I did it. I spread the stench of my warbling, pubescent, I-haven’t-played-in-a-week, put-me-in-the-Shiner-Parade-Band sound around the intimate confines of my in-law’s house. Okay, it wasn’t that bad, it’s just fun to write that way. After all, when else do you get to use pubescent, warbling, and stench in the same sentence? The truth of the matter is: I am woefully out of shape, but the anticipation of how bad it would be was worse than it actually was.

I did lip bends for 5-10 minutes, then I played the Caruso “six notes” (6 times through), followed by the “Seconds”. I played the “Seconds” exercise exactly as it is outlined in the book. During the 15 minute “break”, I played the Clarke 2nd study (every other exercise from low G to F at the top of the staff) plus the etude. I played the etude slowly to get the fingers back into a groove. At the end of that, I went back for the second time through the Caruso “Seconds”, played through it as described in the book, and put the horn away.

After three hours of rest, I will be back on the Caruso “six notes” again, followed by some Bai Lin Lip Flexibilities, and perhaps some Stamp. Anything more than that will depend on how it feels when I pick the horn back up again. Until then…

I did the afternoon session as planned. The exercises out of the Bai Lin felt surprisingly good. I did numbers: 1, 7, 11, 12, 13, 14, 17, and 24. I did not tackle any Stamp. I will work some of that in tomorrow. Ideally, I would do another session this evening, but we are going out and that won’t be possible.

§ 2 Responses to Playing Again"

• JCarlton says:

  January 13, 2006 at 2:06 pm

  Bai Lin : where may I obtain a copy??
• Craig Morris says:

  January 14, 2006 at 1:03 pm

  Any good quality sheet music store will be able to get it for you, if they don’t already have it in stock. I have had good luck at Sheet Music Service of Portland (http://www.sheetmusicservice.com)