A Christmas Story!
by: Sharon Ferrell, circa December 2002

A long, long time ago, in a far off land called Jefferson City, Missouri, I was a happy starting band student.

It was summer school and I was starting out in the Beginning Band program, which was a little "start up" program for kids who wanted to be a little bit ahead in band when school started in the fall. I happily sat in the then-sparse bass band room, silver trumpet on my lap, waiting to start.

Perhaps I should back up a bit. Back in the fall of the previous year there was an Instrument Tryout night over at the high school. I attended, not sure what I wanted to play but pretty sure it would be something loud and brassy, and drank in the wonderful scents of alcohol (to clean the mouthpieces between different students trying them out) and slide oil. I was the first person to try out the trombone, throwing out the slide with ease, and also tried out some of the woodwind instruments, which I wasn't too successful with. This can probably be suspected from a person who couldn't whistle. I don't quiet remember trying out a trumpet, yet that was what my heart was set on once I left that night. When band registration came along in spring my father borrowed a beautiful silver Yamaha trumpet from one of his friends at work for me, and I was set.

Back to summer school. During those early years of band, I was an enthusiastic player. Oh so enthusiastic. I practiced each day after those two hours of summer school band class wanting oh so much to be the best. But alas, it could not be. I could not play any of the higher register notes (which, at the time, wasn't even that high) and after going to smaller sessions with other students having trouble producing the high notes, the teacher and all of the student assistants came to the same conclusion: my chops were just not the right size for a trumpet mouthpiece.

I must back up again so I can explain to those not familiar to how brass instruments work. You "buzz" your lips, in a sort of subdued version of the "thrrpt" motion. When you do this into a mouthpiece, you get a wonderful rendition of a police siren. When you attach a brass instrument to that mouthpiece, you get a musical note (hopefully). The tighter your lips, the higher the note. Unlike woodwind instruments, where different combinations of keys make all the different notes you can ever hope for, brass instruments only have seven different key combinations at best, and you have to tighten your lips to get further up the musical scale. The size of the mouthpiece dictates the tonal range of the instrument, generally, the smaller the mouthpiece, the higher the notes.

Trumpet mouthpieces are on the small end of the scale, probably only second to the French horn. It takes strong, and petiet lips to produce any higher notes in those things. It wasn't that I wasn't trying hard enough-I could blast off a perfect middle C. It was just that unless I wanted to train my lips for months on end to strain themselves to produce higher notes, I would have to go to a lower brass instrument.

I was taken in by the Brass teacher for the middle school and one of the band teachers for the high school, the great Mr. Gilliland, who started out his band career as a tuba player. He later on did the aforementioned training with his lips and now plays all brass instruments, specializing in the trumpet. He was teaching the lower brass students, who were all clumped together for they all played in bass clef, and there just wasn't a whole lot of them. I don't remember how they came to this conclusion, but they thought that the trombone would be the best for me to play. They probably just couldn't imagine me straddling a tuba or even the smaller baritone for too long, especially since I was planning on going into marching band for high school.

Therein lies the problem: the school couldn't loan out trombones. It was one of the "low end" instruments, and therefore the school district didn't carry them as they did tubas and baritones. Still, they were horribly expensive, and the local instrument store didn't have a rental program like trumpets did (for they were too expensive). So procuring a trombone for my use in such short time became a problem.

But ah! Thanks to the resourceful minds in the band department, that did not last long. Through some magical coincidence, a trombone was left at the high school by a graduated student, abandoned. They had to clean up the trombone and try to get ahold of the owner to ask his permission (probably out of formalities, it was an expensive instrument, so it would really take someone who really didn't give a rat's ass about it to leave it behind in your own formal high school). For a short time while this was taken care of, I was playing a baritone, this particular one being a dingy and beat up one that smelled of vinegar. For some reason even now I cannot fathom, I remember being reminded of C-3PO in the beginning of A New Hope by that thing. Perhaps fangirlness is always with you, waiting to be confirmed, like your...er...never mind. (My attempts at paraphrasing Faith and the Rocket Cat is foiled!)

While the golden dented instrument had its peculiar charm, I was glad when I was introduced to my first trombone. Mr. Gilliland greased up the slide with slide grease, for it was achingly dry, and I began my first attempts at handling the awkward instrument. Luckily I wasn't too far into learning Treble clef when I switched over, so it was easy enough to convert, with the slide making it easier since it used that for it's main scale as opposed to keys.

I took to it, successfully completed the summer course, practiced through the music book in the summer, and came back to school that year already ahead of the students that were starting off at the beginning of the year. Luckily, Mr. Gilliland still played the role as my teacher and I happily enjoyed my role as the only female in the lower brass section, and was, more often than not, first chair of the trombone section, which, although it was only inhabited by three players (one of which was also a trumpet-to-trombone switchee) often turned out highly competitive. A couple weeks into the chair tests, I obtained the highest possible score: a 99.9. (Mr. Gilliland didn't believe in 100's, and the only box that didn't get a 10 was a 9.5 which had it's comments erased although I could make out something about my third position, which was something I always managed to goof.)

We were encouraged to practice at home once a week, but I took my trombone home on the bus every day, and practiced for an hour or more each night. By the winter festival I still did not have my own trombone, and they were hoping I would've returned the borrowed trombone by then. But nobody pushed, although I was hoping to arrive at the Christmas festival with my brand new trombone.

I hardly ever demand for gifts at Christmas, which is a habit that often leaves my parents never knowing what I actually want. To tell the truth, I think by the time that Christmas rolled around, I wasn't asking for gifts, for I believed the best gifts were always surprises. So I engaged with my father the great holiday tradition of watching A Christmas Story.

Okay, so that tradition probably doesn't even go back to my father's generation. But in my family, that movie was more revered as a Christmas classic than It's a Wonderful Life or any of the versions A Christmas Carol that you can shove a stick at. It was probably only rivaled by the Grinch Who Stole Christmas cartoon by Chuck Jones (accept no substitutes). We practically had it memorized, and I remember on Christmas Eve my father commented on the comic genus of the exchange between Ralphie and his father that preludes the introduction of his Christmas obsession.

Ralphie's old man: So did you have a nice Christmas?
Ralphie (obviously disappointed): Yeeah.
Ralphie's old man: Did you get everything you wanted?
Ralphie: Eeh. (Or "nah". I'm could never tell.)
Ralphie's old man: Yea? Well, maybe next year...say, what's that behind the...

And so on.

So I happily go to bed and happily wake up and we do the Christmas present opening thang. I got many a gifts, including a chocolate nutcracker guy and THE book on doggies, Bruce Fogle's Guide to the Dog from my brother, which was a pleasant surprise, for he never gave gifts before. It was $40, too!

Anyway, we start the preliminary clearing away of the wrapping paper and my dad and I sit in the middle of the storm, sitting and contemplating our gifts. My dad piped up. "So, did you have a nice Christmas?"

I have to grin. Trying to do my best Ralphie, I say, "Yea."

"Did you get everything you wanted?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Eeh."

"Oh...well maybe next year." My father's eyes roved the area behind the recliner. "Say...what's that behind the couch over there...?"

I stared at him as if he were insane(er). He urged me on, and with my heart racing I walked across the living room and checked behind the couch. Ohmygod.

Can you guess what was there? ;)

A huge long package of such a familiar shape hid behind the recliner next to my mom's houseplants. I slid the red-wrapped gift out from behind there and unwrapped a great Yamaha trombone.

There was no doubt to where he had got it. My father and I had surfed eBay during the beginnings of school and later on we gave up for the time. I examined the great golden trombone and tested it out with my old mouthpiece, and it was grand.

And even greater yet, I didn't even shoot my eye out.

thend!