I dragged out my trombone today and had to brush off the dust on the ole chops to practice a little bit. Scales, long tones, breathing exercises, etc. were on the menu as I must have made the neighbors wonder what cow had been lured into my house to die. Amazingly, after not playing daily as I did many years ago, the muscle memory sprang back to life and I was belting out excerpts from "Blue Bells of Scotland", "Flight of the Bumblebee", and the trombone part in the Tennessee Tech Fight Song (Go Golden Eagles!). Well, maybe just the fight song part, but the memories came flooding back. It was fun to delve into an improvised dixieland tune or just tinker around with circular breathing, triple tonguing, or breath control. I would like to think that I could step back into the band ranks and carry my own against all those up and coming guys and gals ripping out the t-bone riffs.
I stopped briefly to catch my breath, get a drink to quench my parched mouth, and to massage my lips when I thought it would be a neat picture if I snapped my instrument on it's stand. When I walked around it, using a variety of different lenses, I saw an opportunity to catch my dog patiently listening on the chair through the bell of my trombone. The natural lighting through the window helped out and an added bonus was the panoramic capture of the room in the background. Picking up the horn again, I could only imagine being back on the recital stage and my dog was the ever-present and extremely forgiving audience I once played for.
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