I ended up on this road due to the downturn in the economy. Just five years ago I worked as a courier in the Atlanta area and then everything started going to hell. The courier company I contracted with began loosing their contracts and before I knew it, there was not enough business. I had to find some other way to make extra money. Like so many others we have to do what ever we can do to survive. After sending out resumes asking friends and family for leads , I had few bites and no catch. I decided to use what God gave me. I am a musician and I need to put my talent to use.
I played trumpet from fourth grade all the way through high school and eventually joined the US Army and became an army bandsmen. After my stint in the Army, I left and went to New York and began gigging around town. I took any gig I could but most was jazz related and session work with some salsa tossed in. I met my wife and wanted to settle down and decided that being a freelance musician wasn't going to cut it. I got a job working for the Guggenheim Museum. I still had the desire to play but eventually with all the pressures of work I gave up playing trumpet soon afterwards and sold my horn out of frustration because my trumpet playing was only getting worse. I didn’t touch an instrument for the next 15 years.
After 13 years living in a cramped queens NY apartment, my wife and I made the decision to buy a house in a Atlanta suburb, start a business and go for the American dream. While working as a courier in Atlanta, my wife encouraged me to start playing again. I wasn't all that happy as a courier and was convinced that my days were numbered and I would eventually get killed while plowing my van through the crazy Atlanta traffic. I needed some way to relieve the stress. It didn't take much convincing from my wife and I soon decided on the horn that I wanted to buy. For me, my choice of horn was easy. I always loved the tone on the flugelhorn and because I was getting back into music for fun I bought a Yamaha Bobby Shew inspired flugel. Hell my goal was just to have fun and not make money. I had a job anyway. Well we know what happened with that.
One day while practicing on my flugel something clicked in my brain and the tone of the flugel started to sound too heavy to my ears and I felt that it just wasn't my voice. I realized that I've been bitten by the music bug again. I started to take my music serious again. I bought a Kanstul Chicago 1001 which is a copy of the classic benge horns. It was the horn I played while I was in the Army and gigging around New York years earlier. Like so many other trumpet players I spent tons of money on mouthpieces and paraphernalia that became nothing but paperweights. Suddenly I was seeking that perfect sound concept I heard in my head. I searched high and low for that sound until one day I jumped onto youtube and heard a cornet solo played by David Daws. He is a brass band cornetist and one of the best in the world. There was a human quality to his tone that reminded me of the sound concept I wanted. I continued my journey and began seeking out other cornet players. Players like Roger Webster, Richard Marshall, Phil McCann and Gerald Schwartz. All of them had a certain flavor that made them sound different from each other. However, they all had all had one thing that really makes the cornet stand out. That one thing is the almost human like quality in their tone. One other thing I noticed too was that they where playing the short model shepherds cook cornet.
After hearing the cornet I thought to myself that this horn must have showed its head somewhere in the jazz scene in the past. I did my research and eventually discovered that it was indeed very popular in jazz. In fact it was the go-to high brass jazz instrument during the dawn of jazz. However, as jazz bands got larger, the local nightspots became louder and instruments got amplified the trumpet became the high brass instrument of choice. Cornets just didn’t have the power and brilliance to cut through the new and louder stage.
Not to be outdone, the cornet went through a few changes in order to compete with the newer and louder trumpet for attention. Two changes in particular were the Bach styled trumpet mouthpieces for cornet. Instead of the deep v traditional cornet mouthpiece, also known as a cookie cutter, this concoction was simply a trumpet “c “cup mouthpiece on a cornet shank. The other change was the long cornet. Instead of having a shepherds crook, it had a strait bell. The changers added up made the cornet more powerful and brilliant. Now the cornet can cut through the noise. The idea worked a little, especially for Dixieland, but in the allot of cornet players just gravitated to the trumpet. Allot of trumpeters and diehard cornet players argued that this is what eventually caused the decline of the cornet. The long cornet was just simply a trumpet that looked sort of like a cornet. The lines became too blurred. The cornet moved closer to sounding like a trumpet and the trumpet became civilized. The main hold-out for the human like cornet sound was the brass band scene in Europe, in particular the UK.
I didn’t give up on finding jazz cornetist in America after I learned how the cornet fell out of favor. Louis Armstrong began his career playing the cornet. I even have a couple of photos of him holding a short model. shepherds crook. Buddy Bolden, Bix Beiderbecke, Nat Adderly, Warren Vache, Thad Jones, Art Farmer and Chet Baker. These guys are the masters I have to look to and learn from.
I've always been aware of the cornet and I remember seeing long cornets sitting in the corners of band rooms from elementary through high school. They were just sitting in the corner with dust collecting on their cases. Like so many young trumpet players I thought they looked like funny trumpets that sound just like regular trumpets and had a stuffy feel. Since looking cool was one of my priorities there was no way in hell that I was going to be seen with one of them things stuck to my face. The next time I remembered playing the cornet was when I was in the Army Band. We used Bach cornets. I can’t remember the model number but I do know they were long cornets. The only time we would drag our long cornets out of their cases were in concert band rehearsal and during concerts. I know for myself I hated to play the thing as with everyone else in the trumpet section... However I do remember that their small sturdy cases made good foot rests and card tables on long bus rides to concerts.
Eventually I sold my flugel and found enough money to buy my very first and only cornet. There were many brands and models of cornets to research and finally after a month it was between the Kanstul 1530 and the Getzen 3850. In the end I decided to buy the getzen 3850 with rose brass bell. The Getzen was reasonably priced, has a gorgeous tone, and the best valves in the business.
For the next year I played nothing but cornet. The only instrument that can help me achieve the sound concept in my head is the cornet and I had no use for the trumpet anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not biased against the trumpet. In fact I like to listen to a well played trumpet especially in jazz. The tone of the trumpet does not match the sound concept that I hear. Eventually, I got to the point to where I thought that I was ready to venture out into the local jazz seen and test my cornet skills. This is where I really began to run into the realities of playing the cornet vs. trumpet.
Playing the cornet at home vs. playing a cornet in a live jazz setting are two very different animals. Now I see why so many cornet players including Louis Armstrong switched over to playing the trumpet. Unlike practicing in the comfort of your own home, you don’t get the instant feedback from the sound bouncing off the walls that are close by. You must find a way to cut through amplified guitars, amplified keyboards, loud drums, and other assorted noises associated with restaurants, clubs, and other large or outdoor venues. All of these things help to absorb the sweet sounds coming out of the end of your cornet and robbing you of the feedback you need. Trumpets have enough edge and power to cut through with little effort. For the next year I went on what seemed to be a never ending journey to figure out how to make the cornet sound like a cornet while not playing it like a trumpet in a jazz setting.
Finally, I figured out how to make it in a live jazz setting while playing the cornet. And this is without amplification too. Just listen to some of the old turn of the century recordings of cornet players like Herbert L Clarke and John Baptist Arbans. These guys did amazing things with their cornets and without amplification. The first thing you must do is realize that the cornet is not a trumpet. They are similar in many ways, but they are truly different horns. The strength of the trumpet is its brilliance and power. The cornet is not about power. Its strength is in agility and finesse and precision. In a jazz setting, if you play the cornet like a trumpet you are going to get worn out real fast. If you intend to get on the stage and try to blow the walls down and crack glass while playing above the staff all night you are going to be in for a big surprise. I know because I’ve been through it. If you feel the need to wail on the cornet like a trumpet player save your money and breath and stick to the trumpet.
Another thing that I learned was that mouthpiece safaris do nothing but delay your progression on the cornet. I went through tons of mouthpieces sometimes switching back and forwards from one to another. The switches would usually happen after I stick to a mouthpiece for a week and as soon as I had a bad night at a jam session, I would try to fix it by switching to another mouthpiece. I got to the point to where I couldn’t play in public anymore. I couldn’t even hear myself on stage anymore. It felt like I was playing in a black hole every time I was on stage. Things were so bad that I spent more time trying to squeeze notes out my horn than concentrating on the chord changes. One thing snowballed into another. I became so obsessed with this problem that I was forced to stop relearning all the head charts that I’ve forgotten how to play and focus on just getting notes out of my axe.
Then one night during a jam session, I had an epiphany. After a bad set of not being able to hear myself on stage I borrowed a trumpet from a friend. I played and again the same thing happened. My sound went into the mysterious black hole. I was playing the trumpet. This was not supposed to happen. Trumpets are supposed to cut though all the noise and the room wasn’t packed that night. Not only did it not matter what mouthpiece I was using but now it didn’t matter if I was playing the cornet or trumpet. There was something wrong with my technique. I wanted my cornet sound concept to have the presence of a trumpet but when I played the trumpet, I was trying my best to alter its sound to match the cornet concept in my head. I was a mess. Since there where no cornet players willing to take a shepherds crook cornet into a jazz scene that I could learn from living in my neck of Georgia, I was on my own. Instead of running home with my head down, I went home and began from scratch.
The first thing that I did when I started from scratch was decide on the mouthpiece that would help me reproduce my sound concept efficiently and with enough presence to be heard. Then I decided to stop playing in public until I was able to get my cornet sound to project. Then I focused on learning more jazz standards. I wasn’t going to go out again until I achieve theses two objectives. The mouthpiece I chose was the Denis Wick 2b cornet mouthpiece. I know that some of you are probably thinking that I must be crazy to want to play jazz on such a huge mouthpiece. I’m a cornet player and I can care less about belting out a double “f “or double high “C”. My sweet spot is from f# below the staff to high “C” tops. I have no need to play higher even though I can. The thing I like about my Wick 2b and Getzen 3850 setup is that I can belt out plenty of sound with a slight touch of brilliance on more aggressive lines and purr like a kitten on ballads.
I’m back and I have my sound concept. I have enough head charts memorized that I wont be standing on stage looking like I can’t find my way home. Like I said earlier, it has been a long journey and I have come far. I’ve come back into the world of music and I’ve found my voice. I’m jumping in and I would like to invite cornetist from all over to help spread the news that Cornets players can gig too.
