Category: Wheaton College

A musical miscellany

I was trained as a classical musician although I am very grateful my musical life did not fit narrowly into that single stylistic box. I am a firm believer in the value of the pluralistic musical life, whether as a performer or listener. During my long career as bass trombonist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra (1985-2012), I was very fortunate to play much of the important canon of western orchestral music that contained trombones: Beethoven (Symphonies 5 and 9), Mozart (he didn’t score for trombones in his symphonies, but I played his Requiem and several operas), all of the symphonies of Brahms, Schumann, Mahler, Tchaikovsky, and Bruckner, the tone poems of Richard Strauss, and so much more. And this I was blessed to do with some of the finest conductors of the twentieth and twenty first centuries—including Leonard Bernstein, Bernard Haitink, Seiji Ozawa, James Levine, Simon Rattle, Sir Colin Davis, and many others—and great soloists—including Mstislav Rostropovich, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Yo-Yo Ma, Jesseye Norman, Evgeny Kissin, Thomas Quasthoff, Gil Shaham, and many others—who inspired me in countless ways.

[Above: My final bow at Symphony Hall as a member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, May 2012. Behind me, standing, are concertmaster Malcolm Lowe and conductor Bernard Haitink following a performance of Beethoven Symphony No. 9.]

After graduation from Wheaton College (IL) in 1976—where I studied trombone with Edward Kleinhammer (bass trombonist of the Chicago Symphony from 1940-1985) and I have now come full circle as the College’s trombone professor since fall 2019—my wife and I moved to New York City. There I had a remarkably diverse performing life, playing concerts with the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra and American Symphony, Broadway shows (many performance of “The King and I” starring Yul Brynner), studio jingles and record sessions, jazz bands (including the Gerry Mulligan Big Band, the Elgart Band, and the Dave Chesky Band), and the Goldman Band, with which I played many concerts under the batons of Richard Franko Goldman and Ainslee Cox.

[Photo above: That’s me, warming up before a concert by the Goldman Band, summer of 1977, at the Guggenheim Bandshell next to the Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center. That summer, by the way, was when the New York City blackout of 1977 occurred on June 13, 1977. I was playing a concert with the Goldman Band at Lincoln Center at the moment the blackout struck. Seriously. But that’s another story. In this photo, sitting next to me, which his back to the camera, is trombonist Fred Braverman. Other members of the band at that time included William Arrowsmith, then principal oboist of the Metropolitan Opera, Abraham Perlstein, who had been the second trombonist of the NBC Symphony, and Bill Barber, tuba, who had played with Miles Davis in the seminal “Birth of the Cool” recording sessions and concerts. I learned a lot from my time playing in the Goldman Band. A. Lot.]

In all of this musical activity in New York City I was a free lancer, and a substitute in groups (apart from the Goldman band where I was a full member for four summer seasons, 1977-1980—six concerts a week for six weeks each summer). From day to day, I didn’t know what kind of music I might playing. The phone would ring, I would accept an engagement, gather up my trombone and bag of mutes, and head off to play. This plurality of musical styles served me well when I joined the Baltimore and then the Boston Symphony Orchestras, where “pops” concerts required me to play credibly in a host of styles.

Some of the richest fruit of my early experience in the jazz and commercial worlds came when I performed the two Bass Trombone Concertos written by my friend, Chris Brubeck, with the Boston Pops Orchestra. Working with Chris was pure joy, as was meeting his father, Dave Brubeck. I played Chris’ first Bass Trombone Concerto several times with the Boston Pops, including a performance of the third movement, “James Brown in the Twilight Zone,” on national television as part of the “Evening at Pops” television show. The photo above shows me performing the Concerto with the Boston Pops in 2011, with Keith Lockhart, conductor (photo by Michael J. Lutch). Susan Stempleski reviewed the concert for classicalsource.com and wrote, in part:

Lockhart introduced Douglas Yeo, bass trombonist of the Boston Symphony and Boston Pops orchestras, who delivered a wonderful and lively rendition of “James Brown in the Twilight Zone”, a movement from Chris Brubeck’s jazz-flavored Concerto for Bass Trombone and Orchestra. Yeo’s virtuosic performance electrified the audience. Brubeck was in the audience.

In 1996, I began my exploration into early music, first with serpent, then ophicleide, then the early trombone (often referred to as “sackbut”), buccin (dragon bell trombone), and six-valve trombone. This opened another musical world to me, where I have taken part in performances of music that I would not have ever played on bass trombone. I’ve played serpent on a host of pieces with orchestras (both modern orchestras and early music groups) including Hector Berlioz’s Messe solennelle and Symphonie fantastique, Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 5 (Reformation) and Meerestille und glückliche Fahrt overture (Calm Seas and Prosperous Voyage), ophicleide on Berlioz’s Damnation of Faust and Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and early trombone on Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 and L’Orfeo. And I’ve given many recitals that feature serpent, ophicleide, six-valve trombone, and buccin, such as when I gave a concert on nine different instruments in 2015 at the Hamamatsu Museum of Musical Instruments in Hamamatsu, Japan, shown in the photo above.

Today, in this season of life since I retired from the Boston Symphony in 2012, I feel exceptionally blessed to continue to explore playing music in a host of styles, genres, and types of ensembles. Recent months have brought a number of rewarding musical experiences into my orbit. I do not take this for granted, and I am grateful that I continue to get invitations to do interesting things with a trombone (or another instrument) in my hand.

In December 2019, I was in Austin, Texas, taking part in performances of Felix Mendelssohn’s oratorio, Elijah. The concerts were organized by George Dupere, Chief Musician of Redeemeer Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Austin. I have played this piece many times, both the bass trombone and ophicleide parts, and I never tire of it. Never. The piece is so masterfully composed, and it contains such tremendous drama. This time, I played ophicleide with a fine orchestra including some of our brass section, above (left to right): Jamey Van Zandt, Nathaniel Brickens, and Owen Homayoun, trombones, and Chris Carol and Shelby Lewis, natural trumpets.

Just a few days later, I switched musical gears into the jazz world. I was delighted to be asked to be part of an “all star” brass jazz ensemble that was put together by YAMAHA for the Midwest Clinic, an annual convention held in Chicago. The Clinic features classes and performances over several days, and is one of the largest (the largest?) such events in the world. Our concert featured some terrific Christmas music, including carols arranged for trumpets, horns, trombones, tuba, and rhythm section by Stan Kenton, Ralph Carmichael, Sam Pilafian, JD Shaw, Jose Sibaja, and others. Boston Brass made up the core of the group and our trombone section (shown in performance above) consisted of Wycliffe Gordon, Domingo Pagliuca (of Boston Brass) and me. Great guys; great players. John Wittman conducted (shown in the photo on the right).

The trumpet section? Not a bad lineup, actually. Ha! Actually, this was a remarkable group of some of the greatest trumpet players in the world, shown backstage with me before the concert: Jose Sibaja (Boston Brass), Allen Vizzutti, Wayne Bergeron, (me), Jeff Conner (Boston Brass), Rex Richardson, and Jens Lindeman. Any questions?

It was such a pleasure to work with Wycliffe Gordon once again. He needs no introduction and it’s no secret to say he is one of the finest jazz trombonists of our time, for a long time member of the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra (I first met him at a joint concert between the LCJO and the Boston Symphony Orchestra), and now leader of his own combo. He has more albums out than I can count, and we are simpatico in so many ways. For years I’ve referred to Wycliffe as “my brother from another mother.”

In 2015, Arizona State University hosted Wycliffe for some masterclasses; this happened while I was Professor of Trombone at ASU. I included his trombone ensemble piece, Dear Lord, I Love Thee on our April 2015 concert. Have a look and listen, above (to open this video in YouTube, click HERE). It was really, really great to see and work with Wycliffe again at the Midwest Clinic.

February 2020 brought more fun in a different musical world. My good friend Megumi Kanda—principal trombonist of the Milwaukee Symphony— and I travelled to St. Louis to give a joint recital and masterclass, sponsored by the St. Louis Low Brass Collective (STLLBC). Megumi is a superb player and wonderful person (I often refer to her as “my sister from another mother”), and we have done a number of joint events over the years. We also are authors of books about trombone orchestral excerpts and performance. Published by Encore Music Publishers, the annotated orchestral excerpt books, The One Hundred: Essential Works for the Symphonic Trombonist and The One Hundred: Essential Works for the Symphonic Bass Trombonist. To all of you who are reading this who have made our books part of your library: Thank you! And if you’re interested in the books, just click the links on the titles, above.

We began our masterclass with a duet, a movement of Philipp Telemann’s Canonic Sonata No. 3 that I arranged for inclusion in my book, Trombone Essentials, published by G. Schirmer.

We continued the class by each speaking to the assembled audience and then working with several young players. As you can see from the photos above, Megumi and I tend to be similarly demonstrative when we teach. How about a caption contest?! By the way, I should mention that Megumi is the recipient of the International Trombone Association’s 2020 ITA Award, the Association’s highest honor. She is so deserving of this honor, and it’s a pleasure for me—the 2014 recipient of the ITA Award—to welcome her into this special group of trombonists who have been so honored. I am at work on an article about her to be published later this year in the ITA Journal. Stay tuned; she has quite a story to tell!

Our recital on February 17 featured us playing solos and duets. I even used my six-valve trombone to perform Hector Berlioz’s Orasion funèbre from his Grand symphonie funèbre et triumphale. I want to send a shout out and big thank you to my good friend, Gerry Pagano (bass trombonist of the St. Louis Symphony) and all of those in the STLLBC who made this trip possible.

From a solo and duet recital in St. Louis I came back home to the Chicago area to play chamber music. On February 21, the Wheaton College Artist Series presented a concert that featured the Chicago-based brass quintet, Gaudete Brass, as well as organist Nicole Simental and the combined Wheaton College choral groups, conducted by Jerry Blackstone. The centerpiece of the concert was a performance of Morton Lauridsen’s Lux Aeterna. On the first half of the concert, Gaudete Brass performed Ingolf Dahl’s Music for Brass Instruments; Dahl was Lauridsen’s composition teacher at University of Southern California and the piece requires six players. I joined Gaudete Brass as its second trombonist (selfie of me with Gaudete Brass after a rehearsal in Edman Chapel, above).

[Photo above: Gaudete Brass in Adams Art Gallery on the campus of Wheaton College after our performance. (Left to right) Bill Baxtresser (trumpet), Joanna Schulz (horn), Charles Russell Roberts (trumpet), me, Paul Von Hoff (trombone), and Scott Tegge (tuba)

I have played Dahl’s piece on numerous occasions with groups in performances around the world. But I have to say that this collaboration was, to me, particularly special. First, Gaudete Brass is a superb group of musicians. They play at the highest level and it was a joy to work with them; I hope we will do more things together. Nice people, too! Also, the concert was held in Edman Memorial Chapel at Wheaton College, where, as a student there from 1974-1976, I took part in many concerts on that stage. Many memories came flooding back as I played in Edman Chapel with Gaudete Brass. And there was this. . .

In December, Gaudete Brass and I had a rehearsal in the Fine Arts Building, on Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago. That building has very special meaning for me: it was there, on the ninth floor, that I had my weekly trombone lesson with Edward Kleinhammer (bass trombonist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra from 1940-1985) while I was a student at Wheaton College. I had not been in that building since my last lesson with him in May 1976. Walking through the front doors brought back a flood of memories.

After the rehearsal with Gaudete Brass, I climbed the stairs up to the ninth floor, to once again walk down that long hallway (which has not changed a bit since 1976) and stand in front of room 918 where Mr. Kleinhammer had his studio. As I stood there, I reflected on how those lessons impacted me in so many ways. I could not go in the room this time, but I remember every detail of that small space: two chairs, two music stands, a table for music, and a sink (the bathroom is down the hall). This photo, below, shows the two of us after my last lesson in room 918 in 1976:

In that room my life was changed. If you did not see it earlier, click HERE to read the photo essay/tribute I wrote about him last year on what would have been his 100th birthday. He was a remarkable man.

And there is more to come. While my planned trip to Seattle to be guest soloist this weekend at the Northwest Band Festival was cancelled due to the coronavirus outbreak in Seattle, my calendar is full of other events in the coming months, including masterclasses at Interlochen Arts Academy and the Csehy Summer School of Music, performances with the Finnish National Radio Orchestra in Helsinki and Japan (unless the coronavirus has something to say about that trip), teaching at the Pokorny Seminar—hosted by Chicago Symphony tubist, Gene Pokorny—and teaching at the Wheaton College Summer Music Camp. Details may be found on the schedule page on my website, yeodoug.com.

[Header photo: Boston Symphony Orchestra, Bernard Haitink, conductor. My final performance in Symphony Hall as a member of the Boston Symphony, May 9, 2012; Beethoven Symphony No. 9. Photo by Stu Rosner; courtesy the Boston Symphony Orchestra.]

Coming back home: Teaching trombone at Wheaton College

They say you can’t go back. But I just did. In a circle of my life spanning 45 years, I’ve just gone back home. Just a few weeks ago, I was appointed the trombone teacher at my undergraduate alma mater, Wheaton College (Illinois). In a big sense, I feel like I’ve come home, returning to a place that dramatically shaped me even as I now have the opportunity to shape the lives of others.

[That’s me, warming up before a concert in Wheaton College’s Edman Chapel, spring 1975. This photo appeared in the 1975 edition of Tower, Wheaton College’s annual yearbook.]

It was while I was a student at Wheaton College that I studied trombone with Edward Kleinhammer, then bass trombonist of the Chicago Symphony, and started on my road to become an orchestral bass trombonist, a road that led me to the Boston Symphony Orchestra (1985-2012) and many other remarkable places.

[Edward Kleinhammer and me at my last lesson with him in his studio in the Fine Arts Building, Chicago, May 1976.]

It was while I was a student at Wheaton College that I met Dr. Harold Best—then the Dean of the Wheaton College Conservatory of Music and author of the remarkable book, Music Through the Eyes of Faith—and began an abiding and life-changing relationship with a man who began as my advisor, became my mentor, and is now one of my closest friends.

[Dr. Harold Best and me, at his home in Idaho, 2014.]

It was while I was a student at Wheaton College where, two weeks after the most wonderful girl in the world and I got married, we set up our first home. After 44 years of marriage, I thank God that she’s still that girl.

[August 31, 1975]

It was while I was a student at Wheaton College where I memorized all of the verses to Martin Luther’s great hymn, A Mighty Fortress is Our God (for extra credit on an exam), and since that time, I have recalled it every day of my life, especially its second verse:

Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing;

Were not the right Man on our side, the Man of God’s own choosing.

Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is He;

Lord Sabaoth His name, from age to age the same, and he must win the battle.

And it was at Wheaton College where our two daughters attended and graduated with degrees in music.

We all have hopes and dreams. One of mine, held for the last 45 years, has been that God might allow me to return to Wheaton College some day to serve on its faculty, and repay some of what that remarkable place gave to my family and me. Last month, that dream—that prayer—was answered most unexpectedly, when Dr. Michael Wilder, Dean of the Conservatory of Music and Division of Arts and Communication at Wheaton College, asked me to join Wheaton College’s faculty as its trombone teacher. It all happened so quickly, so remarkably, and after a time of prayer and consideration, I accepted.

In announcing my appointment, Dean Wilder said,

“We are delighted to welcome Douglas Yeo to the music faculty of the Conservatory of Music at Wheaton College. He brings an amazing life of experience as a performer, teacher, and thought leader in matters of artistry, faith, and creativity. A very few minutes with Douglas Yeo will pull any person into a whirlwind of ideas and inspiration and we are looking forward to all that he will accomplish at Wheaton College, as he invests in the lives of students, colleagues, alumni, and friends.”

I pray that I might live up to those words.

The fall 2019 semester is now half over, and my students and I are on fall break, a few days of refreshment before we head back to school for more trombone lessons, more trombone studio classes, more concerts, recitals, juries, and our ongoing exploration of music and music making.

So it is that on Tuesdays, you find me teaching lessons in room 022 of Wheaton College’s brand new (just two years old), state-of-the-art Armerding Center for Music and the Arts. It’s a teaching studio I share with four other Wheaton College faculty, a place where my students and I contend to be better stewards of the talents that God has given to us. On Fridays, I’m in the Armerding Center’s room 141, a spectacular “smart classroom” where we hold our weekly trombone studio class and engage in playing trombone ensembles and solos, listening to music, watching presentations, and much more.

[Armerding Center for the Performing Arts, Room 141.]

Next fall, Wheaton College will open a new 648 seat concert hall (this new hall is in addition to the Conservatory’s 101 seat recital hall and the 2400 seat Edman Memorial Chapel), making its music facilities second to none. My wife and I have been blessed to be able contribute to help with the construction and outfitting of these new music buildings and we’d like to encourage others who believe in the mission and work of Wheaton College to support the effort to complete the building of the Concert Hall. Click HERE to read a story about why we are helping with this and learn how you can join us and help as well.

Now, we are already beginning to make plans for the 2020-21 school year. Auditions will take place in the next several months—the deadline to apply for fall 2020 admission is January 10—and I am praying now for the group of students who will be part of the Wheaton College trombone studio next year. If you’re interested in studying trombone with me and attending an outstanding liberal arts college (which has a Conservatory of Music that has a superb undergraduate music curriculum that leads to a bachelor of arts, bachelor of music, or bachelor of music education degree; Wheaton also offers a minor in music), a college that has at its core the commitment to “Christ and His Kingdom,” a place that has high and rigorous academic standards in which students grow and learn to be good stewards of the talents God has given them, and a place that Forbes has recently named one of America’s Top Colleges, I’d like to encourage you to apply for admission. The Wheaton College Conservatory of Music website has details about everything you’d want to know about the study of music at Wheaton: a look at our facilities, biographies of all of our outstanding faculty, videos of large ensemble performances, and much more. You can also get details about how to apply to the Wheaton College Conservatory of Music by clicking HERE. The Conservatory’s mission statement stakes out our commitment to our students:

The Conservatory seeks to bring each of its students to an intellectual understanding of the theoretical, historical, and stylistic aspects of musical practice; to relate each of these to the vast literature of music; and to demand the highest level possible of technical and artistic achievement in performance, composition, and teaching. Most importantly the Conservatory seeks to undertake this task in the light of a biblical perspective which describes the making of music as an act of worship and service, calls for excellence as the norm of stewardship, and relates all of human creativity to the Creatorhood of God.

For more information about trombone study at Wheaton College, go to my bio page on the Wheaton College Conservatory website and click on the tab that says Faith and Learning. There you will find my underlying core philosophy of teaching, and the fundamentals of what it is that we work to do in Armerding Room 022 and 114, across campus, and even to the ends of the earth.

And if you are entering grades 9-12 in the fall of 2020 and are looking for an engaging, one-week long summer music program, I’d like you to know that I will be teaching at Wheaton College’s summer music camp, to be held next summer from June 21-28. This is an ideal way to explore music at Wheaton; for information, click HERE.

I’m back home again, at Wheaton College. If God leads you home there, too, I look forward to seeing you.

Celebrating student success

I began teaching trombone lessons in 1974, when I arrived at Wheaton College (Illinois) as a transfer student from my freshman year at Indiana University. Wheaton’s Conservatory of Music had a Preparatory Department where young players could come to take music lessons; students at the College were often the teachers. Because there were a number of students who wanted to take trombone lessons, I was asked to help with this. And thus my teaching career began.

Over the last 42 years, I’ve developed a manner of approaching the art of teaching, some of which I learned from the example of my teacher, Edward Kleinhammer. There are well-known teachers who try to get the best out of their students by treating them harshly, by getting angry, employing guilt and humiliation, setting students in a studio in competition against one another to “toughen them up.” I’ve never gone down this road. I have very high standards for my students. But I have found that when I lead by example and work with them in a way that both encourages and challenges them, we build a relationship that leads to good results all around.

When Edward Kleinhammer died in 2013, I wrote a tribute to him for the International Trombone Association Journal. For part of the article, I asked several of his students to write a few words about how they would remember him. Eric Carlson, second trombonist with the Philadelphia Orchestra–Eric and I also were students together at Wheaton College and played together for four years in the Baltimore Symphony–wrote this:

I had an hour train ride home after every lesson. During those rides, I formed the habit of writing down everything I could remember from my lesson, so I would be sure to practice properly in the upcoming week. By the time I finished writing, I would usually have a page or two of notes about things I needed to fix. I remember thinking at one point, “With all of these criticisms, how come I always feel so confident after my lessons?” With time, I realized it came down to two things: I always knew that the severe critiques came out of Ed’s desire to see me succeed. And, towards the end of every lesson, Ed would find a problem small enough to fix right then and there, so I always finished the lesson feeling like we had solved at least one problem that day.

“Ed’s desire to see me succeed.” Yes. That is a very important thing for teachers to communicate to their students. There is nothing like offering encouragement along with a challenge to fuel a person’s desire to continue working to a goal.

Last week, I received an email from a student in Japan. I’ve been to Japan over a dozen times, both on tour as a member of the Boston Symphony but also to teach and give masterclasses. Many of these teaching opportunities have come at the Hamamatsu International Wind Instrument Academy and Festival where I have been on the faculty on six occasions. Last week’s email came from Yuta Aoki who was in my class at the Hamamatsu Academy in 2014 and 2015. He told me that he had formed a trombone quartet made up of students who had been in my class during those years and that they had recently taken 4th place in a trombone quartet competition; their debut concert will be in September. I was so happy for their success, but also so pleased that they wanted to share this news with me. Even though we are 6000 miles apart, they know that I rejoice with them. To (left to right in the poster above) Yusuke Nishi, Ayaka Watanabe, Noriyuke Komatsu and Yuta Aoki, I send congratulations again, and I wish you well in your upcoming concert. Bravi! And to teachers who are reading this, don’t forget to celebrate the success of your students, no matter how small. Your encouragement is part of the fuel that drives them.

Motivation

Yesterday, I was at a New Balance factory outlet buying some new sneakers. I’ve always liked New Balance shoes. They fit. Their shoes are made in the USA. When we lived in Boston, we often passed by their corporate headquarters that was near the headquarters for the flagship public radio and television stations, WGBH. So when I needed some new sneakers, it was off to the New Balance factory outlet near our home.

Nice people work there. Attentive, knowledgable. And I walked out of the store with two pairs of sneakers. While browsing around, I noticed a display of t-shirts with slogans on them. Here are two of them:

Motivational slogans. You see these all the time. They are very big in the corporate world. How many times have you been in an office and seen one of these posters:

Be_the_bridge

Motivational posters by Successories.com

They have also provoked a backlash, the cynical DE-motivational poster:

dysfunctiondemotivator

Demotivational posters by Despair.com

One of the big threads of conversation in the teaching world is how to motivate students. Anyone who has been a teacher of any subject knows that a classroom is full of students who have different goals, different energy and skill levels, and who approach tasks differently. Teachers try many things to help students want to learn. Countless books have been written on the subject.

For over 20 years of my career in the Boston Symphony Orchestra, I sat next to Norman Bolter. Norman played second trombone in the BSO and principal trombone in the Boston Pops Orchestra. We are nearly the same age – he’s my big brother by four months – and we were and remain good friends even since we have both retired from the orchestra. We both taught together at New England Conservatory of Music and we spent a lot of time talking about teaching, our students and trombone pedagogy. One day, we were talking about some of our students who just didn’t seem to be making progress. I commented that one of my students was very talented but he seemed lazy and wasn’t working to his potential. To which Norman said:

“Doug, I can give my students a lot of things. But I can’t give them desire.”

BINGO. I cannot motivate my students. I cannot make them want to work hard, want to be curious, want to explore, want to go the extra mile, want to understand what is needed to succeed, want to be great at what they do. Those things need to come from the inside, not the outside. But I CAN lead by example, be honest, share all I know, offer strategies for improvement. These are two different things. If a student doesn’t have the desire, the motivation to work, then someone else can’t give it to them. A pretty poster won’t give it to them either.

Norman was – and is – right. You can’t give someone else desire. The fuel to get better, the fuel to become great at something, the fuel to make a difference has to come from within. For me, that fuel has fed and feeds my engine in two ways:

When I was a student at Wheaton College, the great trumpet player Maurice André gave a concert on campus with a small chamber orchestra. My teacher, Edward Kleinhammer, also came to the concert and the next day I had a lesson with him. I burst into his studio in the Fine Arts Building in Chicago and began babbling away, “Wow, wasn’t Andre amazing?! I’ve never heard anything like that!”Blah, blah, blah. After my superlatives were spent, Mr. Kleinhammer looked at me and said, quietly, “André. Yes, he was really good. But, look. Did you see that bass player? He made a concerto out of every note.” I missed it. I was focused on one thing – the great trumpet soloist. But I missed the bass player who was doing his job excellently in support of the great soloist. I learned at that moment that I needed to pay attention. Pay attention to things – even and especially little things – so I did not miss something that I could take and make my own. Paying attention gave me fuel for my engine as I internalized my observations of others who were demonstrating excellence in their field, whether music, art, business, or even the act of being a knowledgeable shoe salesman.

I am very aware that my talents and abilities are a gift from God; I cannot take credit for them. As a result, I have a responsibility to be a good steward of those gifts, to use them well and wisely. So my desire to improve on the trombone, or write an article that gives people something to think about, or share what I have been given with others, comes from my understanding that everything I have is a gift from God and I have a responsibility to use it wisely. The Parable of the Talents is fuel for my engine, a daily reminder of how I return to God the investment I make with that which he has given to me.

The New Balance t-shirt slogans are cute. I smiled when I saw them. But I wasn’t fooled. They didn’t make me want to go home and practice. Something else fueled that within me. Something much bigger.