Darth Vader and Bill Adam

[Derek Reaban]

I thought you would all enjoy this story…

My little boy (6 years old) was getting ready for his piano class early on Saturday morning. Everyone in his class is graduating from Book 2 and they were giving a mini recital. After he worked on his 2 pieces (no prompting from me, he just sat down to practice! – a first!!!), he starting trying to work out another piece. Finally he came in to get me and said he wanted to play the Darth Vader theme (mi mi mi do sol mi do sol mi). We worked it out and he was very happy to be able to play the first part of it after a little work.

After a while he went to get his bugle and thought he could play it on that. He was having a really difficult time getting it to respond so early in the morning. I could tell that he was just about ready to blow really hard to get things to sound (I’ve encouraged him over and over that he doesn’t need to blow so hard to get a good sound out of it, and he’s been pretty good about that). I told him that sometimes my lips don’t work as well in the morning either. Since my horn was sitting on the chair, I had him gently play on my mouthpiece/leadpipe combination and the second time he blew, his lips began to respond.

Then he picked up the bugle, and voi la! His response was working like he expected it to.

I told him that the Darth Vader theme was a little too high for him so I just played it for him. Then he played a few other notes and moved on to something else.

The thing that was most important for me is that I’m planting a seed for how sound production works on a brass instrument. I’m sure if I hadn’t provided that simple leadpipe suggestion, he would have continued to blow harder until the sound began, reinforcing that “blowing harder” is the way to get this thing to work. I’m certain that this is how 99.9% of all little kids approach sound production. My brief intercession has given his mind something completely different to think about, even if it was only for several seconds. He will probably remember a week or month from now when he picks it up again, “Dad showed me something to get this thing to work better…Oh yeah….Hey Dad can I try your leadpipe!”

Another success for the teaching of Bill Adam!
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Derek Reaban
Tempe, Arizona
Tempe Winds / Symphony of the Southwest

[redhawktrumpet85]

That's great that you showed him an easier way to play. I'm 20 now and I'm still trying to get past that whole "if it's not responding, blow harder" mindset. Great job!
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Matt Miller