Chicago Schools

[invisiblewasp]

What the best Chicago universities for trumpet?
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Austin

[Jon Kaplan]

At Northwestern University you’d get to study with the recently retired Principal Trumpet of the Philadelphia Orchestra, David Bilger. Another obviously amazing situation is over at DePaul where you can study with the current Principal Trumpet of the Chicago Symphony, Esteban Batallan. Hard to go wrong either way!
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2nd Trumpet, Charlotte Symphony Orchestra
2nd Trumpet, Central City Opera Orchestra

[guoliao]

Northwestern University - Northwestern's Bienen School of Music offers excellent trumpet programs and has renowned faculty members.

DePaul University - DePaul's School of Music provides a range of trumpet studies and opportunities for performance.

Roosevelt University - Roosevelt's Chicago College of Performing Arts has a strong brass department, including trumpet.

University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) - UIC's College of Architecture, Design, and the Arts offers trumpet programs within its music department.

[kehaulani]

Keep in mind that, unless you're a monster, you may not be studying with these name teachers, at least in the beginning.

This is not to denigrate graduate-assistant teachers (or "secondary" teachers) because there are some outstanding ones, but they are not the name teachers who might attract you.

For some, it may be more profitable (and sometimes less costly) to study at another university or Jr. College where the teacher may not have the reputation of those top-tier professors who you will not be studying with, but who are more experienced/effective than a graduate assistant at your chosen top school.

To be clear, I'm not suggesting you abandon your goal of studying with that top teacher, just that it may be better to spend your first two years studying elsewhere.
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"If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn." Bird

Yamaha 8310Z Bobby Shew trumpet
Benge 3X Trumpet
Benge 3X Cornet
Adams F-1 Flghn

[PH]

Every school has different policies on who studies with the main professors and who studies with Graduate Teaching Assistants. I know that at my two most recent schools (Indiana and Illinois) all music majors study with one of the main professors and the TAs teach non-music majors taking lessons as an elective. This is one major difference that every potential student should investigate when comparing schools that may seem otherwise comparable.
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Bach trumpet artist-clinician
Clinical Professor of Jazz Trumpet, University of Illinois
Professor Emeritus of Jazz Studies, Indiana University Jacobs School of Music
Faculty Jamey Aebersold Jazz Workshops 1976-2019
JazzRetreats.com

[abontrumpet]

To (poorly) fill in the gaps for some others:
DePaul, at least when I applied to my masters - you would get x amount of lessons a quarter (I think it was 12 at the time) and you could sign up for a mix of teachers. They did have a TA at one point, pretty sure. They may have filled in the gaps.

Roosevelt (CCPA), also applied for my masters - I'm almost positive you would get a handful of lessons from the main profs, if not all.

Northwestern - in the barb/charlie and recent era, you've been able to get lessons with main profs.

Anyway, you can't go wrong. Chicago is a great city and lots to learn. The programs differ and have heard a fair number of gripes with "programs" themselves but never the profs. It used to be a super big gig-city, but in talking with people recently, it's been a little tougher since Covid.

[BuffaloBill]

You can always seek out great teachers regardless of where you go to school. Many of the big names will see you on the side.

[Dayton]

[Minaku]

It doesn’t matter where you go. What matters is the quality of teacher and your work ethic, there’s plenty of professionals who never went to the big schools and still made it. They saved a hell of a lot of money too