it as well as it can in that moment.

You don’t really need to think about where to place your feet when you walk down the street – you just do it. Recording is the same. Set yourself up well with your logistics and then JUST PLAY.

You CAN teach an old dog new tricks

I am 46. I don’t think of that as old, but I have been working in full-time orchestras now for over 23 years. I left school in 1998 to start working and yet, in the last three years, I have learned more about how to play the trumpet (and thus, how to teach the same stuff) than at any other time in my life!

Do you sometimes feel like you are stuck in a rut with your playing and don’t know the way forward? Do you feel like you have a lot of good information from various sources over the years of your education and subsequent work life but can’t quite figure out how to fit it all together? Feel free to shoot me an email, any time and we can talk about what’s going on! benwrighttrumpet@gmail.com

Playing a brass instrument is like shooting free throws…

Steve Nash is the second-best free-throw shooter of all time at 90.43%… just behind Steph Curry, depending on the week!

Nash shot 90% on his first free throw and 91% on his second free throw. That one percentage point difference is smaller than the other players in the top five who were all 3-5% worse on their first free throw. The first free throw is harder because the player needs to access long-term muscle memory. Once they have shot their first, the muscle memory is pulled from their short-term memory which lends the higher percentage to the second shot.

Why was Steve Nash’s first-shot percentage better than the other top shooters of all time?

He practiced his motion three times before EVERY free throw, so he was accessing his muscle memory from his short term memory (see photo).

What does any of this have to do with music??

Think about how many times we put up our instruments and don’t imagine hitting the first note – we focus on any number of other things our excellent teachers have asked us to think about:

• Breathing
• Clear Articulation
• Pitch
• Character
• Dynamics
• The list could go on, and on, and on…

We just performed Frau Ohne Schatten and in the middle there is one of those Straussian head scratching entrances in the second trumpet. Totally calm moment with soft trumpet octaves, then a sudden tempo change, introduced by the 2nd trumpet with an exposed solo entrance (full disclosure: I had it with clarinet, but as he said, “I’ll just ghost you”. – gee thanks!). Yet another one of those trumpet moments where you either feel like a hero or a dog with its tail between its legs. Here’s what it looks like (I can’t share the sound clip per BSO rules…):

I have met and worked with many fantastic trumpet players since spring of 2020 via Zoom: American, Canadian, Asian, Australian, Spanish, and British players; older players and younger; amateur and pro. I feel lucky to have been able to help so many people from the safety and convenience of our respective homes/countries. Even now that it is safer, I am still thankful for the Zoom interface and its ability to reach far and wide. 

I wanted to share some info on how you can make your distance learning lessons go smoother from a technological standpoint.

Often I hear people say: I need FANCY equipment to make zoom lessons work, right?

No!!!

Are you among the people that have expanded their minds and improved their playing over the last year by taking lessons with experts all over the world via Zoom? I know that for many of you the answer is yes, but just in case…

Do you need a mixing board, preamp, condenser mic, DSLR camera in 4K, internet at warp speed, and/or supercomputer to make trumpet lessons work on zoom? 

Nope. Can you use just a cell phone on 3g or slow WiFi? Well… sorry, no. 

Here’s what I use: MacBook Pro (2018), Apogee Mic (that’s the model name, but you can use any plug and play USB mic in my experience to excellent effect as long as it has a way to adjust gain control), corded Ethernet connection to Verizon Fios, and an Apple AirPod in one ear with a corded backup nearby just in case.

I’ve made excellent connections with my online students using similar setups with GREAT results since March of 2020. 

Does it help to have some setup tips? Yes- here’s a great zoom setup guide. 

Make sure you are running the latest Zoom version by clicking Check for Updates (any time Zoom doesn’t work well this is your first place to check :

Once you are sure you have the latest and greatest version of Zoom, open Zoom and select the cog wheel in the upper right corner: