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Derek Reaban

I guess I’ll be the first to kick off the contest this year!

Leigh,

When I read the post on February 1 that the contest would be happening again this year, my mind started swirling with possible ideas. I know that each year you have the story element in the rules, and I thought I’d take a chance and start drafting the first several chapters of my story for this year which is a “parallel” Eclipse Trumpet contest. I will post a new chapter every week or two, as the contestants circumnavigate the globe on the quest to finding the trumpet prize, leading up to the end of both contests.

Enjoy!

2. THE STORY

Chapter One – A Prize Worth Having and a Brief Contest History

The anticipation of the Eclipse Trumpet contest announcement each year was not without the appropriate level of drama. Without fail, Leigh McKinney has kicked-off the best (and only) trumpet giveaway contest on the Internet every year for the past 5 years on New Year’s Day. The prize is the model of perfection – one having no equal; an exquisite, handcrafted work of art.

Like clockwork, I would get home from my New Year’s Eve concert with the Mesa Symphony each year and open TrumpetMaster.com exactly at midnight to see what adventure Leigh had planned for everyone who chose to participate. Last year I sat down in front of the computer with a couple of chocolate chip cookies and a cold can of Dr. Pepper an hour and a half before midnight to catch up on some posts and to be on-line in anticipation of the announcement.

I just about choked on my drink when I saw that the contest had begun (12 hours earlier) and three of the five keys had already been found!

The contest had grown quite a following over the years. It was like a cross between the movies The Da Vinci Code and National Treasure and the television program The Amazing Race. There were a series of clues that led each of the participants to a number of different keys (typically at least 5) that were scattered around the planet (strategically placed by owners of Leigh’s instruments). Once the keys were found, additional clues were revealed, and the first person to find where the trumpet was located would use their key to open the lock and claim their prize. The contestants would post updates on TrumpetMaster.com as they had solved their clues and everyone else could follow the progress of the players. Leigh was notorious for drama, and stories of the past years’ contests were the things of which legends are made.

I’ll always remember the contest from two years ago when it was clear from her posts that Lara (Silverstar) was on her way to finding a key. Rogerio and his Wife ended up being her chaperone as the trail of clues was leading her to South America and they were already there on vacation! When she posted her picture (via a laptop computer) from the top of the Corcovado in Rio De Janeiro standing at the base of the famous statue of Christ the Redeemer with a golden envelope in her hand, we all learned that this was the one and only key in the contest. The envelope contained a plane ticket for the winner to visit Leigh’s shop in England to participate in the completion of the prize (selecting the finish and custom bits)! Talk about drama!

Last year, as I cleaned up the soda that I had spewed all over the screen and keyboard, I found that there were still two keys left in the contest. After helping Lara in her bid for the prize, Rogerio had decided to throw his hat in the ring last year, and he and I ended up driving to the Grand Canyon together (following a cryptic, Arizona specific clue from Leigh) – apparently there were two keys to be had:




Deciphering that our clue was, in actuality, a position marker showing longitude and latitude somewhere along the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon, we chose to split up and come at the marker from two different directions. Rogerio started far up-stream on a raft that he was going to rent for the day and I drove to the South Kaibab Trail to begin my descent into the Canyon on foot. Hours later, when I arrived at the narrow steel suspension bridge that led across the Colorado River, I saw Rogerio (soaked) down below pulling his raft to the shore. Apparently, this was the right place!

As Rogerio searched below, I slowly crossed the 400+ foot long bridge looking for any potential clues and made my way to the rock tunnel on the other side. Sure enough, after only 15 minutes or so of searching, I found a small container jammed high overhead between the steel frame of the bridge and the rock face of the cliff.

.....


I called down to Rogerio and he climbed up to the bridge while I tried to dislodge the container. He arrived on the bridge just as I pulled the small box free from its hiding place. I threw it down to him and, being very well prepared, he pulled out his pocket knife and pried open the box to reveal two keys! Yes!! Rogerio and I were now officially in the game.

When we got back to civilization we made our way to the Grand Canyon Community Library so that we could post our story on TrumpetMaster.com. The drive home was filled with anticipation of what clues Leigh would be posting to guide us to where the horn would be.

In a bizarre twist of events, a new poster to the web site had written the following message (just minutes after Rogerio and I had logged off and started back to Phoenix):

When Rogerio and I got back to my house, my Wife had cooked us a really nice meal, and before we sat down to dinner we turned on the computer to see if a new clue had been posted yet. Imagine our surprise when we saw a picture of Chuck Willard standing by an open glass door at the Greenleaf Collection on the IAA campus, a key in one hand and the prize in the other! That crafty Leigh had hidden the prize for all to see within an historic instrument collection (behind a special locked glass door) and Chuck happened to be the key holder that was closest to Interlochen and got there first. Aaaargghhh! The contest was over only a day after it had started!

I just shook my head and said, “What a ride! I can’t wait until next year!!” After a nice meal and sharing the details of our trip with my Wife, we closed the book on this chapter, with lots of fond memories, and looked forward to the contest in 2007…




Chapter Two – The 2007 Contest Begins

The anticipation was killing me! It was the middle of January and not one word about the Eclipse contest! Leigh was literally torturing us with this unprecedented late start date. The speculation and posting ran rampant on TM. Had last year been the final year for the contest? Was Leigh too busy with his ever growing business to hold the contest again? Was the fun over?


And then, on February 1st, 2007 there was a single line posted on TrumpetMaster.com from Leigh…

Holy @#$%!! Could he be any more vague? The only good thing that I could gather from his post was that the contest was indeed on for another year, but beyond that I would probably have about as much luck finding a key by throwing a dart at a world map as I would actually solving this puzzle.

In past years, solving the first puzzle had taken anywhere from minutes to hours and then involved some kind of road trip. Based on the geographic location which was revealed by solving this puzzle each player could decide if they wanted to (or were able to) participate in the contest. Once the first clue was solved there was typically a race, pitting several teams against each other, to find the key and the location of the horn (taking anywhere from weeks to months). After the “one-day” contest last year, I can only imagine that Leigh has designed a long and circuitous path to the Prize for 2007. I made the commitment, right then, that I would be in this for the long haul this year!

Leigh was notorious for using Wikipedia and a specific key-word to get the ball rolling in past contests; pointing to a book or movie reference or a geographic location, which would then reveal another clue. But this year’s cryptic clue was open-ended at best.

I typed “Destiny” into the Google search engine and, sure enough, the Wikipedia entry was the first item to appear on the list. What am I looking for? There are references to Oedipus Rex, the TV program Lost, the opera La Forza del Destino, the movie “Signs” by M. Night Shyamalan. While I feel like I’m a step closer than using the dart and the world map, it seems like Leigh is just taunting us, and I must be missing something important.

I opened TrumpetMaster.com again to stare at the clue, hoping to find something that I had overlooked the first time. Sure enough, Leigh had edited his original message:

After another quick search on Google, I see that the quote is from a speech that President John F. Kennedy presented at Amherst College in 1963 in honor of the poet Robert Frost. What do I know about Robert Frost? What do I know about Amherst College? Is this pointing me on a road trip back East? What do I know about President Kennedy and destiny? Aaaargghhh! I can just sense that hundreds of people are devouring this first clue and several of them are probably already on their way to Amherst College as I’m fumbling around trying to sort out what this clue means. I can read about Kennedy and Robert Frost and Amherst College on the plane. Right now though, I have to book the first flight out of Phoenix if I’m going to stand a chance in the contest this year.

Apparently, the closest airport to Amherst College is in Hartford, Connecticut which puts me a half hour away by car. With the 5-6 hour flight from Phoenix I’m clearly going to be behind those traveling from the East Coast. So be it. Southwest.com will get me there for a decent price with a short layover in Washington, D.C. If it turns out that I’m too late and someone has found the first key, I can always catch a good concert on the return trip home and make the best out of this adventure.

I wonder what the National Symphony is doing this weekend. Hmm…let’s check their web site:

National Symphony Orchestra (at the Kennedy Center)

Violin soloist, Tchaik 5, and no way!..., Overture to La forza del destino

This can’t just be a weird coincidence. Destiny (destino)…Kennedy Center…

I’m going to Washington, D.C.!



Chapter Three – I was right!

As we approached the airport I checked my watch: 6 PM. I might just make it in time for the 7 PM downbeat at the Kennedy Center! Southwest Flight 1852 / 4294 was scheduled to arrive at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport at 6:39 PM. The pilot mentioned several times during the flight that we would arrive early considering the strong tail winds that we had enjoyed for the majority of the trip, and apparently he was right.

Since I had taken an unplanned vacation day and driven straight from work to Sky Harbor airport this morning after Leigh had posted the first clue, I didn’t have any bags to worry about. Luckily, I wear a tie to work, so I was dressed appropriately for the concert and with the recent cold temperatures in Phoenix I had my jacket with me. We pulled up to the jet way at 6:15 PM, and I was one of the first people off the plane.

I was running through the airport, following the Ground Transportation signs, and based on a conversation that I had with the lady who had been sitting beside me on the plane, I knew that I needed to find the “blue line” train at the Metrorail station and get off at the Farragut West Station. After purchasing my ticket, I found the right platform just as my train was arriving and I squeezed in (it was rush hour)!

Surprisingly, the train was right on schedule and 15 minutes later I arrived at the Farragut West Station and asked directions to the Kennedy Center when I got out to the street. After an invigorating walk in the cold air, I purchased my ticket and found my seat just as the lights dimmed and the concertmaster walked onto the stage.

The first three dramatic chords in La Forza del Destino literally parted my hair. Wow. The intensity in the sound from the National Symphony Orchestra was just spectacular! Then the music is pushed forward by the rushing motive heard in the woodwinds, followed by the beautiful lyrical chorale (the prayer that is sung by the soprano in the opera), and the whole time the strong undercurrent of “destiny” is present throughout the overture. I literally feel like I am somehow destined to solve this clue and discover a key tonight.

After the violin soloist played, I made my way out to the foyer to wander through the facility during the intermission. Still energized by the music from the overture, I was determined to make some headway with the very nebulous clue from Leigh. What was I looking for? Did I need to talk with someone in the orchestra, the conductor, one of the ushers…? This place was immense, where should I start?

I made my way from the foyer in front of the Concert Hall towards the bust of JFK. The chandeliers were beautiful against the white walls and red carpet. Apparently, I was in front of the Opera Hall and further down was the Eisenhower Theater (three halls in one!). It was hot in the lobby and I decided to step outside to think about my best approach to solve this puzzle. I walked past the fountain and stood at the edge of the Potomac River to see if any prominent landmarks were visible (I hadn’t been in Washington D.C. since I was in Jr. High School on a year-end trip with my friends). Unfortunately, all that I could see were the trees on an island in the middle of the river and some tall buildings looming above the trees on the opposite shore.

After a few minutes, staring at the river and silently contemplating what my next step should be, I decided I should go back inside. When I turned around, what I saw literally made me stop in my tracks and I felt my jaw drop. There on the side of the building, 20 feet high and carved in stone, was the complete quote from President Kennedy that Leigh had included in his first clue. “This is it. I’m here! Now I just need to find whatever it is that I’m looking for”.

Two rows of trees were in front of the building just next to the fountain with a raised stone bench / planter surrounding them. My eyes glanced around quickly to see if there were any other possible hiding places. I started looking closely in the plants that were under the trees. Upon closer inspection, I saw that there was a black plastic garbage bag that appeared to be folded over many times. It was along the inside of the planter wall hidden amongst the ground cover plants. I looked around to see if anyone else might also be on this treasure hunt (my heart was pounding quickly at this point), and I pulled the bag out of the planter.

Inside the bag was a golden envelope with the Eclipse Trumpets logo in the corner. I was speechless! I tore open the envelope as people started to head back into the hall for the second half of the concert. I had been right! For the second year in a row, I was in the game!

As I listened to the marvelous sounds of Tchaikowsky Symphony No. 5, it was all that I could do to keep my mind in the music. I kept returning to the mysterious clue that I had read just before I came back into the hall for the second half:

• He listened to a recording of his future colleague play this well known piece of music from the fourth act of Le Prophet every day as a student at the Institute of Musical Arts. His colleague was the youngest player to be appointed to the principal chair of this major symphony orchestra in the United States (his first big job).
  
  Your next clue can be found in the oldest Italian restaurant in this city.

I hailed a cab after the concert and asked the driver to take me to a nice hotel in the area. We ended up driving right by the White House on the way to the Embassy Suites Washington, DC Convention Center. After I checked in, I logged into the TrumpetMaster.com on the computer in the hotel lobby to report my success in solving the first clue.

Leigh was somewhat quirky about the communication process when it came to the contest. His rule was very clear:

After writing a short post relating the details of my evening, I decided that I should get a start on solving my current clue. I opened the envelope and studied the words again:


I typed “4th Act Le Prophet” into Google and was surprised to see that the first item to be returned in the search was from Wikipedia (Leigh had a real knack for phrasing his clues to hit the Wikipedia entry). After a quick scan of this entry, I discovered that the composer of Le prophète was Giacomo Meyerbeer and in the 4th act “Jean's coronation is preceded by a splendid March”. Of course, The Coronation March!

I typed in the Institute for Musical Arts, and was very surprised to find a web site for a rock ‘n roll camp with summer workshops. Then I scanned down the list of entries that were returned in the search and remembered that The Juilliard School had been called the Institute of Musical Arts when it was first established many years ago. On a hunch, I decided that I’d try searching for Vacchiano and Coronation March and see if anything interesting came up.

This search took me to the Stork mouthpiece site, and a page that was a Tribute to William Vacchiano. Reading through this fascinating article, I discovered the following quote:

Yes! A quick check of Harry Glantz’s bio on-line reveals that he was born in 1896 which would mean that he was only 19 when he became the Principal Trumpet with The Philadelphia Orchestra, his first big job. A little more digging and I discover that Dante & Luigi’s is Philadelphia’s Oldest Italian Restaurant.

It had been an incredibly long and productive day! Before heading up to my room, I logged back into TrumpetMaster.com and found that Leigh had responded to my post:

Yep! Just like Leigh. He revealed just enough in his response to pass on what I needed to know, without giving anything away related to the clue.


Chapter Four – Off to Philadelphia

My friend Leroy picked me up at the Amtrak 30th Street Station in Philadelphia and we had a short drive to Dante & Luigi’s. We arrived in plenty of time and I checked in as “Leigh McKinney” for our 6 PM reservation. After catching Leroy up on the happenings in Tempe with family and friends, and telling him about my excellent day of sight seeing in Washington DC, we starting talking about the current Eclipse contest and speculating where in the restaurant the key might be. I figured that Leigh had coordinated with someone on the staff, and the key would simply be delivered to us at some point during the meal.

I had spent a lot of time thinking about the contest on the train ride from Washington DC, and Leroy was always good to listen to my ideas and give me some things to think about. I told him about what I knew about Leigh and the “themes” that he had build into previous years’ contests.

The year that Lara won, the theme of the contest had been “Religious Artifacts” and watching Lara discover the Religious clues leading up to her discovery of the key at the Corcovado seemed very appropriate. Leigh is an extremely skilled artisan chosen by the British government as capable of working on British artifacts (fine silver soldering), both historical, and religious in nature... on items that are centuries old.

Last year the contest theme was related to another favorite pass time that Leigh enjoys, “Obscure North American Fishing Destinations”. The amazing views that Rogerio and I enjoyed in the Grand Canyon tied right into “river fishing”, and when Chuck found the horn, it was in the facility right next to the very serene lake at Interlochen. The real key to Leigh’s contests is being able to tie all the clues together to discover what the theme is for the year, giving the player a distinct advantage at the very end.

Clearly, this year was right up my alley, and it appeared to somehow be related to orchestral trumpet players, but I didn’t want to jump to conclusions and potentially miss something in my search for the prize. I told Leroy about the two clues that I had already solved. We had an Overture to an Opera, a prominent International performance venue, a former United States President, two giants in the world of orchestral trumpet players, an Italian restaurant (possibly a place Glantz actually frequented), and words about getting the “proper sound in your ear”. Leroy jotted some things down on a napkin as I was talking, and he agreed that it was still too early in the contest to make any assumptions about the theme. He told me that since I would most likely be travelling extensively in the next several weeks, he could start doing some research about the clues that we had already solved. In this way he could be the home base providing technical and moral support and I could check in with him whenever I got “stuck” and needed help decoding a clue. We might even potentially discover a contest “theme” if we worked together.

After finishing our meal, and receiving absolutely no hints from the staff about where the key might be, we decided to try some dessert. When I opened the dessert menu, the Eclipse Trumpet envelope dropped onto the table. It had been right under our noses for the entire meal! I opened the envelope, but it wasn’t the key. It was another clue:


We asked for the check and then drove back to Leroy’s house. When we got there Merryl and the kids were just finishing with “movie night” and getting ready for bed. After bringing Merryl up to speed on the newest clue, Leroy and I headed into his office / practice room and logged onto the computer. Aaarrgghh! The cable was down. No Internet access. When we called in the problem to the Internet provider we learned that it would be several hours before we could get back on-line.

It had been a couple of days since I had practiced and over 5 years since Leroy and I had played in a group together so I borrowed his C trumpet and we decided to read some duets and orchestral excerpts. The time literally flew by and Merryl came in to let us know that she was going to bed and on the way out said, “Oh, by the way, the Internet is back on”. Yes!

After over an hour of searching to find the “smallest office” in Manhattan and every possible profession that was related to “languages”, each search had led to a dead end or a sea of unending possibilities. I was holding the card that the clue was printed on and noticed an inscription on the back similar to a Hallmark card with some tiny text just below (I actually had to find a magnifying glass to see what it said):

When we typed this position marker into Google maps, it became very clear where I needed to go!


Chapter Five – Manhattan: 65th Street & Broadway

Penn Station in New York was an absolute mad house! I was now travelling with a small suitcase, some new clothes that I had purchased earlier in the day and a WolfPak double bag with a C trumpet that I had borrowed from Leroy. He wasn’t using this horn and I thought it would be good to have in case I could find some time to practice or possibly schedule a lesson while I was in the city. While I had been to Penn Station several times before, I felt like it was my first time again, and was just blown away by the sea of people that I was going to have to negotiate through to find my way to the subway.

After purchasing my metro ticket I found the “1 line” uptown and waited for a train to arrive. I was in a very crowded car for several stops and got off at the 66th street – Lincoln Center station. It was a short walk to Lincoln Center and I arrived in plenty of time for the 1:30 PM performance of La Bohème at the Metropolitan Opera House. I was lucky enough to purchase a ticket and headed across the street to get some lunch before the opera began.

I was absolutely stunned at the perfection of Act I, from the sets and costumes to the incredible voices and precision from the orchestra. I had almost forgotten why I was here. At the intermission I quickly made my way down to the pit and was fortunate to see David Krauss was still sitting in his seat having a conversation with a colleague. When I got his attention he told me to go out to the side hallway and he would meet me. I was surprised when both he and Peter Bond came up to meet me.

As I brought David and Peter up to speed on my whirlwind adventure over the past three days, we made our way down to the pit. I showed them my current clue and said, “It has to be in the prompter’s box!” At this point it was about 5 minutes until the next act was to begin. Peter walked over, grabbed the prompter’s chair and quickly pulled it out. Apparently the headset that the prompter wears had gotten tangled on the chair arm and when the chair came out the cord caught the clipboard and loose leaf libretto that was sitting beside the chair. Everything came crashing out just as the prompter was coming back into the pit. With a stunned look on her face, she could only mutter, “trumpet players…”

I quickly started picking up what I could and Peter crawled into the box. The prompter was noticeably shaken, apparently this was her first time in the box, and we were compounding the stress in her day. While I was finishing gathering everything from the floor I heard Peter say, “I’ve got it”! As I helped her to get the chair back in place, I could overhear Peter and David; they had torn open the envelope and were already working on the clue. “Call Wilmer, we’ve got 3 minutes.” I quickly came over after I handed the prompter her clipboard, and David had just closed his cell phone. He put the clue in my hand and said, “Allan Dean…You’re going to Yale. Enjoy the second act”. While Peter and David grabbed their horns, the conductor was coming into the pit, and I hurried to get to the hallway. I heard the first note well before I made it back to the security guard.

Before I returned to my seat I had to see what the clue said…

The clue had been in a black bag and stuck to the inside wall at the back of the prompter’s box with black electrical tape. Quite a hiding job! This clue was printed on the back of an index card from a library card catalog. On the front it said,


The rest of the opera was incredible and it worked out that Peter and David were both available for dinner after the show. Yep. We headed down to Sammy’s Roumanian for a meal with some schmaltz! During our early dinner I made arrangements with Peter for a lesson the next day before my trip to New Haven, Connecticut to explore the Yale campus. I couldn’t believe how perfect this leg of the contest had gone.

I posted my story on TrumpetMaster.com when I got back to my hotel and was reprimanded by Leigh for not checking in after the restaurant the night before. I learned my lesson and promised to post shortly after finding all future clues.


Chapter Six – The Key (or at least part of it!)


The conductor punched my ticket and I sat back to enjoy the ride on the Metro-North Railroad to New Haven, Connecticut. I spent some time to write down many of the concepts and stories that Peter had shared with me during my lesson earlier in the day. As I stared out the window of the train car, my mind started to wander. “If somehow I don’t discover the prize horn, I have already “won” with all of the amazing experiences that I have had in this year’s contest.”

After arriving at the New Haven train station, I hailed a cab. The taxi dropped me off in front of the Sterling Memorial Library on the campus of Yale University.

Last night at the hotel I did a Google search and discovered that Leigh had been true to form and the Wikipedia entry that came up for “Sterling Yale” was third on the list. Apparently, the Sterling Memorial Library still had a working Card Catalog (I thought all libraries had converted this index card information to an electronic format). Obviously, the index card that I was holding in my hands had been pulled out of the card catalog, and I’m sure my key must be in the “A” cabinet for Arban.

It felt like I was walking up to a Church. This library was simply amazing from an architectural perspective. I walked through the Sterling Nave, feeling like I was inside a cathedral, found the Reference Desk and asked where the Card Catalogs were located.

I was shocked when I was told that the cabinets housing the index cards had been removed last year, and I could use the automated Orbis system to look up anything that was in the library. I thanked the woman behind the desk and sat down at the closest Orbis terminal to consider what Leigh must have in store for me. The Orbis database showed me that the Arban book was located in the SML Music Library and the woman at the reference desk directed me to the music library entrance.

Wow! Walking through this place was just amazing! This room that housed the music library was situated in what looked like an enclosed courtyard and the surrounding walls were easily 5 stories high. The artistic structural / sculptural ceiling required that I stop and stare. After soaking in my surroundings, I walked up the staircase in front of me and found the Oversize section.



I quickly located where the Arban book should be, but for some reason it was missing. In it’s place was a book called Fundamentals of Musical Acoustics by Arthur H. Benade. I pulled the book off the shelf, wondering if this was some simple misplacement by the staff, and quickly realized that I was on the right track. Flipping through the pages, I discovered Leigh had put an envelope just about in the center of the book, but there was nothing inside the envelope. I glanced down at the pages and saw that the envelope was marking the section on difference tones. Hmmm…

I went to a different row of stacks in the music library, based on the identification numbers on the Fundamentals of Musical Acoustics book, and found that the Arban book was on the shelf where the Benade book should have been. Very curious… What was Leigh trying to tell me here?

The Arban’s book was on the second shelf from the top. I pulled the book off the shelf and flipped through the pages, to see if there was an envelope waiting for me. Nothing! I was at a complete loss on what I should do next. While I was standing there in a daze, my mind wandering trying to tie all of these clues together, I realized that I was looking up at this shelf, thinking about how deep it was, and that I could see only the bottom of the shelf. I stood on my tiptoes to see if I had missed anything. A gleam of gold caught my eye! I had found it!

I reached to the back of the shelf and realized that it was a gold plated trumpet mouthpiece. Clearly not the key that I had expected, but certainly what Leigh had intended for me to find. Things were certainly heating up, and I was definitely a step closer to the prize!

When I looked more closely at the mouthpiece, there was a rolled up piece of paper stuffed up in the back bore. It was really jammed in there, and I knew I didn’t have anything with me that I could use to safely dislodge it. Then I wondered if Leroy might have something in the pocket of the WolfPak double bag that I was carrying that I could use to free this clue. Sure enough, there was a mouthpiece brush! I pushed the brush through the hole and the clue fell to the ground.

I unrolled this piece of paper that was about an inch and a half high by eight inches long and found the following handwritten message:

Excellent! I’m going back to New York!

Before I left the library I decided that I should run a copy of the two pages that Leigh had marked in the Benade book.

It was dinnertime and I walked a short way to a place called Ibiza. I called my friend Leroy to bring him up to speed on the current set of clues that I had discovered while I waited for my meal. When I finished eating I asked my server how far it was to the train station and decided that I could just walk since it was a nice evening. I was in time to catch the 6:57 PM train back to Grand Central Station in Manhattan. It had been a fantastic day and I was looking forward to a good night’s sleep.



Chapter Seven – Other Stories from This Year’s Contest

The morning after I posted that I had solved the first clue, Leigh checked in and let everyone know that there were 3 keys left to find in the contest, and two would be available for the first two people to solve the following clue:



The two players that solved this clue, very surprisingly, were both from Australia. They had read my posting and put together that the clue was exactly the same, but just located at a different concert hall in a different part of the world. One flew in from Australia, the other from London and arrived on Saturday in time for the complete opera of La Forza del Destino with the Kirov Orchestra at the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersberg, Russia. “ozboy” (Tim) and “damo 4701” both found the hidden mouthpieces that Leigh had hidden at the Theater, and began their search for the other half of their keys.


On Sunday Morning the following post showed up from Leigh. The final key in the contest would be found here:

I laughed out loud when I read the bizarre twist of events in the posts from tpter1 and Kinghornplayer!


Chapter Eight – Teaming Up with Kinghornplayer

Monday morning - Day five of the contest. How many more twists and turns does Leigh have planned this year?

After getting ready for the day, I came downstairs and logged on to the Internet on the computer in the lobby of my hotel. I wanted to see when the next New York Philharmonic concert would be because I knew exactly where my next clue was waiting for me. I had been in New York last year to hear the Philharmonic and I remember seeing the pictures of all of the music directors on the walls just outside the first tier balcony. Let’s see Monday is dark, but Tuesday there is a concert at 8 PM. This is perfect! I have some time for sight seeing.

I decided to check TrumpetMaster.com to see if there was any news from Leigh and what was happening with the other contestants. I had a Personal Message waiting for me and I saw that Leigh had also left a post:

Wow! I hadn’t seen that twist coming. Once the key is in hand, it’s been every player for themselves, or at least that’s what’s happened in every contest up until this one. What crafty scheming is Leigh up to?

I clicked on my Private Messages link and found that John had gotten up early and was headed to the Amtrak station. He told me that his train from Montreal arrived at Penn Station at 7:40 PM and that if I could meet him at the station he would really appreciate it as he had never been to New York City before. He also left me his cell phone number.

I called him and we had a great conversation about our experiences so far in the contest. Apparently he had exactly the same clue that I did (it had also been stuck in the shank of his mouthpiece). I explained to him that his timing would be great since our first opportunity to get into the Avery Fisher Hall was tomorrow at 8 PM for a Philharmonic concert. He asked me if I could get tickets for us and possibly set up a hotel room for him since he was on the train with no Internet access. I said, “Not to worry, we’ll have a great time when you get here, and I’ll take care of all the arrangements.”

My day included a subway ride to Brooklyn to meet with Wilmer Wise for lunch and stories, and then going back to his house for duets and excerpts. I was having such a great time playing my horn, meeting Internet friends, attending concerts and sight seeing on this trip that it was almost as if the contest was simply an excuse for the most thrilling vacation I have ever taken. After what seemed like the blink of an eye, my day with Wilmer was over, and it was time to head back to Manhattan to meet John at Penn Station. Wilmer had plans all day on Tuesday, so I was glad that it had worked out for us to get together.

I found John at the station and he said he was starving (he had been on the train for almost 10 hours!). We made it to street level and saw a T.G.I. Friday’s restaurant and decided that would work well. I told John about the last time that I had been in New York and about the pictures on the wall at Avery Fisher Hall. I had also crafted a plan in my mind for how we could possibly get the two photos that Leigh had mentioned in the clue.

John was exhausted after a long day of traveling and we had a definite adventure in front of us tomorrow. We got on the subway and made it back to the hotel before 10 PM.



Chapter Nine – Historic Photos Stolen From Avery Fisher Hall

John and I discussed my plan in detail on Tuesday morning and he felt that it would work very well. We did some shopping and picked up a backpack and the other items that I would need to get the pictures off the wall in the First Tier Balcony lobby area. After a full day of sightseeing we arrived at Avery Fisher Hall about a half-hour before the concert was to begin.

When we got to the top of the escalator we saw the photos of the music directors:

..


Oh my gosh! I had remembered this all wrong. The pictures were behind glass and I had no idea how we would get them into my backpack. Nothing that we had purchased would help us to acquire these pictures tonight. John and I talked about what our possible plan B should be prior to the start of the concert. I had met Jim Ross in the trumpet section once before, but I absolutely did not feel comfortable asking him to sneak us into the hall after hours to steal these pictures, and John felt the same way.

The lights dimmed and we were treated to a piece called Parados by Daniel Bortz and then a spirited Beethoven Piano Concert #1 with Lars Vogt as the soloist. Intermission flew by and the only option that looked feasible was to attend the after concert talk that Jim Ross was doing in the 6th floor Board Room and present our situation to him. We sat through an inspired performance of Debussy’s Images (almost forgetting about our impending conversation with Jim), and then we headed up stairs to the Board Room.

You could almost hear the sigh of relief as John and I walked through the Board Room door. Apparently there were duplicate photos of all the music directors that were on the walls in this room. Time to implement Plan A.

John took a seat by the wall close to the pictures that we needed to take, while I headed to bathroom to take on my new role. I was wearing a pair of khaki slacks and a long sleeve white shirt. I opened the backpack and took out a stylish red vest and a nametag that John and I had created with a Lincoln Center logo and “Avery Fisher Concert Hall – Facility Porter” along with my name. I also took out my clipboard, which had a sheet with the names of the music directors and a pen.

After Jim’s presentation had started I walked into the room walked over to where John was sitting, checked my clipboard and put several marks by the names of the pictures that were around the two that we needed. I took seven pictures off the wall and noticed that, sure enough, Leigh had managed to have his envelopes taped to the back of our two pictures. I turned to John as I started out and said nonchalantly, “We’re re-framing these”.

I took them to the bathroom and peeled the envelope from the back of the Leonard Bernstein photo. There was a cryptic message (literally):

The second photo was of Arturo Toscanini, and inside the envelope was a scrap of paper that simply said, “Right guy, wrong building. Now Become Creative.”

I loaded our clues into the backpack along with my vest, nametag, and clipboard and left a message on John’s phone to meet me by the fountain in the courtyard. I carefully placed the pictures by a wall in the 6th floor lobby area before heading downstairs.

As I was waiting for John, I called Leroy and told him what we had discovered at Avery Fisher Hall. By the time John finished listening to the talk that Jim was giving, Leroy and I had a good start on what our next step should be. Apparently, the Arnold Cipher search on Google came up on Wikipedia as the first choice on the list. The numbers on our clue represented a page number of an agreed to book, a line number on that page, and a word number in that line. Now we just needed to know what book to use to crack this code.

Leroy did a search to see where the Philharmonic had performed before Avery Fisher Hall under the baton of Toscanini. While I was waiting and staring at the clue I realized that Leigh had capitalized each of the last three words. Now Become Creative – NBC! I told Leroy to check where the NBC Symphony had performed and he quickly came back with Rockefeller Center.

John arrived just as I got off the phone with Leroy and I filled him in on our next step.


Chapter Ten – Wednesday (A Tale of Two Cities)

John and I were first in line for the NBC Studio Tours that began at 8:30 AM at Rockefeller Center. The tour was fascinating and I was amazed at the 400 spotlights that were on the ceiling in the Date Line studio. I asked when we would get to see the Saturday Night Live studio, and the guide said that we could go there next. John and I had discovered that this was the studio where The NBC Symphony performed weekly radio concert broadcasts with Toscanini.

We arrived at the studio and stared through a window looking down on a studio with lots of people building sets. When I asked if we could go down on the floor of the studio, the guide told me that we couldn’t interrupt when there was work going on in a studio. I felt like our clue was just out of reach and I turned around to think.

And just then I saw it. There were half a dozen photos of the NBC Symphony in this observation area. I nudged John and he realized that I needed some time to find our clue. He started asking a lot of questions about SNL and the stars that had been on the show over the years. I looked behind each of these pictures and sure enough, there was the Eclipse Trumpets envelope. I tucked this in my back pocket and gave John the high sign. This had been the last stop on the tour and when John and I got downstairs we tore the envelope open. There was one word on the card: ARBANS. Of course!

It was a short walk from Rockefeller Center to Charles Colin Music at 315 W. 53rd Street. We purchased a copy of Arbans, found a place to sit down, and began decoding:


The Principal Trumpet player with the
10.21.1 10.29.2 6.1.4 7.39.9 5.3.2 5.2.4

Seattle Symphony from 1977 to
Seattle 210.2.5 210.2.2 MCMLXXVII 57.4.3

1981 holds the second half
MCMLXXXI holds 5.2.4 37.14.2 5.32.9

Of your keys
87.1.3 your 57.8.6



Very cool! We were going to get to see Manny Laureano!

We raced back to our hotel to checkout and contacted Manny. He was performing a Messiah later in the evening and would be using his two horns from his former teacher, William Vacchiano. He had just received them back from Leigh McKinney who had done some restoration work on them and was excited to see how they would sound in this performance. This was simply amazing, and started to tie together all of the clues so far!

We arrived at the Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport in plenty of time to make it to the performance. A cab ride to Orchestra Hall got us there 45 minutes prior to the concert. Manny was shocked when we showed him our “keys”. “Hey! These are my mouthpieces. I thought I had lost these. What’s going on here?” Leigh had provided an emergency contact number and this seemed to be a good time to use it.

Manny’s Son had been part of the “deception” to give Manny a giant surprise. Manny knew all about the Eclipse Contest, and was an integral part of it this year, and had been in close contact with Leigh for months. Leigh had secretly called Manny’s Son after the refurbished Vacchiano horns had been returned to Manny. Leigh asked Manny's Son to get the mouthpieces for the Vacchiano horns and mail them back to England, because he had sent the wrong ones back with the horns and he wanted to correct the error without Manny knowing about it.

Well, Manny was speechless…And then he started shaking his head and began laughing. “You really got me this time Leigh. Nice one!”

Manny presented us with the final clue (the location of the prize horn), and two round trip tickets to Italy! Leigh was great about rewarding the finalists with extra perks beyond the prize itself. Manny also told us that after the concert we would be taking both of his horns with us and they would be used to open the lock.

He sounded amazing during the concert and ended up playing on both the Eb and F trumpets (with the mouthpieces that we had discovered in our trek to the prize). He posed for a great picture with both horns after the concert!


Chapter Eleven – Milan, Italy – La Scala – The Prize – And a Giant Surprise

On the front of the tickets was a short note from Leigh. “You are coming to Milan, Italy. By now you should have an idea about the themes of this years contest and should know where the horn is located”. Holy Cow! Is he kidding? I don’t know anything about Milan, Italy!

I called Leroy with our current dilemma. He just laughed and said, “La Scala”. He had been studying these clues carefully while we had been solving them. He told me that the "standard" performance version of La forza del destino had premiered at La Scala, Milan, on 27 February 1869 (which tied back to our very first clue). Now we knew where we were going!

We landed at the Milan Malpensa Airport on KLM flight 6056 / 1627 after over 12 hours in the air. Our flight had left Minneapolis / St. Paul after Manny’s concert and leaving at 9:25 in the evening, both John and I slept almost the entire flight. We landed at 4:40 PM and quickly found an Internet terminal in the airport.

The other team [“ozboy” (Tim) and “damo 4701”] apparently had also found horns to go with their mouthpieces. We learned that these horns belonged to a player named Veniamin Margolen who was the Principal Trumpet with the St. Petersburg (Leningrad) Philharmonic Orchestra from 1947 to 1974. Apparently the owner of these horns had sent them to Leigh to have them refurbished and they were in the shop at the same time as the Vacchiano horns. Very interesting…

As we read on, we discovered that Tim and Damo had left for Milan and had probably arrived at La Scala several hours before our plane landed. Aaaarggghhh! Were we too late?

John and I found our bags and went through customs. When I opened my bag for the custom’s agent, his face brightened up and he looked right at me and said, “Trompetta!” I shook my head and he passed us through without any delay.

The cab dropped us off in front of La Scala at about 6 PM local time.



We walked around this absolutely enormous facility and discovered the stage door. I said “Eclipse Trompetta” to the guard and he let us in and took us down a long hallway. He opened a door and there was Tim and Damo, with somewhat dejected looks on their faces.

We introduced ourselves and they gave us an update on the previous 3 hours that they had been in the room, with no success in solving the peculiar “combination lock” that apparently had a six number code. There was a single locked door on the far wall, two microphones were mounted on the wall on either side of the door, and above the door were two LED graphic displays with six positions each, somehow tied to each microphone.

Tim and Damo told us that when they played the Margolen trumpets the LED display on the right side of the door seemed to activate but always showed a red light and then turned off after about 1 second. John and I were exhausted after the flight, but our adrenaline was pumping. Could it be that the Vacchiano horns would open this combination lock?

We played the Vacchiano horns individually and got the same response that Tim and Damo had gotten, except that our trumpets lit up the LED display on the left side of the door. Then I suggested that John and I play at the same time (octave concert E) to see what would happen. With a lot of effort, we managed to play an in tune octave (remember, these are high-pitched horns that we’ve never played, and John hadn’t played his trumpet for almost a week). This time our LED turned green for a brief moment before turning off.

I asked them what they thought the combination was, and they mentioned when the first arrived in the room that they had played the first six notes from Pictures at an Exhibition and from the Ballerina’s Dance from Petrouchka. Nothing had seemed to work.

I had been studying our clues and talking with John and Leroy extensively over the past several days and the only clue that we hadn’t used was the one from the Benade book on difference tones. My suspicion’s had been confirmed when we got the green light on the concert E.

I asked all of us to try and find a concert E on our respective horns (we had horns pitched in Bb, C, Eb, and F). Our sounds were all so different that we got a brief green flicker on both LEDs and then it shutdown. I needed some more information about what this thing was that we were playing into. I called the contest moderator (Tootsall – Ed Grant). Ed had been involved in the Eclipse Trumpet Contests for the past 5 years and was available to answer questions when he was able to.

“Ed, I know you can’t reveal too much information, but I need to know something more about our ‘combination lock’. Can you give me any specific details?”

Ed was very happy to share what he knew. He had always wanted to contribute to the development of the hunt for the prize and had been working for several years on perfecting a special locking mechanism to give a huge twist to the key necessary to open the lock. This lock incorporated a special type of voice recognition software. Ed had modified the software to recognize the unique acoustic signature of a specific trumpet instead of a person’s voice. So a standard phase would be spoken (or played), and the software would check to see if it matched the original recording. I asked him about when he had sent this new “combination lock” to Leigh and he told me he had finished his work on the lock and sent it to Leigh at the beginning of the year. Then he asked how things were going, and I told him all would be great in just a few minutes.

I talked with John, Tim, and Damo and asked them to brainstorm with me for a few minutes. If Leigh knew that he would be changing the contest to use this voice recognition software, he would have needed all four of these trumpets in his shop to record their unique signatures, and I’m guessing he recorded the “combination” at the same time.

John spoke up. “Remember when Alex went over to England back in January or February with Pat Harbison? What if they were two of the players that recorded the “combination”? In fact, what if Noel Langley had been there and also played one of the four trumpets?”

I said, “Leigh could even have had Ian Balmain from the Royal Opera House there. He’s an Eclipse client. So, let’s assume that he has recorded this “combination” with four top-flight players, in ideal conditions, on fresh chops. Damo, when did you last play before today? OK, 6 days ago. And Tim, how about you? 6 days…”

“Hang on, I have a fantastic idea. I know what the combination is, but there is no way that the four of us will be able to unlock it.”

I called my friend Leroy and asked him to look up who the trumpet players are in the La Scala opera orchestra. He quickly came back with four names including Francesco Tamiati. I checked my watch and it was close to 7 PM local time and I was guessing that they had a performance tonight.

I left the room we were in and walked down the hallway. Sure enough, after a several turns and several long corridors I started to hear the sound of a trumpet. I got to the door and knocked. As luck would have it, this was Francesco Tamiati (the Principal Trumpet player). He had studied in the United States and his English was pretty good!

I told him who I was and why I was here and then told him that I needed his help. He smiled as I told him my story.

We returned to the room 10 minutes later with his three colleagues in the trumpet section. They took the Vacchiano and Margolen trumpets and played a pristine Concert E in octaves. The LEDs registered a green light and then shut off. They all smiled at me and then played the opening phrase to La forza del destino… “1, 2, 3…pause…4, 5, 6”

Click, Click. The lock opened! I had been right!

All eight of us peered through the open dressing room door and we were shocked at what we saw. Four of the most beautiful Eclipse Trumpets that any of us had ever seen!




I immediately called Leigh on the emergency contact number and had our new friends from La Scala play the beginning of La forza del destino again. He said, “Congratulations gentlemen! You have all been fantastic players and I wanted to reward each of you for your persistence, intelligence, creativity, and sacrifice. You all met my requirements with flying colors and it didn’t feel right to reward just one of you. Please take these horns with my appreciation on a contest well played!” And with that he hung up.

We were all speechless. John picked up a trumpet and a tear rolled down his cheek. His voice was shaking as he said, “I never thought I be holding a prize horn.” He turned to the La Scala trumpet section and asked if they would do a giant favor for him. John called his Father and said, “You won’t believe it Dad…I won!” He nodded to the trumpet section and they played a beautiful melody from the opera that night and then 3 of them ran out to get ready for the 8 PM show.

The banda player for the evening didn’t have to play until Act II (they were doing La Boheme). He invited us to say for the opera and we all eagerly took him up on the offer.

When we walked into the main hall, while it was visually spectacular, but it seeed to be just a notch or two below the door we had opened just a few minutes ago:



And another year of the Eclipse Trumpet contest ends with the appropriate drama befitting the true craftsman and generous soul that is Leigh McKinney.

Thanks for everything Leigh! It was quite a ride!





3. BACK TO SCHOOL

When I was a kid I collected baseball cards (still have them in a shoebox). Now that I have kids, they really enjoy collecting cards too, but they are "in" to Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! And with 3 boys, they have literally hundreds and hundreds of cards. One night when I was practicing, I was staring at these cards that were scattered all over the floor of the Play Room / Practice Room. I started thinking how cool it would be if, instead of baseball players or Pokemon creatures, I had a giant stack of “Principal Trumpet” player cards that I could use to make a trumpet for the Eclipse Contest.

Well, I have painstakingly created 232 Principal Trumpet trading cards and ended up using 173 of them for my contest entry this year (I felt really bad leaving some players out, but I just couldn’t make the instrument any bigger). Each 2 inch by 3 inch card contains the name of the player and a photo, the orchestra in which they hold / held the principal trumpet chair, and their dates of tenure with the orchestra. The earliest card dates from 1847, the longest tenure is 53 seasons, there are several "rookie" cards for prominent players, and three actual rookies (taking the helm in the 2006-2007 season). It's a history lesson that unfolds through every turn on the instrument.

The actual trumpet has a 21-inch bell and is 7 and a half feet long (similar to my entry last year). The name of my entry this year is “The Principal Trumpet”. I mounted it on 10 sheets of poster board and it is hanging in my dining room (literally taking up an entire wall). I planned ahead this year and I can easily ship “The Principal Trumpet” should my entry be selected.

The trumpet includes 49 ensembles, three TrumpetMaster.com “Artists in Residence”, and an Eclipse C trumpet artist (can you find them?). The valve stems are photos of this year’s prize trumpet and the slide ring and U hook were created using the Eclipse logo. My boys wanted to participate this year, and I decided to add them as the Valve buttons (they were shocked to see they had their own cards when I was flipping through my giant stack of cards).

This is clearly a conversation starter (when you see it in person).

Enjoy!

Links to Additional Photos:

Collage of Photos…Stack Height (Close Up)

Derek with Entry

Bell Close Up…3rd Valve Slide Close Up

Valve Cluster Close Up…1st Valve Slide Close Up

Mouthpiece Close Up

MANDATORY

A) Written Explanation from Teacher

To Leigh McKinney,

Derek has been a student and dear friend for many years. His support, interest, and commitment in all matters relating to the trumpet is almost without peer. It is all the more impressive when you realize his day job is as a Principal Engineer in Reliability & System Safety at Honeywell Aerospace.

His responsibilities at work include assuring that safety is a prime design consideration in the development of main engines for business jets and auxiliary power units (APU) on commercial jets. The APU is a small gas turbine engine that provides electricity and air conditioning for commercial jets while they are on the ground, and provides high pressure air to start the main Propulsion system engines. He works closely with airframe manufacturers (like Boeing) and Certification Authorities (like the FAA) to make sure that safety and reliability requirements are designed into the engines.

Every time I travel on a commercial airline, I am mindful of Derek and “thank him” for helping to keep the airplane safe and providing relief from the overly “ripe” passengers sitting nearby.

Whether or not Derek’s entry is successful in this years Eclipse Trumpet contest, we all come away as winners having Derek as a dedicated member of the trumpet community.

Yours,

Benny Nguyen
Phoenix Symphony Orchestra – Assistant Principal Trumpet



B) Most Fantastic Moment Since Becoming a Player

My Wife took me to New York City last year for my 40th birthday. It was the first time that I had ever been to the city, and I made certain that music would play a major role in our many activities. This meant experiencing a live performance at the Metropolitan Opera House as well as a lesson with David Krauss (Principal trumpet at the Met).

I chose the music for my lesson to take advantage of David’s specialty in opera literature, and played the opening of Act II from Don Pasquale by Gaetano Donizetti. This is one of the most prominent solos in the literature, and I knew I would be getting amazing pointers to bring the music alive. Little did I know that I would also be getting a lesson in fine cuisine!

While I had been listening to Italian songs and arias for months in preparation for this lesson to immerse myself in the vocal tradition, I had never heard a recording of the complete Don Pasquale solo (just several 60-second clips from Amazon.com). I decided to play a very clean version (holding close to what was printed).

When I finished, David said, “That was very nice, but this is Italian music. It needs to be greasier! It needs to be played with Schmaltz!” Then he said, “You know what schmaltz is, right?” I shook my head, thinking to myself that I needed to take more liberties with the music. He said, “No, really. Do you know what schmaltz is?” I just shook my head and said, “I guess I don’t”.

He shared a story about one of the first times that he went out to dinner with his colleagues from the Met. They took him to a restaurant called Sammy's Roumanian on the lower east side. He said, “You’ve been to an IHOP restaurant before, right? With all of the bottles of syrup on the table?” Of course (with 3 boys, Funny Face Pancakes are something that we do at least every couple of months)! “Well”, he said, “Sammy's Roumanian had bottles like that on the table, and when they brought out the meal the waiter took a bottle in each hand, poured it over the food and said, ‘Those are your vitamins’”. Of course, it wasn’t syrup in the bottles.

The “vitamins” were literally called “Schmaltz” or chicken fat! And he said, “If you eat too much of this stuff it will kill you, but it tastes so good you can hardly believe it!”

So, with that, he launched into Don Pasquale with schmaltz! WOW! Talk about greasy and tasty! He took my bland reading of the notes and transformed it into something worth listening to. "You need a feminine ending here...sixteenth notes in Italian are short…take your time here…take a breath at the “cadenza feel” before the fermata". He said, “You’re essentially playing this big trumpet solo by yourself in the middle of the opera, and you have to really tell a story. It has to have schmaltz!”

Several days later, my Wife and I returned to Lincoln Center for a performance of Rigoletto by Giuseppe Verdi. Attending the Met for the first time, I was amazed at how elegant the lobby area is. From the white marble and red carpets on the floor to the gold hand rails and red velvet on the walls, this place was exactly what it should be: Grand!

Our seats were on the floor on the right side. The 5 balconies were certainly impressive, as was the gold scalloped ceiling, the red velvet seats, the enormous gold curtains on stage, the huge chandelier in the center of the hall, and the 12 smaller chandeliers that were retracted to the ceiling when the lights dimmed.

Rigoletto begins with the solo trumpet and the “curse theme”. David’s playing was simply impeccable. His sound floats into the hall and is captivating and demands attention. Likewise the orchestra sounded fantastic!

After the 1st act, my Wife and I went up to the pit and David directed us to the side hallway so that we could meet him backstage. He gave us the full tour! We worked our way to the pit and got see the setup. This was by far the biggest pit that I have ever seen, and the stage didn’t extend over the pit at all (all the musicians could see what was happening on stage). Everyone had plenty of room too, and that’s amazing when you consider it’s a full opera orchestra (100+ players). I was somewhat awestruck standing there, in the pit at the Met, enjoying the grand treatment that my Wife and I were receiving from David.

David showed us the two parts that he had on his stand (the original part and his working part – what he used to play the notes). The original part was an historical who’s who of the principal trumpet players in the Met. A grand tradition began years ago, and the principal player would write their name, the date of the performance, and the name of the singer in the role of Rigoletto inside the front cover. This part dated back to 1899 and had dozens and dozens of entries in two columns! A number of the early performances showed that Enrico Caruso had played the role of Rigoletto. Mark Gould was the last one to have signed the part. How I would love to have a copy of that sheet for my scrapbook!

It was at this point that I took out my own copy of the 1st trumpet part for Rigoletto that I put on heavy card stock and had David sign it. It’s now framed and hanging on my practice room wall along with the program, tickets, and the picture that my Wife took of the two of us.

This is easily the “most fantastic moment in my playing life so far”. I will remember these moments very fondly for the rest of my life!

Schwab

1)



Unison Dubba Cs!

4)

There once was a guy from PA,
Who played high and loud all the day,
His neighbor got mad,
Yelled, "Shut up you cad!"
Guy took his horn and went away.

He returned back home with a friend,
Who lived down the road round a bend,
They both played together,
As light as a feather,
The neighbor yelled, "This is the end!"

The neighbor came on bended knees,
Said, "I'm beggin' you, c'mon, PLEASE!"
The trumpeters turned round,
Said, "Time to throw down!"
And drilled out some loud DUBBA Cs!

A) My sister decided to do this in a series of haiku. She is the smart one in the family, and she has lots of extra time on her hands now that she cancelled her cable TV!

Dylan plays trumpet
to entertain the masses.
Music is his life.

He lives on a bus -
sometimes he sleeps on the floor.
On the road again!

All his days repeat
Like that movie, "Groundhog Day."
What does he deserve?

New, beautiful horn
from awesome Eclipse Trumpets
would bring him great joy!

Help my brother out!
He has sacrificed so much
for love of trumpets.

-Jill Schwab

B) I think my most fantastic playing experience was playing for sold out crowds at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus at the base of the Acropolis in Athens, Greece with the Glenn Miller Orchestra. The theater is really steep, when you look out from the stage all you see all the way up to the sky is a wall of people. It was great to be a part of the thousands of years of music that have been played there, and fun to play for thousands of people who were really having fun listening to the music. President Karolos Papoulias was in attendance!