Music can’t be found in the instruments, but a good instrument certainly helps you communicate music to the listener. I have been blessed with some amazing instruments. Below you will see a list of instruments that I currently perform with along with a photo gallery for each.
Piano
I have played some really great instruments in my career. While on tour in Vienna it was very common to see Bösendorfer just sitting around in random corners of restaurants, I played EVERYONE. I had a teacher with a Bösendorfer in his home. I’ve played some AWFUL instruments as well. I had never really been a fan of Baldwin pianos until I found the one that now sits in my home. It is one of the best pianos I’ve every played.
1936 Baldwin L Model 6’3″
Click here for the gallery
Trumpet
I worked for a music store for a number of years and one of my favorite things was helping students find the instrument that felt right and fit their style the best. The unfortunate story for me is with all the access I had to instruments I wasn’t able to find one that fit me. I also lived fairly close to a store that specialized in brass instruments and couldn’t find one there. So I scoured the forums to see what people were playing. I listened to trumpeters play and one particular instrument caught my ear (and eye). I found a custom maker (George Schlub of Schlub Brassworks) who made his own version of Schagerl’s Ganschhorn, and spoke with him and he made me what you see in the gallery below.
George now lives in Singapore. And with my luck shipped my trumpet during the winter. It arrived from Singapore right as Winter Storm Nemo hit which brought 30″ of snow to Long Island where I was living at the time. The bell of “Nemo” (had to name the trumpet after the storm) comes from a German trumpet bell maker and is around 150 years old everything else was handmade by George with the exception of the Zirnbauer rotary valves. When Nemo arrived I was astonished by the ease of playability and sound that it produced.