cobs (1915-1998), the famous tubist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and during his lifetime (and perhaps since) the world’s leading expert on pulmonary function as related to wind playing. Interestingly, even though Jacobs possessed great knowledge of the physical aspects of brass playing, his “Song and Wind” approach placed primary emphasis on the “song,” one’s mental concept of the desired sound, and he exhorted students to avoid overthinking about what the body is doing while playing beyond efficiently moving air in and out (“wind”). Although I have less immediate familiarity with Jacobs’s teaching than with Remington’s, the sense I get from his students (and their students) is one that places far less emphasis on a daily regimen of technical exercises than on simply playing musically and allowing the body to work.
In the often-polarizing environment that is the internet, advocates of these two extremes rarely seem to find a way to “meet in the middle.” But can they? I think so. My students certainly have heard me invoke both Remington and Jacobs on numerous occasions when the approach of one or the other will yield the best result. I have a great appreciation for Jacobs’s approach—in fact, one of the great regrets of my professional life is that I was unable to take a lesson with him before he passed. Besides a general appreciation for his knowledge of and approach to the breath, I think that many, many brass players think too much about “what to do” when playing and far too little about “how it sounds.” Jacobs’s fundamentally musical approach frees players to focus on the music and not on the body…and then to their surprise and delight they discover that only then does the body “work right.”
Nevertheless, I suppose if I were forced to align myself with one of these “camps” or the other, I would choose Remington. My trombone teachers at the collegiate level included a Remington student and student-of-a-Remington-student, so my training was largely in that tradition. My own daily routines, which I have developed over nearly 25 years, have a small following in the brass playing world and immediately betray a decidedly “Remingtonian” influence. While I use routines of varying length (depending on factors such as student ability, available practice time, etc.) and will vary the exercises somewhat to address immediate concerns, I find that returning each day to familiar patterns helps me to prepare not only physically but mentally for the demands of my profession. Incidentally, I find that this daily repetition (though not necessarily first thing each day) leaves me free to approach the “real work” of performing and teaching in a much more “Song and Wind” manner.
Although I have occasionally experimented with abandoning the daily routine approach, I’ve never lasted very long doing that. These “old paths,” this familiar way of approaching brass playing has a centering, almost catechetical effect, as I am each day reminded of the very basic elements of playing a brass instrument correctly before moving on to focus on “the music.”
And that deliberate word choice (“catechetical”) hints at the topic I’ll address in Part Two, Lord willing.
From an early age, many band students are drilled in the “Pyramid of Sound” model for achieving a properly balanced ensemble sound. This model was perhaps most prominently championed by the prominent band composer and conductor W. Francis McBeth (1933-2012) and is used by band conductors throughout the United States. When rightly applied, the Pyramid of Sound is an effective tool for balancing not just concert bands, but practically any type of ensemble. The concept is very simple: the lowest instruments and parts in the group should be loudest, forming a foundation upon which higher parts build, becoming progressively softer until the highest notes are played most softly. Because human beings tend to perceive high pitches more readily than low ones, ensembles that are balanced in this way tend to have pleasing sounds where all parts are easily heard.
So far, so good, but difficulties arise