I am writing this blog as I wait to meet my new trumpet teaching assistant, John Pirillo, at Doug’s Day Diner in South Fort Collins. He is visiting with his family to explore a little before moving here next month. John went to Florida Southern College and won his audition largely on his wonderful recording of his senior recital, where he played, among other challenging works, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. He seems to be a very relaxed, but enthused, young trumpeter, interested especially in helping out with my ongoing trumpet literature research. He has experience in trumpet choir, brass quintet, pit orchestra, jazz band and jazz combo. Our last TA, Jesse Glass (a.k.a. “Coach”), will be missed, but we’re off to a new, promising start.

We have some other new students that will be very interesting! Brigitte Benson is a transfer from University of Northern Colorado, coming to CSU to change majors to music therapy. Brigitte is a fantastic jazz trumpeter, piano player and vocalist. Levin Grimlund, who was deployed in Kuwait for a year with the National Guard, will be resuming his Music Ed studies. We’ll welcome Ben Pouncey, a grad student in conducting. We’ll also welcome Gideon Matchey, a grad student in composition and music education (Gideon will be writing a trumpet ensemble piece for us!).

Together with our returning Ram trumpeters, I’m so excited to be a part of such an original and vibrant studio. In our returning group we have trumpet talent, but also students who do graphic design for the studio, documentary videos, web design and social media. I can’t wait to see where we go!