Week Seven

This week the Quartet went into the Jeffrey Haskell Recording Studio at the University of Arizona to record the two pieces we have worked on, “Fanfare for an Angel” (Stephenson) and “Eagle Oxford March” (Byrd). We were recorded by Wiley Ross as he had a student shadow our session to learn how to record. But for our part Wiley made it easy for the quartet, Our job was to show up and record. To better capture our natural ensemble sound we were not individually recorded, rather we had 2 cross pairs of mics one closer for articulations and one further back for tone and room sound. By doing this we get as close to our natural sound as possible.

We started with the fanfare since we had limited time in our session and this was the piece we wanted to make sure we captured. We recorded two full runs and then an extra insert for a section at the end just so we can have another option to choose from during the edit. When we went into the console room to listen back to the first take, one of the things we immediately noticed was how dark our tone quality was, we almost sounded like we were playing on flugelhorns rather than trumpets. We asked if that was our natural sound or a filtered sound, it was largely our natural sound, so for the second take we recorded with the goal of having a brighter sound. That take turned out pretty close to how we wanted it to. But we decided it would be smart to record a third take as a safety for insert purposes.

For the march we recorded our first take and went to listen and we noticed that unlike the fanfare where there are a lot of ideas working together the march has a lot of ideas being woven throughout parts and some call and response between parts.But in the recording this was a little harder to hear so we knew that all of the trade offs of lines needed to be exaggerated. With this in mind we recorded our second take. This take had a better blend and fixed our balance issue. This was the final take.

Week Six

This week the quartet played in our studio class the 2 pieces we are recording in a few weeks.
This was an important step because it acted as a stress test on the pieces to see where under a little pressure we have problem spots within the pieces. We played March first and had a pretty successful and stable run throughout the entire piece. The biggest take away from the comments we got was a correction of the parts. The Score and parts we have have an accidental Bb in all the parts for the last 12 measures of the piece accidentally turning it minor. The individual has played this piece for Brass Quintet and was able to help us correct this error.

The Farfare was next and this one is where we had more issues arise, the general comment is that our collective time rushed and dragged in certain phrases. Also that the two groups were not always supporting each other. In this piece there are two primary roles and it's split up as Trumpets 1 & 2 have a role and 3 & 4 have a role and the 2 roles work independently but when put together they work together. But the comment we got is that the 2 roles alone are blended together. But when put into context they were not lining up together, the reason being a time issue between parts 1 & 2 in their own time primarily on a repeated descending arpeggio on beat 4.

This issue was something that we as a group had fixed but being under the pressure of an actual performance it helped show that it wasn't as solidified as we thought we got it to be, so we will work that section to internalize it better. Those were the primary issues that got brought up so overall still a successful performance. Next week we have our professor coming in to workshop the piece!

Week Five

Today one of our trumpet professors here at the University of Arizona came to our rehearsal to give us a workshop on the two pieces we will be recording coming up here soon. We played the two pieces as full runs and then we started getting into the finer details and taking the sections apart. Overall all of our comments were about musicality and blend, there were almost no comments about technique or nuts and bolts of the trumpet which is great because now we can work on the bigger picture.

For the march the way we were playing was more with the sound concepts of bell tones and having everything with this decay in mind. But our professor told us it has a “DWah” sound instead since there are so many moving parts it moves too fast for a bell tone approach on every note and that it just makes it uneven. So he recommended we take a different approach to the piece, the one that worked the best for us was to think about the piece like an organ and how everything is big, bold, regal and most importantly even throughout the lines and attacks. This approach opened up our sound tremendously and it helped unify all of our attacks and the 2 parts with passing 16th note lines made it easier to hand off to each other.

The fanfare had more comments to be addressed. We had largely fixed the problems that were previously mentioned in studio class, we had one slip and caught it as a group and fixed it in the next run. But the primary thing we were presented with was the tempo had slight push and pull and it was diagnosed that it was caused by our contrasting interpretation of the 16th notes. One group put them on the beat and the other in front of the beat. We tried uniting it and trying both ways to see which worked better and it was unanimous that putting it in front of the beat sounded better and kept the momentum of the piece going.

We have one more rehearsal to solidify all the stuff mentioned from the studio and our clinic with the professor, After that we record!

Week Four

This week the Datura Trumpet Quartet meet to start working on the repertoire we have selected. The pieces we have decided to focus on are “Fanfare For an Angel” (Stepheson) “Eagle Oxford March” (William Bryd) and “Trumpet Quartet” (William Presser). The Fanfare is one of the more advanced fanfares with a bright uplifting push. The march is a very regal march with some floating running counterpoint over this regal melody. These two we have been rehearsing and have been able to piece together these two pretty cleanly and efficiently. The fanfare has needed more work than the march. There are a lot of articulate moments that were challenging to get lined up but we've found it.

The Presser Trumpet Quartet is our other focus but since this is a three movement piece it has a lot more to unpack. Each movement has its own challenges and they all are so very different. This piece we consider to be our final piece, it is a great closer due to the arch of the piece and how it ends with a very grand fugue. This piece is also our showcase piece because it appears there is no recording of this piece.

We plan on recording an EP and have set a recording date for the Fanfare and March early April, the Presser Trumpet Quartet will be the next to be recorded sometime after that. We still need to pick 2 more pieces to conclude our EP.

Week Three

This week the Dature Trumpet Quartet explores more abstract repertoire to add to our set. Last week we found a strong selection of fanfares and marches to put in our set as consonance to help balance out the abstract stuff we want to do.
These include “Country Pictures” (Willy Brandt) “Trumpet Quartet” (William Presser) “Variants” (William Schmidt). All of these pieces are more challenging for the ensemble which is good and achievable for us but they are also not as easy to follow or as consonant as the fanfares. The focus point for the quartet is the Presser Trumpet Quartet because it seems there is no recording of the piece so we would like to publish a recording for the piece. So that will turn into our goal piece as we work through the repertoire we have picked.

“Variants” (William Schmidt) is a movement piece that has the trumpet quartet breakdown into a trio supporting a soloist but the piece is structured that each member becomes a soloist at some point and the “Moment” is that we physically have to move down a line of stands and just read the music there and one stand is out front for the soloist. This works out nicely because each of the solos highlight each member and a particular skill of theirs. This piece also has several different styles written within it so it is a good contrast within itself and to anything we can program it with.

“Country Pictures” (Willy Brandt) is the safest of the movement based pieces easily describing cute portraits of different parts of country living, this piece is highly melodic and almost like European brass band and European folk song mashed together. This one might be a personal favorite due to its simplistic melodies and supporting parts.

Week Two

This is the second meeting of the Datura Trumpet Quartet, a group of Trumpeters based in Tucson, Arizona. This week we decide on what our goals are as a performing ensemble and the pieces we are geared at playing,
Right off the bat we leaned away from going too far back in repertoire and have chosen to avoid performing or recording Bach Choral type Pieces, we all acknowledge their significance and we will continue to use them as part of our rehearsals. But we wanted to look for some more modern music that hasn't been played to death yet. This has led to us finding longer pieces that are built in movements, adaptations of more popular classical works and fanfares. We are deciding to go towards pieces in movements or fanfares. We are choosing to avoid adaptations of pieces because we want to focus on repertoire that is focused specifically on trumpet Quartet.

In going in this direction we have found several pieces we enjoy and would like to perform with varying levels of safe and abstract. The more safer pieces are the fanfares and a march, they are popular fanfares including “Fanfare for an angel” (Jim Stephenson) “Brooklyn Farnare” (Douglas Hedwig) and “Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman” (Joan Tower) the march we found is the “Eagle Oxford March” (William Byrd) these are the more safe pieces we'd like to play, they are very consonant the ear, very thematic and yet they still have some challenges for us to work through and are still advanced pieces. Next week We will look at more of the movement structured pieces.

Week One

This week marks the start of the Datura Trumpet Quartet, Named after the Datura flower often referred to as the trumpet flower.
This is a group of Trumpet Players in the Tucson area. The members all come from different musical backgrounds creating a wonderful blend of musical input to the group. Two of our members are classically trained but on opposite sides, Harry has been trained in orchestra and british brass bands. While Joseph is trained in chamber and wind ensembles. The other members and myself are trained in both classical and jazz but have a slight leaning towards commercial and jazz music but still actively perform and practice in classical music Addison is the wind ensemble side and I am the orchestral and chamber side. But even with our different backgrounds we have a good ensemble sound concept and get along quite well which is a big part of such an intimate ensemble.
For our first meeting we read a lot of standard trumpet quartet repertoire and found our sound and who sits better on what parts. This was a large collection of Bach chorales and fanfares. But we discovered our part assignment for different styles and who plays what things better. This step is crucial because not enough musicians can recognize that someone else might be better for certain things. In an interview top call hollywood trumpet player Wayne Bergeron talked about how on gigs they split up the book depending on who can play what better and they call it “leaving your ego at the door.” Which to me is a wonderful phrase to sum up how to get the job done the best is to work together.
This first meeting was largely a business meeting and playing through pieces to see what direction we want to go, next week we will discuss our goals and hone in on what pieces we are looking to play.