| Yoou can get objecive critique from your freinds/colleagues in the brass section. However, a teacher with years of professional experience has many methods available to solve problems AND to pose new ones. (I'm a teacher, by the way). Like you, I NEVER had private lessons throughout high school or until I reached my third year of college before I transferred to a real music school. The summer before my audition for college is when I began, and I worked hard and learned ALOT from that guy. Had I done that earlier, well, who knows?
A good private teacher can hear things and see things and provide solutions yoour peers cannot, and has a wealth of knowledge about the literature and pedagogical (teaching) methods available. Much like a doctor...you go seeking a solution and the doctor proivides a treatment or prescription.
Further, lessons will encourage you to practice more.
As to your question, I still go get a lesson once in a while (had 2 this summer). Music is a field where you are constantly required to learn and refine in order to move forward, unlike most other areas. Miles did what he did because he was always moving forward, and had the kind of personality to push himself to do so (along with tremendous creativity and talent). Those people are rare.
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-Glenn
"Roses have thorns; shining waters mud. Clouds and eclipses stain the moon and the sun; and history reeks of the wrongs we have done. After today, after today, consider me gone."- Sting |