TromboneChat

Hi! I came to think of the occasions when I left a mouthpiece behind. I guess it has happened to others as well.

First time it happened I was very young and had forgot my mouthpiece at home on the piano so my lesson had to be cancelled. I guess I was about 14-15 years. It was not a big thing. I just was ashamed.

The second time it happened it was worse. It was on a gig where I was called to sub to play lead on an outside concert with a big band. I was the first in place and soon noticed my mouthpiece was missing. I called the other tromboneplayers to have them bring a spare mouthpiece but they had allready left their homes. One of them I could not reach. I had no time to go and buy or lend me a mouthpiece. The panic was near and it was a payed gig. We sat in our places with the first tune ready. I knew the second piece was "I've got you under my skin" with the famous trombone solo coming up in my part and I had still no mouthpiece. I was sure I would never be called again  I thought I could just pretend that I was playing or something, and maybe borrow the second players mouthpiece just in time to play that solo. The start of the gig was delayed and it was because the second player was not heard of and was now five minutes late. The audience waited. He arrived and I desperately asked if he had a spare mouthpiece to lend me. I was lucky he had a Bach 6 1/2 AL on loan, a massive mouthpiece with much extra heavy metal. I borrowed that mouthpiece and that saved my gig. This was about five years ago and happened because I had begun to switch a lot between horns. The mouthpiece was in another case.
After this I never put the mouthpiece in a case. I allways put it in my pocket. I still do that.

The third time it happened was a year ago and I thought I had the mouthpiece in my pocket but for some reason I was mistaken. That was a rehearsal and one of the other players had a spare mouthpiece.

Since that happened I have begun to bring one extra mouthpiece just in case. It could be one of the others that needs my spare mouthpiece.

Nowdays the risk is much less. I always check I have the right mouthpiece when I leave the house and I check it also fits the leadpipe of the trombone I bring. I know I never keep any of my mouthpieces in the case so I always check.

I've been lucky the times it has happened and it has not led to a catastrophe. I have always been rescued or it did not matter that much and it has only happened three times. I guess it could be much worse...

What's your story?

/Tom

So far; so good.

Before I leave the garage, I take a mental inventory. Trombone. Check. Mouthpiece. Check. Music. Check. Gig bag. Check. Etc.

Before I leave a rehearsal or gig, I take the very same mental inventory.

Water bottles don't count. 

...Geezer

One of my former teachers showed up to a gig without a mouthpiece. Luckily the 2nd trombone had a spare one in their case, which was the exact same model. After that they both kept the habit of having a spare one of the other player's size that never left the case, that way if one had used their mouthpiece with another horn and forgot to switch it back, they always had a spare one on every gig. I thought that was a nice story and clever strategy - you're not going to take that spare mouthpiece out of the case if it's not a size you ever use.

For me it was recently (fortunately just for an informal rehearsal with no consequence). Usually kept my bass sackbut mouthpiece with all my stuff in my tenor sackbut gig bag which I pretty much always have with me. Recently started leaving it in the bass case, and then there was a bass sackbut-classical bass swapping series of dumbness happening and I found myself with my bass mouthpiece being with the wrong instrument, locked inside a locker I don't have a key for. Had to play those bass parts on tenor (which I guess was good practice for false tones!).

I am super paranoid about this. Thus far, my paranoia has paid off.

I keep plastic mouthpieces (one SS, one LS) in my car's cupholder.
Just this past summer, I lent one of those plastic pieces to a sectionmate who forgot his mouthpiece for a gig.

I also keep ~3 mouthpieces in each of my cases.
Came in handy ten years ago when I dropped a mouthpiece (smushing the shank) immediately before a concert.

I once showed up to a recording with no mouthpiece. I was still getting into the groove of playing so many horns and mouthpieces and left with the correct horn but my mouthpiece was in a different case.

Since then I have been keeping spares all over the place including compartments in my car and music bag. Even if the size is t quite right it’s better than having nothing.

I use a gig bag and leave the mouthpiece in the receiver virtually all the time.

There was one gig where I had been playing another horn at home and the mouthpiece stayed on that horn.  Fortunately there was a music store near the gig so I bought a 6-1/2AL to use.  Not close to my size, but close enough.

For a while I carried a spare for a colleague who seemed to be going through a period of absentmindedness.

I always carry a spare m'pce in my equipment/mute bag that is at least close to the one that I am playing. Forget my m'pce? It's happened... But...maybe worse...dropping it and busting up the shank.

S.

Brought the wrong music book or no music at all? Grabbed the wrong trombone case? Showed up to the wrong venue and had to race to make it on time? I’ve done worse than forgetting a mouthpiece 

I played an orchestra gig a while ago and I accidentally left my mouthpiece with a different horn...

I ended up playing principal on a Bach 1 1/2 G that I borrowed from the bass trombonist... This is close to the rim I play on now, but back then I was still playing on a 4G-ish mouthpiece. It worked, and the gig went great.

Somehow (knock on wood) I've never forgotten a mouthpiece.

I did show up to a major orchestra with the wrong concert wear. That was an interesting 45 minutes.

I have had mouthpiece palava in the past.  I keep a plastic 5G and a 1.5G in my mute/music case just in case.  I have not needed them since doing that - but you never know.

I have never forgotten my mouthpiece, but I regularly spend my drives to rehearsals and concerts convinced I have forgotten my mouthpiece or something.  It is totally unproductive.

I normally play on a 1 1/4 sized bass mouthpiece. I carry an extra Kelly 1.5 in the coat, or glovebox.

Only happened once for a dress rehearsal ... I ended up sitting in my chair and watching the music go by.  I now have one mouthpiece for every horn and make sure that I never, ever separate the two.  If the horn is on the stand in my studio, the mouthpiece is in the receiver, and the only way a case gats closed is if there is a mouthpiece in the case with the horn. 

Not a mouthpiece, but I got the dress code wrong for an orchestra concert (the last time I had played with them was for an opera production, so all black, and for some reason I forgot that the usual with them was black tie). The conductor had a different set-up, with the trumpet and bones on the left side behind the cellos and violas, and the basses behind the woodwinds. So basically I was sitting on a riser close to the front of the stage. Playing the solos in Sibelius 7. The orchestra manager was about to blow a gasket. Luckily I managed to get a spectator to bring be a white shirt. It arrived about 2 minutes before showtime.

I forgot a mouthpiece on a gig exactly once.  After that, I put a couple Kellys in my car (lg and sm shank) as insurance.  I've never forgotten a mouthpiece since. 

I do keep a mouthpiece in the case of every horn I use regularly.  I have some duplicate mouthpieces to facilitate that.

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I do not as yet have a solution to forgetting my music.  Did that a couple times (once I brought the wrong folder).

I carry a gig bag for music, lubes, water bottle, tools, etc. I keep a 1.5G in the bag. In a pinch, I can play either bass or large tenor with it.

Not forgotten mouthpiece but I have experienced opening the trombone case to find the slide missing. I had prepared the slide well at home but forgot to put it in the case when I left. The occasion was a radio recording with the local community band, I was 17 years old and the radio recording was a big thing for all of us. Luckily there was a music store nearby and I ran there as fast as I could and they lent me a trombone for that recording.

My granddaughter dropped her trumpet mouth piece under the retractable basketball stand while waiting to perform her Christmas concert...She came to me crying in a panic...I got to be the grampap hero by getting the janitor, who had a specially designed pole for dropped items...She had a spare in her case, but she doesn't like it as much...All turned out just fine...

Nanook

As of now, I have never forgotten a mpc for a concert/rehearsal. But this thread will make me be extra careful in the future 

I`ve never forgotten my mouthpiece, too damn paranoid.
I have duplicates in all my horns and a "Buzzing" mouthpiece (Megatone 7C) in my car at all times.
I always check everything before I leave the house.

Not gonna lie, Tom - reading your first story in you OP legitimately stressed and freaked me out, glad it all worked out.

Closest I've come to this was pulling out the wrong mouthpiece. Never played any paid gigs, usually just community-type stuff, but even then, I'm the kind to lose a bit of confidence when I suddenly have to add a little bit of extra effort because of unfamiliar equipment.

Two very funny missing equipment stories :
   I played a gig MANY years ago on which the lead trumpet player brought his brand new Shilke quadruple trumpet case containing a trumpet in B flat, a trumpet in C, a trumpet in D and a piccolo trumpet in E Flat.  He forgot to include even ONE mouthpiece!  The booker on the job was a school music teacher and fortunately [for the lead trumpeter] had a 7C trumpet mouthpiece in his briefcase he used to demonstrate to his students. The trumpeter was especially fortunate because the booker was a violinist !  I can only imagine what one of those demos sounded like !
  The second story occurred about 1957-58 during a concert of The Rochester Philharmonic when I was a student at The Eastman School of Music.  The principal horn player in the orchestra, Morris Secon, suddenly stood up in the midst of a concert, walked off stage and returned several minutes later to resume the performance.  As it was later discovered, he was dumping water from his French horn and one of his slides fell from his grip, bounced along the risers on which the orchestra was seated and fell through a narrow opening at the base of the riser making it impossible to retrieve without removing half the orchestra from the risers.  Morris immediately headed to the annex building next to The Eastman Theater where all of the individual practice rooms were located, listened for the sound of a French horn, crashed into the room and snatched the instrument from the unsuspecting player with a quick promise to return the instrument later and returned to the stage as if nothing of importance had happened ! It might not be a mouthpiece story, but I think it fits nicely into the paranoia we all have about forgetting or losing part of our "kit" at a critical moment !   Cheers !!   Bob

I had an equipment related senior moment in July last year, a senior moment lasting nearly a whole weekend.  I keep my slides hanging on a rack on the wall with the inners and outers separated.  The night before the gig, I was cleaning the Bach 50 slide which I was going to be playing the next day.

After cleaning the outer I picked the inner of my 42 slide off the rack on the wall and inserted it.  I couldn't work out why it felt looser than before I cleaned it.  I thought maybe I damaged it during cleaning but really couldn't see how I could have done that. 

Anyway I put it in the case ready for an early start the next day.  In the morning I got it out and checked it and yes it was still as loose as it was the night before.  Puzzling.  I didn't have time to have a blow on it so I just put it back in the case and grabbed my other 50 slide (50 LT) and put it in the car just in case.

I got to the venue and got the bone out for a warm up.  Could hardly blow a note.  Definitely something wrong here.  So I went and got the LT slide out of the car.  But then I noticed it didn't have a lead pipe in it.  Both my 50 and 42 slides have Edwards threaded pipes so I unscrewed the lead pipe out of the loose slide and screwed it into the 50 LT slide.  It was loose in the inner tubes.  That's strange I thought.  My brain still didn't make the obvious connection.  So I took the lead pipe out and expanded the end with the shank of another mouthpiece I had in my case.  That was a bit of work.  I eventually got it to fit the 50 LT slide and we were in business.  All went well.

On the trip up to the venue I explained the problem to my wife.  She suggested that maybe I had mixed up the inner and outer with another slide from the rack.  No, not possible said I.

We got home after the gig and I found that I had left my extra mouthpiece behind at the venue.  I rang and found someone there who found the mouthpiece for me.  Drove for an hour back there, picked it up and an hour back home again.

So then I started to unpack my bone and put it away in its usual place.  That's when I found the 50 inner slide hanging on the wall by itself and the penny finally dropped.
 

Quote from: Full Pedal Trombonist on Dec 30, 2017, 11:49AMBrought the wrong music book or no music at all? Grabbed the wrong trombone case? Showed up to the wrong venue and had to race to make it on time? I’ve done worse than forgetting a mouthpiece 
I used to have a huge folder that I kept all the music for my various gigs in at the same time.  That way I would never forget the music, right?  Well... one Christmas season I was playing both the band and orchestra arrangements of “A Christmas Festival”. D, Db. Are they really that different?

Cheers,
Andy

I played for 16 years with a very successful classic R&B/Soul/Classic Rock Band. we had a 3 pc horn section. we were booked to play a wedding about an hour 1/2 from home. Got to the gig set-up and went to dinner. Got ready for the gig and my trumpet is swearing himself. He had played a wedding ceremony that afternoon and didn`t change his horns out. Instead of his Bb and Flugel, he had his C and piccolo. I made a few fast calls to friends and got a Bb for him. duh!!
The next weekend, again we`re out of town for another wedding, He comes in and makes a big deal about having the right horns this week. We get all set-up , eat and get ready to play, swearing again. He forgot his Tux. so he runs out to Walmart and buys a short jacket, pants and a white shirt. There goes most of the gig pay
After that , for months after I would phone his wife and make sure he had everything needed

Sunday morning (10:00 am) rehearsal. Arrive, pop the trunk. No trombone. (Forgot it).

Quote from: Ellrod on Jan 12, 2018, 10:58AMSunday morning (10:00 am) rehearsal. Arrive, pop the trunk. No trombone. (Forgot it).

I've considered keeping a spare beater horn in the car for exactly this purpose.
...and a spare white shirt, black shirt, black jacket, black shoes, black socks, black pants.
I need a bigger car.





BTW, this might be my favorite thread ever. 

I keep in my car/trunk at all times , so I never have to worry about that stuff

Music stand
Mute bag
Seat cushions
Microphone case
Mic stand

No stand light?
I carry 3 or 4 with me to every gig.

Quote from: Ellrod on Jan 12, 2018, 10:58AMSunday morning (10:00 am) rehearsal. Arrive, pop the trunk. No trombone. (Forgot it).

What was her name?

Quote from: Ellrod on Jan 12, 2018, 10:58AMSunday morning (10:00 am) rehearsal. Arrive, pop the trunk. No trombone. (Forgot it).

What was her name?