The Trombone and the Harmonica

 

I spend way too much time thinking about, playing and listening to trombones and harmonicas. These two instruments grabbed me at different points in my life, and for different reasons.

Many of us had that elementary school experience around fourth grade - after playing "Hot Cross Buns" on ocarinas in third grade, a few students decided that they liked making quasi-musical noise. The band room was available for kids in 4th and 5th grade. I was one of those kids that was eager to  goof around in with musical instruments - and kids in band got to leave the main classroom to work with the music teacher for a couple hours a week. That was the main draw for most of us.

On that day early in the fourth grade school year that kids could claim instruments, I had a cold. I stayed home from school for a couple of days. By the time I returned, all of my favorite instruments had been claimed by other kids - the trumpets were gone, the saxophones were gone, the violins were gone. There was a collection of sad orphan instruments - violas, French horns, and trombones.  I picked a trombone as the "least worst" instrument available.

Well, I was ambivalent about the trombone for a while.  It was an awkward instrument - the slide was hard for short 9-year old arms to manipulate.  It was a long horn and I had a tendency to bump into other musicians in the band. I sounded like crap - thin tone and generally off-pitch.  I had enough musical awareness to know that I sucked. I didn't quit, though.  I had caught the music disease and the trombone was my instrument.

I kept at it and became a half-decent trombonist in high school.  I switched to bass trombone for a few years, then back to tenor, then back to bass.  I grew to love the instrument and worshipped the great jazz players - J.J. Johnson, Curtis Fuller, Slide Hampton, Frank Rosolino, Carl Fontana and many more. But the trombone was a tough instrument for me. I had to work hard just to avoid deterioration of my modest skills. I kept hitting walls that I couldn't break through. The music in my head wouldn't come out of the horn. I played through college and graduate school, but put it down when I got my first "real job" and embarked on a business career.

I was a band geek, music nerd in high school. I also used to hang around with guys that had garage bands, playing bad covers of "The House of the Rising Sun" and other chestnuts. I wanted to play with those guys, but the trombone was  not a natural fit with electric guitar, bass and drums. I can't remember how it happened, but I found a harmonica somewhere. Maybe one of my guitar-playing buddies had one.  I discovered it was very easy to get a decent sound of of a harmonica. If you can breathe, you can play it.  There is no need for hand-eye coordination or control of obscure embouchure muscles.

I began seeking out recordings of harmonica players. There are many limited players out there - the Bob Dylans, John Lennons, Mick Jaggers, etc. - that see the harmonica as an easy way to add a different sound to their work. Since I was a working-class white kid in a mostly-white high school (some Asian kids, some Mexican kids, no Black kids), I had to find the good players through white people that stole their shit.  So John Mayall was my first influence. 

I didn't work on the harmonica, but I played it a lot. I could play it while walking down the street. I could play it while I was driving in my car. I kept one in my pocket most of the time - still do. I could play along with guitar players once I figured out how to match harmonica keys to guitar keys (it took me a while to learn that the harmonica sounded best when the key of the harmonica was a 4th higher than the key that the guitar was playing in (so a harmonica in the key of A sounded great when the guitarist is playing in E). This is elementary stuff, but it was revolutionary to me when I was 16 years old.

I eventually found the real masters of the harmonica - Little Walter Jacobs, Big Walter Horton, James Cotton, George Harmonica Smith, Junior Wells.  Since I was a jazz nut, I found Toots Thielman and fell in love with jazz on the chromatic harmonica. Oh, and Stevie Wonder - a harmonica God for sure. And Howard Levy - the superhero who mastered chromatic music on the little old diatonic harmonica, which is not designed to play chromatic music.

Since I started playing trombone again in March, I have been appreciating the similarities and differences between my chosen musical weapons. Both are very vocal instruments - the trombone can sound like people talking (remember the teacher in the Charlie Brown animated specials?).  The harmonica can also put out wails and moans that sound very human.  The differences between the two instruments are also obvious - harmonicas can play chords, trombones cannot.  Getting a decent sound out of a harmonica is relatively easy (if you can breathe, you can play a chord); getting a decent sound out of the trombone takes quite a lot of practice; it requires unnatural buzzing of lips and control of airflow. The process of learning to play the trombone is like lifting weights - you have to get your reps in and build muscles; if you lay off for any significant period, the trombone "chops" begin to atrophy. Playing a harmonica is like walking - it is easy, almost anyone can do it and you can sit for a long time without losing your ability to walk.

Of course, if you want to truly master one of these instruments, you must be focused and dedicated. In that sense, the instruments are identical.

Five Living Musicians I Love

I am into the music of many people who have shuffled off this mortal coil. But there are lots of folks that I love who are still with us. I admire dozens of musicians - maybe hundreds. Here are five, not listed in order of preference (because I love them all):



Bonnie Raitt: I am Bonnie's loyal dog. Her voice is an unique, exquisite instrument, capable of expressing love, lust, anger, longing, joy, sorrow - and every other emotion that a human being can experience. I was a fan boy long before she broke through with the "Nick of Time" album in 1990 - I bought her first album in 1971 when I was a junior in high school. She was and is a frequent visitor to Chicago, and supported the blues people from whom she drew her inspiration - Robert Johnson, Son House, Sippie Wallace, Muddy Waters, A.C. Reed, John Lee Hooker, Junior Wells and all the rest. While her voice is what captures me and reduces me to a puddle of emotions, her slide guitar work is also outstanding - unhurried, tasty and instantly recognizable. Stevie Wonder is among the fans of her slide guitar prowess, adding her as a guest musician on his most recent album. She is also an individual with strongly-held convictions, and she devotes considerable time and energy to pursuing those convictions. Hard to come up with a more admirable person among the upper echelons of popular music....



Sonny Rollins: Miles, Dizzy, Bird, 'Trane, Monk, Duke, Dexter.....and Sonny. Sonny is surviving member of this exclusive club of jazz heroes. He is the Saxophone Colossus. Here is a link to an interview of Sonny, conducted by Clint Eastwood on the eve of the 2007 Monterey Jazz Festival (it is well-known that Clint is a dewey-eyed jazz fan, bless his heart). At the age of 77, Sonny is still blowing up a storm - in his sixth decade as a jazz giant. His exuberent and joyful music is a blessing for all humans. It was my great honor to play trombone in the UC Berkeley Jazz Ensemble that supported Mr. Rollins back in 1975 when he was the featured artist at the Pacific Coast Collegiate Jazz Festival in Berkeley. Listening to him play, working through the arrangements that he wrote, being in his presence...it was one of the peak experiences of my musical life. Sonny is a constantly striving musician - his practicing regimen is legendary. He is famous for dropping out at the peak of his bebop fame in 1959 to play alone for two years under the Williamsburg Bridge in Lower Manahattan. There are many things I love about this musician, but one of my favorite things about him is his affinity for unusual material - "I'm an Old Cow Hand, "Tennessee Waltz," "Someday I'll Find You" (which is the theme song from an old radio show called "Mr Keene - Tracer of Lost Persons"). Sonny gets my vote as the coolest man alive. His look, his way of speaking, his devotion to his craft, his focus and refusal to wallow in the fruits of his success are all very cool. The intensity, humanity, humor, and tenderness of his playing are absolutely unmatched by any other musician, living or dead.



Tom Waits: I discovered Tom Waits in 1974 when I bought his "Closing Time" CD at a used record store on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley CA. I spent $1.50 for the record, and I got $150 worth of juice out of one cut - " Ol' '55" - a great song. And that is one aspect of Tom Waits - he writes great songs. Sentimental, heart-breaking, weird emotional songs. Bruce Springsteen covers Tom - "Jersey Girl" is the tune, if I remember right. This is my favorite "nice" Tom Waits song. And then he does some stuff that is WAY....OUT...THERE. Man - he can squeeze so much emotion and intensity out of a limited vocal range - but it isn't his range that is important. He can evoke a wide spectrum of tonal colors and craziness with his voice and his shenanigans.

Tom is also a terrific actor - his current movie role is in "Wristcutters - A Love Story" Can't wait to see that flick - it hasn't been released in Chicago yet.


Curtis Fuller: Back when I was a mediocre high school trombonist, I discovered Curtis Fuller. He is now 73 years old and still making the trombone do things that are hard to believe. He played 'bone with John Coltrane on the "Blue Trane" LP; he played with Art Blakey. Mr. Fuller was one of those cats that had talent that refused to be denied - his Jamaican parents died when he was a child, so he was raised in an orphange in Detroit during the WWII years. He joined the U.S, Army in 1953 - one of the few places where black men were treated like human beings. He was a J.J. Johnson protege, but he developed his own style - edgier, faster, crazier. When I used to play trombone, I would listen to his records and weep. He is the reason that I changed my major from music to economics at Cal Berkeley.



Kim Wilson: Kim is my blues harmonica idol. He is devoted to the post-war Chicago blues tradition. He is also an official rock star; has written major hits and fronted the Fabulous Thunderbirds for almost three decades. The royalties from "Tuff Enuff" and all of the T-Birds hits allow Kim the freedom to play straight-up blues with true believers like Rusty Zinn, Billy Flynn, and a long list of other blues fanatics. I feel deeply connected to this man due our similar histories - Kim is three years older than I am, he played trombone as a kid, he found the harmonica and the blues when he was a senior in high school (I bought my first harmonica when I was a junior in high school). I have had the honor to meet him a couple years ago at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago. He is the best Chicago blues harp player alive today, in my opinion. He also is a very solid, skilled vocalist with a very flexible and powerful baritone voice.

So that is five that I love...the list of living musicians that slay me is much longer than this. Watch for more profiles in future posts....