Getting into Sackbut?

[ATXBassBone]

How much work is there really in playing sackbut? Apart from some groups in Europe I don't see anyone US doing full time work as a sackbut player.

As far as getting into the instrument, anyone know of any sackbuts in TX for sale? Any work in TX for sackbut in general?

[Posaunus]

Full-time work as a sackbutist? To earn a living wage doing nothing else but playing the sackbut?
Pretty much zero chance in Texas. Or anywhere else in the U.S.A.

Maximilien Brisson (LeTromboniste on TromboneChat) is our resident European sackbutist and is in the top rank. I expect that he is supplementing his sackbut playing with lots of teaching and other musical activities.

That being said, learning to play the sackbut is a worthwhile and fun pursuit, which I enjoyed several decades ago in a different environment. But I gave it up since the opportunities to play are few and far between.

[LeTromboniste]

Hi! Apologies in advance for the long post.

It depends what you mean by "full-time work as a sackbut player". If you mean literally only playing sackbut, then not really, at least in the US (and arguably anywhere, for a player starting now). Not unlike most music freelancers in general. There is no such thing as full-time position as a sackbut player, anywhere, as there are no full-time ensemble and virtually no salaried group (usually fees per project).

But then again most people don't want to only play. If your definition is broader, then yes, it's totally possible. I don't play or teach modern trombone anymore, and I don't have a non-music job; all my work is early music-related. Many colleagues are in the same situation (and many with much more work than I have!). There's more room and more opportunity for it in Europe, but some also make a living in the US (Greg Ingles plays freelance and with regular groups and teaches at BU, Liza Malamut also freelances, is the director of a well-established and long-running early music ensemble and of her own group and teaches at IU, to name but two people). Teaching can supplement playing (there are part-time university teaching jobs – not many but they do exist, there are workshop and festival teaching opportunities, and depending where you are, teaching a few private students might be possible). Most of us do other related activities that enrich our musical life and inform our playing: musicological research (although rarely directly lucrative!), preparing modern editions of old manuscripts and prints (can be quite lucrative, relative to an equivalent performing gig), playing alternate instruments or singing, directing ensembles or choirs, having a part-time admin job for an ensemble in the field, audio and/or video recording or editing, playing and/or teaching modern trombone, etc.

All in all, early music is a niche scene compared to mainstream classical music, but there's also not many people doing it, so overall I would say opportunity and the possibility of making it as a working professional is actually higher than for orchestral playing. It's also a growing scene, so there is room for one to start projects, start ensembles, create work for yourself, so if you have an enterprising mindset, you can make your own success (but like everywhere in music, the number of musicians tends to increase faster than the amount of work, so that may be shrinking).

One more important thing is, having success as an early musician is not just about playing very well, and it's also not just about the usual social and professional skills needed to succeed as a freelancer. On top of that, there's an important knowledge element to it (much more than orchestral playing). If you're going to do historically-informed performance professionally, then your playing doesn't only need to be good, it needs to be...well, informed. About the repertoire, about the huge variety of styles, about how the musical language works (it's a very different language than 18th-19th century tonality), about the techniques we use, why we use them and when and where which ones are appropriate, about improvisation and ornamentation, about organology, about tuning and temperaments... The list goes on. The world of early music is fascinating and constantly, actively rediscovering itself as knowledge and understanding of the repertoire and performance practice evolve and get more refined.

The best way to get started is to get a decent instrument and get playing (I recommend Adam Woolf's method Sackbut Solutions for getting a crash-course on your own). Maybe see if a university near you has ensemble sessions you could join (not sure how far that is from you, but the UNT trombone studio has a tradition of sackbut-playing). If you like it and find that you have a facility for it, then the best path to get a solid training is of course to study early music academically (in North America, you can do that at BU, IU or McGill; in continental Europe, there's a bunch of different places – Basel, Bremen, The Hague, Brussels, Geneva, Lyon, etc). If that's not an option, some certainly have success learning on the job, and reading up sources and educating themselves on their own. It's just sometimes harder to know where to start, and obviously a lot harder to make contacts and get into the scene. Then you should definitely get some lessons with specialists and/or attend specialized workshops and courses (San Francisco Early Music Society workshops, Early Double Reeds and Sackbut Workshop (Indiana), Amherst Early Music Festival, and a number of others).

Feel free to PM me if you want more information or cues!

[MStarke]

Compared to Maximilien my knowlegde on this topic is a 1/10

But still adding a few points.
I have at least some touchpoints, especially as my brother is freelancing quite a bit primarily as a baroque trumpet player.

As Maximilien also said, purely playing baroque trombone as a freelancer will not typically provide a decent living.
That's a totally logical issue - your typical paid working hours are normally limited to weekends and only sometimes during the week. (Of course there are exceptions...)
So you would need to do something else in addition - as Maximilien outlined very well.

However I think one point to be considered:
If you limit yourself to baroque trombone, probably 99% of teaching opportunities for trombone don't work.
And those that do work are normally teaching people on their way to becoming professionals.
So you normally have to be on a seriously high level yourself.

It's not the same as teaching just regular trombone beginner students.
Don't get me wrong, they also need good teachers, but the requirements are different.

In my opinion that's even more a problem of the baroque music world than the "regular" music world: It's quite a small and almost closed world, good jobs are to a large part oriented at educating the next people who will be looking at exactly these same jobs, as there is an even smaller share of non-professionals doing baroque music.

@Maximilien: How do you see this last point?

[MStarke]

On the other hand, at least in Europe:
It seems like if you are able to play baroque trombone on a good/serious level in addition to modern trombone, I would imagine that's quite a good combination!
My impression is that baroque gigs are often relatively well paid and also fun. Obviously the portion of stupid music that you are asked to play on a sackbut is limited.

[ithinknot]

Maximilien's covered more or less everything, but to reinforce the point about 'the knowledge element':

HIP isn't 'a double' - that's not to say you can't do both, but it's not mainly a 'technical proposition'. It's a different process - much more akin to jazz development - that ultimately depends almost entirely on musicianship and Being Interested (within which the instrument itself is merely one of many Interesting Things).

If the repertoire isn't the motivation, don't bother. Of course, if you like it, the good news is that the repertoire is of enormously higher quality and contemporary significance than that of the modern classical trombone.

[LeTromboniste]

Maximilien's covered more or less everything, but to reinforce the point about 'the knowledge element':

HIP isn't 'a double' - that's not to say you can't do both, but it's not mainly a 'technical proposition'. It's a different process - much more akin to jazz development - that ultimately depends almost entirely on musicianship and Being Interested (within which the instrument itself is merely one of many Interesting Things).

If the repertoire isn't the motivation, don't bother. Of course, if you like it, the good news is that the repertoire is of enormously higher quality and contemporary significance than that of the modern classical trombone.

Yes, exactly!

Sometimes modern players play sackbut without really having any clue about it, approach it as just another trombone gig that they should accept since they play trombone, and that's a real shame. To me that's akin to a professional trombonist who plays trumpet at an amateur level accepting high-level work on trumpet, which would be frowned upon by trumpet players and rightly so. I wouldn't encourage approaching it that way.

But I wouldn't say "don't bother" – we all have to start somewhere, and you have to try it to discover you like it.

There are people who double successfully, whether predominantly modern players who do get good work as sackbut players, people who do more or less 50/50, or some specialist sackbut players who still play and teach modern trombone. The predominantly modern players who successfully integrate the early music scene usually have spent a decent amount of time, effort and thought into familiarizing themselves with the instrument and the practice, and have an openness of mind and genuine interest.

In my opinion that's even more a problem of the baroque music world than the "regular" music world: It's quite a small and almost closed world, good jobs are to a large part oriented at educating the next people who will be looking at exactly these same jobs, as there is an even smaller share of non-professionals doing baroque music.

@Maximilien: How do you see this last point?

Yes, teaching jobs are for the most part only possible for committed specialists, since there aren't really jobs for teaching beginners, and not many teaching jobs at all, usually at the higher ed level. There are certainly exceptions, though. For instance a friend and colleague of mine teaches sackbut at a major conservatory, with little formal background in early music. He did a minor in sackbut while studying experimental contemporary music, and freelances in both those scenes, well respected as a sackbut player. But he spent the energy and time learning about it over several years and has this essential curiosity for it.

I will add that having a solid background in sackbut might also be a plus for landing certain modern trombone teaching jobs. There are also orchestra jobs in Europe where proficiency on historical instruments is encouraged or even expected. Beyond landing a job or getting freelance work, sackbut it is just good anyway for your musicianship, to inform your playing on modern instrument, and to integrate in your modern teaching.

[ithinknot]

Sometimes modern players play sackbut without really having any clue about it, approach it as just another trombone gig that they should accept since they play trombone, and that's a real shame. To me that's akin to a professional trombonist who plays trumpet at an amateur level accepting high-level work on trumpet, which would be frowned upon by trumpet players and rightly so. I wouldn't encourage approaching it that way.

But I wouldn't say "don't bother" – we all have to start somewhere, and you have to try it to discover you like it.

Yes, in my line of work it's 'organists who assume they can play the harpsichord'... which they can, badly.

And yes, of course - I don't mean "don't try it", but the essential curiosity factor should be apparent fairly early on, even just from listening. You need to be 'into' a lot more than the instrument, that's all.

[LeTromboniste]

Sometimes modern players play sackbut without really having any clue about it, approach it as just another trombone gig that they should accept since they play trombone, and that's a real shame. To me that's akin to a professional trombonist who plays trumpet at an amateur level accepting high-level work on trumpet, which would be frowned upon by trumpet players and rightly so. I wouldn't encourage approaching it that way.

But I wouldn't say "don't bother" – we all have to start somewhere, and you have to try it to discover you like it.

Yes, in my line of work it's 'organists who assume they can play the harpsichord'... which they can, badly.

And yes, of course - I don't mean "don't try it", but the essential curiosity factor should be apparent fairly early on, even just from listening. You need to be 'into' a lot more than the instrument, that's all.

Yup, absolutely!

[imsevimse]

I've never been real serious about learning to play sackbut but I have at least got the instruments to start. I have a Monke tenor sacbut. That's not really a true sacbut as I've been told. It has a valve so probably not what anyone serious really want but I got it cheap and as a first instrument it could do. I later stumbled across a Finke tenor and that one is more like it. Finally I also collected a Kuhnl & Meier F-bass sackbut. All these were really cheap. I guess not many people want them in Stockholm or they want those real expensive "true" ones.

Anyway it's not easy to produce the right sound in a sackbut. If you have tried your best to make the best modern trombone sound for many years and think a sackbut should sound the same then don't play sackbut, it is a totally different sound. The best mouthpiece from the three I have produces lots if air, and from what I've heard thats the mouthpiece that gave me the best sound. Heard that from a friend who happened to be one of the rare professional sackbut players in Stockholm (now retired).
I put the sackbut back in the case. Maybe later...

/Tom

[Posaunus]

Many thanks to LeTromboniste and ithinknot for their thoughtful and extremely valuable contributions to this thread. This is a fascinating topic to me, and I still regret that I could not participate more in the complex world of early music performance. I wish that I could enjoy more of this in person, even as part of the audience.

[jonathanharker]

As an owner of both, I'm getting more work on bass sackbut than contrabass trombone It's likely to stay that way until New Zealand orchestras start doing concerts of Hans Zimmer soundtracks and the call goes out for two extra contrabass trombones. Not sure about Texas, but to get into sackbut here we've pretty much had to come up with the gigs ourselves. Local players of period instruments have formed The Queen's Closet, a Renaissance and Baroque group, and the local cathedral MD now likes to use sackbuts and cornetts in the Christmas mass and Tudor Consort concerts. It's not going to feed a family, but it's a lot of fun.

[ivantong]

My teacher ask me to play Mozart Requiem with sackbut (while others are playing modern instrument) It sound silly in the first time but it’s so amazing and everything work out with choir in sackbut. I do not have much experience on sackbut but for me it fit the ‘right’ sound and things are easier if you do sackbut in particular music. There are some great trombonist could do early music artists but I believe it’s not easy to start with. For example I really admire great musician Patrick Wibart who plays Serpent beautifully. I wouldn’t say it’s a good investment to sackbut but it’s inspiring to have one and encouraging to trying more music into sackbut repertoire.

For hardware I personally think Ewald Meinl is slightly more in tune than Egger but both are superb sackbut in best quality!

[baroquetrombone]

As far as I know, there are exactly two people in the US making all of their income from performance* on period trombone (renaissance through romantic in our cases). I'm one of them, and as mentioned, [my closest colleague and friend] Greg Ingles is the other. We make about the same yearly, it's not a lot, it's difficult, and we've been in it for 20-25yrs. And at least the top couple tiers of players fly for work, so for any group with enough money to pay reasonable rates, you'd be competing with many of the current established players for that work, assuming the concert week doesn't conflict with one of their usual groups.

There are other people who play only period trombone in the US (renaissance/baroque (sackbut), for the most part) with varying levels of success and varying geographic reaches, but they all have other sources of income, and of course there are some people who double on modern, again, with varying levels of success. All of the ones I know get at least SOME work every year though- most are competent and knowledgable, and some are quite good.

Like any kind of music performance, I'd think, in order to get any real income, you need to be serious, a very good player, knowledgeable about what you're doing and why, connected, and it would help a LOT to be lucky. To just crap around on it and get the occasional gig, you just need to know some people with low standards.

If your interest is just to "get some gigs," don't bother (really--I'm saying it for practicality, your sanity, and for the good of the field). If you're actually interested in the music and its performance and want real, serious info, let me know via pm or email. I think my email is in my profile.



*to be completely clear, both of us also occasionally teach/coach at workshops or universities, but that's maybe 1/20th or less of the income.