Where it all began.

Last night, at the conclusion of Thanksgiving evening and an enjoyable evening with family when I was gathering my things to leave my parents’ house, my mom reminded me that my old trumpet was waiting for me in the entry way.

My old trumpet.

In some ways, it was the family trumpet. My brother inherited it temporarily when I had graduated to baritone and sousaphone and high school, and he felt the weight of becoming well rounded musically like his siblings. My sister had played viola in orchestra in middle and high school. I joined the band with that trumpet as a 5th grader. My brother followed in my footsteps, at my parents’ frugal prodding. For him, band just wasn’t his deal. My parents evidently went to his first concert, and he made it clear he was present, playing his own variations on the evening’s chosen songs. He explained to my folks that he just didn’t like to practice. That was enough to assist him out of the musical arts, and the trumpet drifted back to being Welton communal property. That’s okay. He’s supremely gifted in a number of areas in life.

But that trumpet began as my selected instrument when I was at Hubert Humphrey Elementary School in fifth grade, I think in part because Chuck Mangione was cool at the time, and the trumpet was cool looking. I remember a significant facination in the brass section those early years with the spit valve. You got spit in the horn, and yu had to empty it in time, or your notes would gurgle. We could just drain our trumpets from the spit valves right there on the band hall floor. Wow.

I was always a mediocre musician. I enjoyed the camaraderie and community I felt in the band circles in mid and high school. I excelled in music in school largely because I was tall and I was willing to play the bigger and bassier instruments. By seventh grade, Mr. Mattern had me on the baritone, and for 8th grade, I was converted into a tubist, which paid dividends for my two years of high school band. I was immediately in the marching band at Eldorado, even though I am not sure how well I really played that instrument, and I was immediately in Intermediate Band my freshman year, and the heralded Wind Ensemble the ext- all because I would lug that monster tubey contraption around. but I enjoyed those band years quite a bit.

And the trumpet was for a short time my brothers.

The horn is still in pretty good shape. Third valve sticks a little, but no valves are dented or fused closed.

I could still play a basic scale on it when I took it out of its case today.

Chuck Mangione is still cool, along with that modern jazz bugler I appreciate today- Chris Botti.

Yeah. Trumpets. They are pretty cool.