From: "Trumpet 佬"
Newsgroups: newsgroup.music.WindBrassInstrument
http://www.resoundingpraise.com/grouppic.htm
CNN Interview / By Beth Nissen - CNN.com Senior Correspondent
He grew up in a Salvation Army
family, playing cornet on street corners and in church bands. His
father, a Salvation Army band soloist, was his only teacher. But Phil
Smith was a player gifted enough to make it into Juilliard with
noformal training -- then to the Chicago Symphony on his first
audition; andthen, while still in his 20s, to the New York Philharmonic
as principal trumpet.
He's an unfailingly humble man, a gentle soul whose strongest
curse word is"crumbs." But when he picks up the trumpet, he plays with
extraordinary powerand passion. Many of his colleagues in the New York
Philharmonic -- and inother major orchestras -- consider him one of the
best trumpet players in theworld. And he does it all on faith.
When and why did you start playing the trumpet?
I was probably about 7. I belong to the Salvation Army church -- I'ma fourth-generationSalvationist. I grew up playing outside on street
corners at Christmas time.Young kids in any of our churches -- as soon
as they can, we get them singing.And as soon as they get their second
teeth, we put some kind of brass instrumentin their hands -- it's just
part of the fellowship of the church. The founderof the Army, William
Booth, believed in taking the gospel to the street, andhe used a brass
band for that purpose.
My dad was a cornet player -- he was the stand-up soloist with
the premiereSalvation Army band here in New York City. He had a very
sweet, mellow tone-- his heart came through his horn -- and I was
attracted to that. From a youngage, I watched him and had visions of
growing up to be like him. I startedon cornet -- when you're a little
kid, it's easy to hold a cornet.
Cornet and brass banding
At what point did you decide this might be your life's work
professionally?Like a lot of kids, you just go through life doing what
you like to do andwhat you're good at. Then when you get to 11th grade,
some guidance counselorsays, "So what are you gonna do?" Well, I liked
music, so that seemed a naturalchoice for me.
The safe bet was to do music education, because professional
musicians -- well,you can't make a living being a professional
musician, I thought. A young ladywho was a Salvationist and a
professional trumpet player at the time got theear of my dad and said,
"You know, he ought to audition for Juilliard." I wasaccepted, and I
got a bachelor's degree and a master's degree at Juilliard.
Did your history of playing on street corners and in concerts with SalvationArmy bands prepare you for Juilliard?
Oh, I was completely behind the eight ball. What I knew was cornet
and brassbanding -- I knew nothing about being a trumpet player.
For my audition at Juilliard, the orchestra person put up a
piece of musicand asked me to play. So I played what I saw -- which
trumpet players veryoften don't do. They look at the music, but play it
perhaps a major third higheror a perfect fourth higher -- they
transpose. I knew nothing about the techniqueof transposition. I played
what I saw, which is what happens in the brass band.The man stopped me
and said, "What are you doing? You should play it this way."And I
looked at him like he was crazy -- I didn't know what to do.
How difficult was the transition from band music to orchestra music?
Great music is great music -- whether I'm playing hymn arrangements
in theArmy or playing the Tchaikovsky Fourth Symphony in the orchestra.
What washard about the transition was the language -- I didn't know the
orchestrallanguage. And I was a "feminine" cornet player, not a
"masculine" trumpet player-- they're two different instruments in terms
of style and approach.
Is the trumpet difficult to play? Difficult to master?
The most difficult thing is to get the best tone. You can have
oodles of technique,but if you've got no tone, it's not going to be
attractive to the person hearingit. Tone comes from the inner ear --
you can't teach it. It comes from deepinside your brain -- and also
your heart.
"Splee-ahs"?
That's exactly what it sounds like: You go to hit a note, and the
sound goes"SPLEE-aaaahhhhh." I wanted to get that as a license plate,
but I haven't beenable to. (Laughs.)
The trumpet is showcased, a lot -- there are many, many pieces
that have prominentmelodic parts for the trumpet. Most of the parts are
bravura -- they call forstrong playing. But you have to play some
little delicate things sometimes.There may just be two bars of
pianissimo (very soft) in a piece, but thoseare probably the toughest
two bars to play out of the whole piece. Playingsoftly takes more
control, and there's a higher risk of splee-ahs or air-balls-- nothing
but air comes out.
It can be so obvious when a brass instrument hits a wrong note.
Do you everenvy the violinist in the middle of the violin section,
whose slip might notbe so noticeable?Yeah, I'll be honest -- there are
times when I wish I was more anonymous. (Laughs.)But there's also the
part of being in the forefront that's exhilarating. Andthat's kinda why
you play trumpet, because you kinda like that.
How did you get your first orchestra job?
Near the end of my time at Juilliard, I started taking auditions and
tryingto find my way into the workplace. Three announcements for
trumpet auditionscame up. One was in Calgary, Canada -- I sent a letter
of application and theydidn't even respond. The other was in Honolulu
-- I sent a letter and theywrote back and said I didn't have enough
experience on my resumé. Thethird one was in Miami. They
actually gave me an audition date, but it conflictedwith a date I had
playing with the New York Salvation Army Staff Band, so Icouldn't make
the audition date.
So my first audition, in November of '74, was for the Chicago
Symphony. I knewthere was no way I was going to win this -- I was this
kid, this greenhorn,"Phil Who?" Well, I ended up winning the audition.
I was shocked. I startedwith the Chicago Symphony in January of '75.
How many trumpets do you own?
Total, I might have as many as 20. You have to understand that if
you startat middle C on the piano, and play up one octave, there's a
trumpet that'sbuilt on that key: There's a C trumpet, a D trumpet, an
E-flat, an E, an F,a G, an A, a high B-flat, and a low B-flat.
I have two primary trumpets: I have a primary C trumpet,
pitched in (the keyof ) C, which I use in the orchestra 98.9 percent of
the time. And I have aprimary B-flat trumpet, which I practice on, and
which is the standard trumpetof trumpet-players. I do a lot of solo
work on that -- a lot of solos are forB-flat and for C.
Depending on the music we play, we'll play on either a German
trumpet or anAmerican trumpet. Germans refer to our piston-valve
trumpets as "jazz trumpets."I play the piston-valve C and the
piston-valve B-flat. If your kid goes toschool and plays trumpet,
they're going to give him a piston-valve B-flat --that's the standard
trumpet. When your kid finally comes to Juilliard, andstarts to play
orchestral music, we say you need to think about a C trumpet.
When your kid gets halfway through Juilliard, we say you need
to start thinkingabout a German trumpet, either B-flat or C. The
playing mechanics are the same,in terms of what you do with your mouth
and with the fingerings. (But) thevalves are like French horn valves --
they're rotors, they're not pistons.
What's the history of the C trumpet you use for most of your
orchestral playing?I'm in a crisis right now. My C trumpet -- my baby
-- I bought in 1975; itwas one of the trumpets I got when I first went
to the Chicago Symphony. AndI know that baby, I know everything about
that horn. It's worn in. It's comfortable,like an old coat or a
favorite pair of shoes -- it bends in the right places.
In one sense, a horn gets better with age, because it loosens
up and beginsto vibrate. But like all things, it wears out. It can
almost be blown out.Some people will have the same instrument for a
lifetime -- and I was tryingto do that. But my trumpet, the valves got
loose; I had to have them tightenedup. The acids in my hand were eating
through the metal, so I had to have somepatches put on the instrument,
and have it re-plated.
When I got the horn back, the workmanship was fantastic - but
the quality ofplaying ... . That horn took a nosedive. It just didn't
resonate the way thatI was used to it resonating. And now I have got a
brand new trumpet that I'mbreaking in -- which is the first C trumpet
that I've broken in, in 25 years.
It's hard to change. If I pick up a new trumpet to play a
concert, it's like,"Oh man, that didn't feel right," or "Crumbs! That
was out of tune" -- I'mhaving conversations with myself that I don't
want to have.
What does a new trumpet cost?
Mine is off-the-shelf, from Dillon's Music Shop in Woodbridge, New
Jersey.They're upwards of 1,800 bucks -- somewhere in that range. I
don't have tomortgage my house or anything.
All trumpets are initially made of brass. The brass can have
different contentsof copper and different materials, and that changes
the sound. Some peoplelike to play an instrument that's made of raw
brass; that usually looks kindaugly -- they get green. You can lacquer
the trumpet, which is a clear coatthat goes over the raw brass, which
makes it look kind of golden. The troublewith that is that the lacquer
wears off quickly.
You can cover the brass with silver plate, which is what I
usually do. Andyou can gold-plate the instrument. Gold won't adhere to
brass, so you haveto put silver on it first, then gold; gold will only
adhere to the silver.I like to gold-plate my smaller trumpets because I
think it warms the sound:The smaller the trumpet, in general, the more
piercing the sound becomes.
Those, basically, are your choices: brass, raw brass, lacquered brass, silver-platedbrass, gold-plated brass.
What's required by way of daily or weekly maintenance on your
trumpets?Swabbing it out; keeping it clean. We have brushes, cloths
that we pull throughthe horn sometimes. And we also have spitballs. You
can make them yourself:You take a sponge slightly bigger than the bore
of the horn, and you just pokeit in, then blow it through. It swabs out
the inside.
The other thing you do is keep the slides -- all the moving
parts - greasedso they don't freeze, so you can control your pitch. And
you keep the pistons,or the rotors, lubricated with an oil, to keep
them moving. You'll see me indungarees in rehearsals, because I have
ruined so many pairs of pants withoil and grease.
How do you maintain yourself?
I'll work out, sometimes, with a breathing bag: We blow up a 5- or
6-literbag, so we can get the feel of the air coming from our lungs, up
through ourthroat, keeping relaxed muscles all the way up.
Lip care is important. I just did a recording out in New
Mexico, where it'sincredibly dry. And I had the worst time out there --
I couldn't keep my lipsmoist enough. And I don't respond well to
creams, or waxy lip balms. I canfeel almost a muscle in my lip when I'm
in shape, and when I put cream on,I sometimes feel that that muscle
gets kind of jellied.
I can sit there and tell you to do this with your mouth, and
make sure youblow, and that doesn't translate into anything. First is
hearing it in yourhead; the other part is your heart -- having this
innate part of our soul thatneeds to express itself. Music is not just
the black dots on the white paper-- it's what happens when those black
dots on the white paper go into yourheart, and come out again.
How forgiving an instrument is the trumpet?A trumpet is a bold
instrument; a signal instrument. From days of old, thetrumpet was the
instrument that called people to battle; it called people togatherings.
But whether you're on a ram's horn or a legitimate trumpet, ifyou don't
hit the note right in the middle, that's going to be heard -- andit's
going to be brutal. There's a verse in the Bible that says, "If a
trumpetsounds an uncertain sound, who will prepare for battle?"
It's more unforgiving for the youngster than it is for the
professional. That'swhy I like to start kids on cornet, because the
cornet is a softer-soundinginstrument. So a kid's first honk, his first
blat on a cornet, is a mellowblat. If you start with the trumpet, the
initial blat is more brash.
Do even professional trumpet-players "blat" now and then? Hit
bad notes?(Laughs.) We call them "clams," or "cacks," or "splee-ahs" --
they're common.
How important is dental care to a trumpet player?
Oh, you gotta take care of your teeth. When I was a kid, my two
front teethprotruded. My dentist said, "The best thing you could be
doing is playing trumpet,because that will naturally put them in line."
Poor gum health, chipping teeth-- all of that is a problem for brass
players.
Any kind of change in your teeth can be a problem. If you don't
like the wayyour teeth look, and some dentist says, "Oh, I'll just file
this down" -- youcan lose an octave, just like that. There are great
stories of prominent high-notejazz players who have a space between
their teeth. That space presents a turbulencewith the air stream, which
enables them to play up high. And some of theseplayers, not liking the
look of that space, had bonding done to make it lookgood -- and all of
a sudden, they can't play.
What happens when you get a cold?
You work through it. The worst thing is to have a bad throat -- the
aggravationof the air going through there is terrible. If you've got a
thick cold, youcan't hear properly - you can't tell about (sound)
balance, about pitch; youcan't breathe. But I don't like babying
things: "Oh, this week I can't play-- I have a cold." Get real. Short
of being on my death bed, I will be herefor performance.
The average work week for you would be how many hours long,
divided in whatway?Basically, we do four rehearsals a week --
two-and-a-half hours each -- andfour concerts a week, most concerts
being 2 hours and 15 minutes. That's theminimum schedule. We're only
guaranteed a day off; we can be called for rehearsalsor concerts on six
other days.
Our annual season is mid-September through end of May. Then we
go on tour forthe month of June. Then there are two or three weeks of
summer concerts inthe parks of New York City, and special festival
events in the hall. We'reoff for nine weeks a year -- nine weeks when
the orchestra is technically shutdown.
During that time, do you take a vacation from your instrument?
I will usually take two, three weeks off, and put the horn away.
It's for mentalrelief, more than anything else. But there are times
when I'll take my hornon vacation with me, just because I feel odd not
having it there. I may noteven practice it, but it's kind of like it
had to be in the car, it had tocome along.
My wife and I celebrated our 25th anniversary last year, and I
surprised herwith a cruise. I took a week off of work, but the week I
was to get back, Ihad a fairly substantial piece (to play). So I took
my horn on the cruise ship-- and that was weird, wandering the bowels
of the cruise ship, trying to finda place to practice. Here it was our
25th anniversary, and I had to say toher, "I'll meet you later at the
pool; I've got to get some time in on thehorn." She's great about that
-- that's just life; that's what I gotta do.
How much do you normally practice?Usually every day, although
I'm not pharasitical about it. I'll miss a dayif I feel that physically
I need a day off; I'll miss a day for mental health-- if I just gotta
have one day to not do this.
When I practice, it could be anywhere from one to up to three
hours. I preferto do that piecemeal. If you're practicing for an
hour-and-a-half, and you'replaying 55 out of every 60 minutes, you can
get to the point where it becomescounterproductive -- you're working
against yourself. You start feeling tired,you start missing things. I
may "practice" for an hour and a half, meaningI'm in the room for that
time, but I'm not playing the whole time. I may play,then I may spend
10 minutes marking the score, or putting on a CD and listening-- "How's
that guy do that?"
I didn't used to spend as much time on warm-up or fundamentals
as I do now.I'd just toot a few notes, and then bam! I'd be practicing
solos. I'll spendmore time now doing a little bit of mouthpiece
buzzing; some scales and fingerstudies; some of what I call "bugle
slurs" -- wavering notes by using justembouchure (position of lips).
I'll do some lip bends, where you "bend" thetone down a half a tone, by
in essence flexing your mouth muscles. You're buildingstrength in the
corners of your mouth - that's where a (trumpet player's) strengthis,
right there in the corners and extending to the cheek, where a dimple
wouldbe. I probably spend more than 20, 30 minutes a day doing that
kind of stuff.
I'm more prone to practice now than when I was younger. When I
was younger,it came easier. Now, I just need to practice more. I don't
consider myselfold -- I'll be 49 in April. But there are physical
effects. I don't think myrecovery powers are as fast as they were when
I was younger. Then, I seemedto have endurance that went forever; now,
building up endurance is somethingI have to work on. And my fingers
just don't work as fast as they used to.It's not that they're arthritic
-- it's just wear, and the natural state ofdecay, unfortunately.
But -- we get wiser. In many ways, I don't think I'm as good a
player as Iwas 10 years ago -- but I hope I'm a wiser player. We learn
what we've gotto do to play our best - and that's my job: to play the
best I can.
'Arrogance stinks'
Do you have a method for learning a new piece of music?
Do you use Yo-Yo Ma'smethod, where you master each measure before goingon to the next?I don't do the Yo-Yo Ma Method. I will oftentimes try to
just play throughthe thing and butcher it -- and then panic. (Laughs.)
And then I will becomemore methodical and work at it slowly, then get
it up to speed. When I getup to speed, I'll go back and play slowly
again, for the sake of building endurance.Repetition, repetition -- not
bar by bar, but phrase by phrase.
Are you a perfectionist?
I consider myself a perfectionist, yes. That helps you as a young
player, becauseit helps you see your goal: You set a standard and say,
"I'm going to achievethat; I'm going to work hard to do that."
Where it can be a detriment, at any age, is when you strive for
perfectionand don't achieve it -- and then become hard on yourself, and
put yourselfdown. Or you allow fear to come in.
Last night I was practicing an offstage horn solo, from the
Mahler Third Symphony-- a beautiful melody that comes from offstage.
Last time we played that here-- '97, I think it was -- I struggled on
that solo. I "cacked" notes. Thiswas a featured moment -- and I
shouldn't have missed those notes.
To me, it was a big deal. It was substandard. No one goes to a
concert to hearit fall apart -- people want to hear it perfect. As I
saw it, I let down myself,I let down my team, and I let down the
conductor. And you can ask my wife:I was ready to hand in my
resignation. That's what happens to someone who isa perfectionist.
That (solo) has become a mental point of fear for me, and I
don't like that.The Mahler Third is now on the schedule for 2001 -- and
I saw that, and theinitial thing in my soul was, "Oh, crumbs, here it
comes." So I just decided:I'm not going to wait till 2001 to practice
it. I'm going to be much more methodicalabout playing this thing all
the time.
You mentioned "letting down the team." How collegial is the orchestra -- andhow competitive is it?
Do "office politics" come into play?All of that exists in an orchestra,as it exists in any office. You can feelthe heat sometimes when a young
player comes into the orchestra, wanting todo the best they can - and
sometimes wishing you wouldn't do so good, so thatthey could get ahead.
I think a "principal" can sometimes be arrogant, andthat can create a
political hornet's nest. Arrogance stinks. And it only getsin the way,
whether it's coming from the principal or from the last guy inthe last
stand. It shouldn't come from the conductor, either.
You're the principal trumpet -- how do you see your role?
Your role as a principal player is to be an encourager to the other
membersof the section. You want to be an example. You want to be a good
colleague,interested in your colleagues -- not just from a musical
point of view, butfrom a personal point of view. I mean, we spend a
lifetime with each other,so you want to be a friend.
Above all else, as a principal player you want to be truthful,
when you passon to your section what comes your way from the conductor.
You want to be truthful-- but also temper what you say so it comes out
in a positive way, in a waythat uplifts somebody rather than bashes
them.
One leads by unification, not by power -- those that lead by
power eventuallyfall. I have been given the role of principal trumpet
in the New York Philharmonicfor a little slice of time. I need to be a
good steward of the position.
Your church, like others, stresses the importance of good
stewardship of one'sgifts. Is your trumpet playing a gift?My trumpet
playing is absolutely God's gift. In the beginning, this was a
lifechoice of mine -- but that was only because I was too dumb to know
that itwas a calling. I mean, it has to be, the way this has worked out
-- how I gotinto Juilliard when I really had no training; how on my
first audition, I becamea member of the Chicago Symphony; how on my
second audition, I became co-principaltrumpet in the New York
Philharmonic.
Each of us has specific gifts; each of us has specific roles to
play -- tolift people up, and to point to God Almighty. One of the
roles of being a Christianis to tell people about what Christ has done
for you, what Christ means toyou. Because of my role as principal
trumpet for the New York Philharmonic,I get a big opportunity to go out
and mix with young kids, to challenge them,to lift them up and say,
"Keep going; work harder."
It's politically incorrect to talk about one's faith -- but you
can't livea life without a faith in something. And our kids are being
told by the world,it seems, "don't worry about your faith." And I'm out
there saying, "No, yougotta think about what you believe, in whom you
believe, why you're here -are you just here by some quirk of your mom
and dad's unification? I don't think so."
Do you try to get your message out through words?
Through example -- how youlive your life? Through your trumpet playing?All of the above. My faith is a relationship with Christ in my heart -- ifyou've got that song in your heart, it's got to come out. It's part of whoI am -- I can't help it, I have to talk about it.<br />
But it's going to come out in my living, too. The truth of what I
say, hopefully,is expressed in how I live -- with gentleness, peace,
joy, love, kindness,compassion. And as a musician, it is going to be
expressed in your music, inhow well you play. I don't believe God is
into giving high C's, per se -- Ithink you have to practice. But I do
think God can put down a sense of calmand a sense of peace, and allow
you to play at the best of your ability.
There's no greater place for missionary service than in the
arts. Art is expressionof the heart, of God's gift -- and the
missionary duty here is to say, "Doyou realize where your gift came
from?"
Are there as many opportunities as there used to be for young
musicians todevelop their musical gifts?You do see the effect of music
being knocked out of the public schools. Thereare so many elementary
schools now that don't have bands. When I was in elementaryschool, we
had an orchestra, we had a marching band, we had a concert band.And it
was probably the most horrific-sounding thing in the world, but
nonetheless,it existed. There are pockets where it still exists, and
thank God for that.But it's been decimated.
That's a problem for orchestras. Kids are coming out and not
having a musicalexperience in school -- why, when they become adults
and work in the world,are they gonna want to go to a concert? What does
Joe Average Citizen reallycare about orchestral music? Their whole
musical experience has been some rapperor some yeller-and-screamer
type. If you don't play an instrument, you don'thave an appreciation
for it.
I see that in the number of empty seats. That's a big question
for us (at thePhilharmonic) right now: What do we have to do to bring
more people in? Howcan we make what we do more attractive? And are we
compromising ourselves whenwe play pops, or do (concert performances
of) "Sweeney Todd?" Those are alltough questions that are seriously
discussed.
Many orchestras try to fill the seats by regularly playing the
most familiarsymphonies, by the best-known composers. After 25 years of
playing some ofthese Classical Greatest Hits, are you ever bored by
them?Absolutely! It's like, "Crumbs, another Beethoven Ninth." We play
such a smallpercentage of what's out there. There are symphonies by
major composers thatI've still not played. Sibelius symphonies, for
example -- I mean, Sibeliusused to be a household word, but we hardly
play Sibelius anymore. I have yetto play Mahler Eight -- but I've
played Mahler's Fifth ad nauseum. We repeata lot.
What kind of music do you listen to?
I guess my tastes are pretty eclectic: I like contemporary music --what'stermed "easy listening" music. Obviously, I listen to
contemporary Christianmusic. One of my favorite groups is the Brooklyn
Tabernacle Choir -- I justlove that gospel thing.
What's the reaction when you tell people what you do for a
living?Sometimes, you'll get a knowledgeable reaction: "Oh, that's
quite an achievement."Sometimes, you'll get the reaction of: "You can
make a living, playing an instrument?"We're paid well enough. And to
make a living, doing what you love to do --you can't ask for anything
better. It's a bl
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