Tartellog

January has been a lot of fun.  After ringing in the new year with the Cincinnati Pops, I flew down to Houston to play a Pops weekend with the Houston Symphony.  These are two great orchestras that I always enjoy playing with.  I’ll be back with both of them in February, which means at least two very important things:

1. Skyline Chili
2. Real Mexican food

Some of you might think that there is good Mexican food where you live.  There’s really no argument here.  I’ve been all over the country.  I’ve been to Mexico.  I’ve tried.  Really tried.  And I’m sure being born and raised in Texas doesn’t make me extremely biased.  The best Mexican food is in Texas.  End of story.

Where to eat when you travel is an important topic.  Perhaps we can discuss this further in a future post.

What I want to discuss today is what I did the week after playing in Houston.  It started in October with a text from Andy Baker, a trombonist in Chicago, that asked:

“Do you happen to play slide trumpet?”

Now I’ll be honest with you.  The real answer was: No.  This is not how I answered Andy.  I told Andy that I do own a slide trumpet and have messed around with it a bit.  It turns out that Andy was putting together a group to record two pieces written by Leo Sowerby for the Paul Whiteman Orchestra that have not previously been recorded.  The lead trumpet book includes a slide trumpet double.  So of course I said yes.

After receiving the music, I noticed that some of the slide trumpet parts are solos, and way outside of my extremely limited skill on the instrument.   This brings me to the title of this post.  I decided that I needed to do something new: get better at slide trumpet.  Leading up to the recording, I added slide trumpet practice to my day.  Please note that I wrote “added” not “put it in and took something else out”.  I’ve covered this topic here:  “In addition to,” not “Instead of.”

Here’s a video from the first rehearsal (thanks to my trumpet section mate Brent Turney for taking this):

Now it’s your turn.

What have you done lately that pushed you outside of your comfort zone?

What are you doing that is truly new to you?

What do you want to be doing that you’re not currently doing?

It’s time to answer these questions.  If you think about where true growth comes from, it’s from, at least in part, doing something you’ve never done before.  This can be a frightening proposition for some.  There are people that have come to me asking how to get better at playing in the upper register.  I ask them what they currently practice to get better at playing in the upper register, and most of the time the answer is: nothing.  This makes my job really easy.

If you can’t do something, and you don’t work towards doing it, it’s likely that you’ll continue to be unable to do it.

If there’s something you want to do that you can’t yet do, it’s time to make a plan.  You might surprise yourself with how much you can achieve with a little bit of work every day.

At this point you might be thinking “but…why?”  Because growth for growth’s sake is important.  Too many people get stuck in school only doing what’s required of them.  Then they get jobs…and only do what’s required of them.  Then they wonder why they’re not happy.

What you choose to do is what makes you an individual.  And interesting.  And smart.

Don’t do it because it’s easy….it’s not.

Don’t do it because it’s convenient…it’s not.

Do it because it’s worth it.