Mouthpiece adventures

Trumpet players are the demi gods. We can play loud and soft, we annouce the coming our royalty, and gods alike in operas, music dramas, and musicals. This being said, every person who puts a trumpet to their mouth and are chosen by their trumpet begin a long, long journey that parallels the mission to find the Holy Grail; The perfect mouthpiece.


Looking for the "perfect" mouthpiece is a weakness I believe that every trumpet player succombs to at some point in their career. Later in life we find we have old shoe boxes full of various metals that we have tried and have failed at being the "perfect" mouthpiece.


They have different marks on them, different sizing, it's almost like learning five different languages or switching from the US system of measuring and the metric system. Each mp has a different sound, feel, taste, and spirit.


Yes, I think they have spirits. I had a wicked flugel mp that refused to work for me or my my flugel. It was a bitter mp that is sitting under my desk, hidden from the sunlight like a vampire.


Some believe there are mps that automatically get you a higher range, and superior tonging. Just because you have a shiny gold Monette mp doesn't mean you're automatically better than me.


I too have fallen prey to this journey, but not for reasons that are conceited or amateur. Every trumpet has a matching mp that can make it sound great. It's not about enhancing the skill of the player, but allowing the player to have the full potential to make the music sound its best.


Believe me, I didn't buy my gold plated Laskey 65B for high notes, I bought it for my Schilke S32. I want it to sound good, and half of it needs to be my skills and the other part needs to be my hardware. My spirit needs to connect with the mp's spirit and the trumpet's spirit to make my potential happen.

In addition to my last post...

The holiday break came and went. It has been rough since my last post. A friend passed away, a family member had a stroke, and another was in a car accident. Within that time I didn't pick up my trumpet, occasionally picking up my guitar. Music couldn't save me from the pain that I was feeling.

Despite that, I went back to school on Monday. I'm taking all music classes this semester. Theory IV, Ear Training IV, Major Composers of the 19th and 20th century, Arts and the Creative Process, Orchestra, Jazz Ensemble, trumpet lessons, and a jazz improv independent study. I'm back at work with my job over there, back to the same old same old.

But something is different. I'm never going to erase those markings in my copies of Haydn, Hummel or Hindemith. I'm never going to erase them. I'm going to preserve them as a memory. Memory of where I began again.