[TPIN] What IS competent?

[Travis Wilson]

ok, a few thoughts from a comeback player. My first idea of what I want 
in a teacher is not so much "technical competence" but I want someone 
that helps keep me inspired to go on with this stuff.

secondly I am not 13 years old, so I want someone who listens to me. Who 
hears what I want to do, what I want to play, what I want to sound like, 
and helps me get there. Who knows the world of trumpet players enough to 
say "hey, go listen x y and z, you might like them".
someone who is not stuck in a one way to do things, but keeps working 
with me until a solution comes about. Who listens to my feedback as much 
as they need me to listen to their ideas.

i suspect teaching a stubborn 59 year old is very different then 
teaching a 11-13 year old. I will give a glowing report here that my 
main "mentor" (I call him that because I view Bob more that way then as 
a trumpet teacher), Bob Odneal is all of those things, plus being very 
technically competent. He has listened to me continually. Encouraged me 
when i know he had to shut his ears to avoid getting sick. (the 
encouragement is a huge part of teaching to me. Always encouraging a 
student to go on, move on, make them want to work without it seeming so 
much like work)

He pushed me to play in his big band LONG before i was really ready. He 
heard me say what i liked, and he found me more similar players (and 
started becoming a big Sweets Edison fan too--still my main model i 
would like to sound like). He got me into his improv classes, and if i 
wanted to work on something, he would add it to that class' work.

and he kept with me as I struggled with my embouchure set, until we got 
it right. (It is a higher set then most use, more bottom lip in the 
mouthpiece, less top lip). So for me, Bob has been ideal.

he also has a great "sound model". I listen to Bob and think "man, i 
want that sound". Not his range (he can be a real screamer when he wants 
and i am much less interested in that then i am his gorgeous sound in 
the middle register)

and for me, this is big. He is not "jealous". If I get ideas from 
someone or someplace else, he is very cool with that. Like a number of 
others on tpin  have become part of my teaching "team". Paul Randall 
helped me very early (thanks a ton). Leon helped me like he did anyone 
interested. Glenn, the detroit terror, has helped a anful lot (when i 
was changing and starting to play in a blues/rock band, I needed to 
really up my endurance, and he gave me stuff that worked very fast and 
has stayed, like Bob, encouraging of what I do constantly. . Nick 
Mondello took real time from his schedule to help me. Mike Vax as well. 
So I have benefited from some real help from some real pros.

and from each of them, I think that the encouragement and inspiration 
mattered the most to me. (that is not downplaying the need for technical 
competence, but saying that there are other things that matter too. )

as a final thing I will say that maybe why the encouragement and 
inspiration thing matter so much to me is that in my first comeback, I 
took several lessons from one of the real big names in the trumpet 
teaching business, and I got no real help in what i wanted and in fact 
think i got sent down the wrong path. And with no inspiration or 
encouragement to keep going. I always felt like i was just not as 
important as a "comeback player" as his younger students were.

Bob, and you guys on here have been SO Much better

Travis

-- 
When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro
Hunter Thompson