gglassmeyer

I had largely followed my older brother's footsteps into marching band in high school. I chose the trumpet because I loved hearing Doc on the NBC Tonight Show.
I began playing the summer before high school began, but it was a rocky start. The normal instructor who taught lessons at the High School was very ill and his return was in question. No one wanted to replace him since he was an awesome teacher (evidenced by the quality playing of the upperclassmen).
The school's band director happened to be a trumpet player and he gave me instruction until the other teacher was well enough to attempt a return. This didn't last long before he gave up teaching for good and ultimately passed away from his illness. I can't accurately spell his last name but his name was Michael Denovcheck (spelling phonetically). I think he played with the Cincinnati symphony from the time he was like 18 years old until he became ill.
Anyway the school went through a few teachers that didn't work out for various reasons and then things really changed for me.
Between junior and senior year I had my braces removed and for the first time trumpet playing was actually easy. That event coincided with the school hiring Dick Brown as their instructor. He was the stereotypically hipster jazz musician with the cool hat hip jive cat lingo and the gravelly smoking voice.
I really enjoyed his lessons, he gave a ton of feedback. If you played something with a bit of style, he'd laugh out loud and say something like "man you laid that down like <insert jazz musician's name I'd never heard of here>"
My lessons changed over that year from strictly playing out of the Rubanks books to adding Rythyms Complete, Herring Etudes, sight reading whatever he had laying around that he wanted to torture me with, and he'd assign a popular tune and the key I'd need to know it in by the next week.

I progressed more that year than the previous 3 due to him and my newfound enthusiasm for playing.

Toward the end of the year, Dick began a search for a new horn and I got to try out a bunch of sweet new Bachs, Schilkes, Benges etc. After his selection he sold me his old Yamaha for about $200. I still run into him on occasion and I regularly play on that Yamaha to this day (though I do have a new Vintage One that's used mainly).
And on occasion I will "lay it down like <insert obscure jazz musician name>"
I think he plays frequently at the casinos in Southeastern Indiana and teaches at our local music store, Buddy Rogers.