[From the collection “First Easy Tunes for Beginning Trumpet Players on TrumpetHeroes.com]
If you had to find one tune that has introduced more musicians to jazz than any other it must be this one. These are the bones of the tune but the very first thing to do once you learn them is to start messing with them – please. By “messing with them” I mean what some call “jazzing them up”. For instance play that first note as a pair of swung 1/8th notes; make that whole note in bar 8 into a whole bunch of notes, maybe staying in the key that you’re in, maybe like a scale but not. Seriously. Take liberties with it. Buddy Bolden wasn’t reading notes off a page, I guarantee it.
Anyway, I digress. The first key –in G – is probably the most widely used but there are no guarantees. The second – in C – is lower, so easier if the high notes aren’t there yet. The third – in Bb – is there to make you work that 3rd valve slide … it needs to be out for the D’s but in for the Eb’s then right back out for the next D. Yup, I want you to get that slide working as a part of the fingering for D, but not for Eb. That exactly why your instrument was built the way it was. You don’t have to like it, you just have to do it! As I heard a Kindergarten teacher say yesterday -“you can do hard things”. No excuses. If your grip doesn’t allow it, fix your grip. If your slide doesn’t work freely, fix it or get it fixed.
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