Thanks Greg! Another great video full of truthful insight, this one with a concise overview and a lot of specific guidance on how we can “check in” on the various aspects of playing.

I think the concept of “Illusion of Competence” is a great one.

What are we doing when we start our day playing?

Do we go through a warm up routine someone else came up with for us without any thought about why we’re playing what we’re playing or whether it is working for us?

It’s perfectly fine to play other’s warm up exercises–many of us play Stamp, for example.

But without having a keen awareness of the sensations we are feeling as we start our day, how our the lips responding to the air? How are things feeling and sounding? What adjustments are necessary to improve the sound, what can I / should I let go of–what unnecessary tension and engagement exists in the body?

I still play Stamp a lot, but I don’t always do the same thing every day. One thing I’ve done that’s helped me is to “take control” of things and not focus on playing exercises necessarily as written but focus more on feeling and sit on notes a bit before moving on and paying attention to what’s happening (how it feels, sounds, etc.) as I make minor movements and experiment with trying to do more with less engagement, etc.

It is so easy to lose that awareness, especially when we’re distracted by the various aspects of playing (articulation, fingering, dynamics, rhytym/timing, reading, playing in a group) and ESPECIALLY when we are distracted on our emotional attachment and focus on the results we want to experience from our playing (i.e. obtaining certain pitches) rather than learning from objective experimentation with letting go of tension in the body and increasing efficiency.

I’m still on this journey and want to accomplish a lot more on the instrument, but I’m thankful to be playing at a level I never dreamed possible. It’s not a straight line upwards, there have been peaks and valleys for sure–the lowest point actually came AFTER I had accomplished quite a bit, about a year in. That was kind of surprising, but makes sense in hindsight. I had finally learned how to play above the staff and was progressing quickly, but didn’t really understand how or why I had been progressing. As I started subconsciously focusing my attention more and more on my newfound range and ability and less and less on the Process that got me there, I started backsliding to old habits and my playing started deteriorating and my range decreasing. I didn’t understand what was happening or why and almost lost hope and gave up. Thankfully, I didn’t.

I’m not a great player, I’m doing this for fun and personal development/fulfillment. But I am a “Driver” (as defined in the video). I consistently and relentlessly think about what it is to play the instrument and look for insight from others on playing, nearly all of which reinforces WindWorks’ principles/mantras, etc. And I don’t take anything for granted, I keep an open mind until I have an opportunity to experiment with it and understand it by experiencing it for myself.

Another way to look at this might be humility–are we approaching the instrument with a healthy degree of humility? If any instrument or activity can teach humility, it’s playing trumpet…

Are we starting the day by objectively observing how the production of sound is happening using Passive air through an embouchure/aperture with minimal engagement / tension? Or do start out by somewhat rushing through a series of warm up scales, paying little or no attention to how it’s feeling or sounding, not taking the time to pause or repeat or alter what we’re doing to address any issues we’re experiencing?

I have no playing commitments and don’t play in a group anymore, so I have the luxury of going “all in” and taking my time. I realize there are times when players can’t do that and need to get on with it.

But some of the great players in history have said something to the effect of “We must learn how to play again everyday”. I believe this is the nature of the trumpet. Our bodies are not a constant–our hydration level, swelling of the lips, degree of rest, environment and a whole host of factors effects our ability to play.

We must consciously focus on how the delicate balance of Air and Shape is, or is not, working (optimally/freely/efficiently) to produce sound and objectively learning from that success or failure (we learn more from failure, btw).

We can’t blindly follow a routine or play exercises without really asking ourselves why we are playing what we’re playing–what is it that we’re hoping to accomplish? Our teachers are merely guides, they can’t literally tell us what specifically to do as they can’t really know what it is we’re doing inside the mouthpiece and our bodies, they can only look for clues. We must own our playing, our success and our failure.

Thankfully, it does get easier and better. The “bad days” come less and less often. It took a while for me. The first year or two, for me, I would have great progress for a period, then I would have a “bad day” and not really know why. Sometimes these periods would last a bit with some good or great days mixed in to add confusion and frustration. Eventually, with a renewed focus on the principles to got me where I had been before and paying close attention to what I was feeling, I got back on track and progressed to a new level.

Now, about 3 years in, I couldn’t remember the last “bad day” I had up until this week–they are few and far between. And when I do have them, I feel like I’ve learned how to deal with them and a better sense about why they occurred.

And my “bad day” is better than the best “good day” I had 3 years ago… Three years ago, I couldn’t play much above the staff, never touched a High C or anything above. My “bad day” Thursday included my playing above the staff to an E and F above high C with a relative ease I wouldn’t have thought possible 3 years ago… But I was feeling stiff and had a “fuzzy sound” in the low register up to G on the staff and I was not playing as well and things didn’t feel as well as they have been normally. I realized that I have just been overdoing it a bit on my range development.

I rested up today, will make sure to hydrate and am looking forward to seeing how things go tomorrow. I’m confident it will go good. But if it doesn’t, I know what to do–I will refocus my attention on the basic production of sound using Passive air released through relatively relaxed lips, looking for an ease of ascending with minimal engagement on passively released air. And I’ll try to take it easy, but will “check in” by playing some music–something I have found important to do to keep ourselves honest. I have caught myself feeling bad about a “bad day” because harmonic slurs or other exercises didn’t produce the Results I wanted them to, then when I play a piece of music I have played before I play it as good or better than I ever have before–kind of puts my “bad day” into proper context…I can’t tell you how many times this has happened to me, but it’s been a lot–perhaps more often than not on those “bad days”. So much of playing is MENTAL and we are simultaneously our worst enemy and greatest resource / only hope.

My $.02 FWIW. Keep the Faith, but don’t just blindly play exercises expecting to improve through repetition…playing the trumpet is mostly about coordination, not development of strength…focus on how it feels and sounds and learn from those objective experiments, develop your own “check in” points that help you determine how it’s going–for me, this has been a variety of musical passages or exercises (an interval in a piece of music, etc.) that has been a past “coffee moment” that I repeat each day to check that I’ve held on to that newfound ability that I had in a past “coffee moment” achievement.