Successful "Wrong" Trumpet Embouchures

Jon Faddis

My wife calls my trumpet my mistress. Don't think so. It's way too high maintenance.

The fact is, for many of us, the struggle to find the right embouchure can seem sisyphean. There is so much bad information-especially for young players (see my post on mouthpieces); so much cant, rhetoric and conflicting theories. Right now, I have put myself in the hands of John Lynch. Previously, I have been indentured to Pivot-Master Donald Reinhardt, Mr. Superchops Jerome Callet, the carefree John Coffey and, finally, my first teacher, who told me not to tell my mother he told me, but that I had to bear down like I was taking a poop.

The fact is, there is no single right way to do it and for those of us who have chased this unholy grail through the years, it can be a comfort and an inspiration to see people do it the wrong way and yet become masters. In that spirit, here are a few examples of how right wrong can be:

Here is the great bop player Bill Hardman. Note how far off to the left side he plays:



Here's cornettist Ruby Braff who, if anything, plays even more off to the left than Hardman:




High note king Maynard Ferguson plays way over the the right of his chops.



Don't want to shortchange the swing players. Here's Ziggy Elman, playing off to the left.


Jon Faddis plays off to the left and also uses very exaggerated head movements to change register. Jon-don't ya know you're not supposed to move your head?


I always love an excuse to post this video. Here are two of the greatest-Diz and Pops. Pops played off to the right and Dizzy is the most famous "wrong-way to-play" genius in jazz history.


Trumpet players are an admixture of masochist and dreamer, as those who live with us know. In exchange for the head, neck and backaches and cyclical depression, we thirst for the daily chance to live several lifetimes in one practice session. To us, beyond every crumbling G there lurks a golden double G, crystalline, centered and in tune, or a perfect negotiation of Rhythm Changes.

Sex may be a rival to this experience; but little else.

"Vote With Your Ears-Dizzy for Pres." by Steve Provizer

 

Vote for Herbie

Herbert Hoover's advisers no doubt warned him that getting endorsements from Red Allen or Miff Mole might backfire. Ditto Harry Truman, who never sought the support of Bird-or even Tommy Dorsey. Ronald Reagan never thought that the backing of Archie Shepp would seal the deal.


Through most of its history, even in its mainstream swing heyday, jazz was considered dionysian enough to be vaguely disreputable. Eventually, you got jazz people invited to the White House and there was even a period when jazzmen were sent abroad as "ambassadors"-never a really comfortable fit, as exemplified by the fact that when Armstrong was photographed in full Ambassador's get-up, he was carrying a briefcase which happened to be full, as he said, of "that fine moota[pot]."

Listening to Brubeck's 1962 album (and unproduced musical) "The Real Ambassadors" wrestle with the wrongs and rights of collaboration with the US government is like observing through a one-way mirror as a group of confused psychologists scratch each other's van dycks. 

While there have been many jazz songs about civil rights, injustice, war-Trane's "Alabama," Nina Simone's "Mississippi Goddamn," "Compared to What," by Les McCann-the only jazz title I know of that addresses politicians directly in any way-deprecating or not-is Mingus' "Fables of Faubus." That came at a point when rock and roll had pretty much usurped the mantle of disreputability from jazz.

Jazz musicians, subject to the whims of local, state and federal beaurocracies and law-enforcement, may have been reluctant to shake those trees. Whatever the reasons, the relationship between specifically electoral politics and jazz has been almost non-existent.

With these depressing 2010 mid-term elections upon us, I'd like to recall an odd and for me, lovely moment when jazz and electoral politics became strange bedfellows: Dizzy Gillespie's campaign for President in 1963-64.


Dizzy had marketed "Dizzy for President" badges as a laugher, to raise money for Core (Congress for Racial Equality), and other civil rights projects under Dr Martin Luther King's direction. But people responded so strongly that Dizzy let it happen and buttons and bumper stickers sprouted in hip enclaves throughout the land. Dizzy's response was perfectly modulated, letting us know in his sly way that he understood and shared with us the multiple layers of irony and seriousness that his participation brought to this mid Vietnam-era election.

Unfortunately, Dizzy's character sealed his fate as a candidate. Too funny, for one thing. Also too wry, too arch, too dedicated to music, weed and worst of all, too honest. Eventually, LBJ beat Barry Goldwater.

Dizzy may have dropped out of the 1964 race, but when I got old enough to vote, in 1968, I wrote his name in on my ballot for President and I was not alone. You may know who won that election: Tricky Dick Nixon and Spiro Agnew. Jazz people: I know how hard it is to take this stuff seriously, but...

Sarah Palin aide Fred Malek helped former President Richard Nixon dump Jews from government

Comfort-Food Jazz by Steve Provizer

As Flann O'Brien once wrote, in "At-Swim-Two-Birds":


"When things go wrong and will not come right,
Though you do the best you can,
When life seems black as the hour of night,
A pint of plain is your only man."


Well, the man was an alcoholic, so his RX for the blues was a little narrow.


Jazz may not be the magic elixir. It may not make the lame strap on roller blades. It may not even make ugly people look better at closing time, but still we turn to it for succor.


In this needy state, you may find your choices are less adventurous than usual. If it was food you chose to fill the hole in your soul, you might pass on the escargots and go for the beef stew. It's it's music, you might opt for cozy over adventurous-at least I do. What do I want for my "comfort jazz"? Allowing myself the obligatory ten choices:


Mulligan, Getz and Brookmeyer together.
Late Billie Holiday
Early Ellington
Coltrane's Crescent
Miles on Prestige
Dizzy singing
Clifford's "Ghost of a Chance"
King Pleasure
Ella doing ballads during the 50's
Eldridge-"After You've Gone"

What's your jazz for solace?