Lesson 6 - conclusion

I have found this gestalt approach to brass playing very useful in my own playing and teaching. I have shared it here in hopes that it may be of use to you, too.

Parting thoughts

The Phases described in Lesson 4 should not be considered as “once-only” steps to learning a piece; I do not view them as tools to be discarded when the music is
”mastered” (is it ever?). My own practicing shifts back and forth between the Phases, depending on various factors: for example, where I am in the trajectory of a piece (just learning it vs performing it tomorrow), how difficult a particular passage is to execute, how many bad habits I am trying to “over-write” in pieces I learned before adopting this approach, how energetic I’m feeling on a particular day, how much / how well I practiced yesterday, etc.

Notes that suddenly feel “unfamiliar,” or don’t want to speak one day might need a few minutes of Phase 1 (individual long tones as gestalts) or Phase 2 (single notes in time as gestalts), while a fast passage with a clam in it might need some Phase 3 work (notes in pairs - or more - as gestalts).

Success with this approach requires a fair amount of maturity on the part of the player, and may not be a very effective approach with younger learners. It’s also important that a player have a basic understanding of notes that actually do feel whole (comfortable, centered, full-bodied, rich, etc), as compared to those that don’t, in order to recognize the “familiarity” that comes from a successful implementation of this gestalt approach.

Above all, the goal is to make hard things easy, because easy is impossible to fake, and it is therefore the best overall measure of when difficult music has become a single gestalt.