Patrick Sheridan

Andrew Hitz: Hello and welcome to The Brass Junkies. I am your host, Andrew Hitz, and I am joined by my former Boston Brass colleague, my current friend- Mm ... mentor, mentee- Lance LaDuke: Wow ... Andrew Hitz: uh, um, father figure, big brother- He's a good animal ... annoying little brother, uh, kinda all wrapped into one package, Lance LaDuke. Lance, how are you? Lance LaDuke: I feel like a package. Andrew Hitz: You look like you got hit in the face with a package. Lance LaDuke: I did. I'm doing all right. I've got all my Christmas shopping done. I am, uh, coming out the other end of a cold, which wasn't a terrible one, and trying to carve out time to do nothing, which is, uh, find- I'm finding that more difficult than I wished I am- Andrew Hitz: I just- was ... recorded and uploaded, I do for my Patreon patrons on The Entrepreneurial Musician, which by the way, I just hit episode 200 on TEM. Lance LaDuke: Hey, congratulations. Andrew Hitz: Thank you. And the, uh, the interview for that was Angela Beeching, who's the author of Beyond Talent. It's amazing. I don't care what you do, she talks about overcoming fear and about, like, goals, and it- it's- it's unbelievable. It's really empowering. Yeah. But- She's Lance LaDuke: the real deal. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, she's unbelievable. But, uh, for the... I do an extra TEM every week for patrons, and I just, one of the three things I talked about, about the one that I just posted, like, an hour ago was, uh, intentionally carving out space for you to do nothing. Mm-hmm. 'Cause most of us who are making a living as musicians have, like, you know, 20 projects going, and that can kinda start to gnaw at you over the holidays, and it's like I'm- I'm carving out a few days where I'm doing nothing, um, which is- Yeah ... yeah, which is gonna be really good. But, like, going on record as saying I'm doing nothing, so- Right which is, yeah, which is different than- But- ... just not doing it. Lance LaDuke: And I'm going to Africa, uh, which we, uh, I don't know if we talked about it. We don't need to dive too deeply, but the good news is I'm gonna have almost no internet, uh, for the whole time we're there. Yeah, sounds good. And I'm gonna have a 12-hour flight followed by a 3-hour flight- So I'm hoping to just sort of sit and stare into the nothingness for- Andrew Hitz: Right? Lance LaDuke: great periods of time. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, it's not so bad. So today's guest is Patrick Sheridan. Lance LaDuke: Woot. Andrew Hitz: He is such a knucklehead, but we love him dearly. Lance LaDuke: Mm-hmm. Andrew Hitz: He is a- Yep ... dear friend of both of ours, and, uh- Yep ... yeah. I've known him a really long time, and Lance has known him significantly longer than that. So it's, it's- I Lance LaDuke: can't even remember. Andrew Hitz: Yeah. Lance LaDuke: Early '90s, whenever Andrew Hitz: that was. It's great. Uh, yeah, no, it was, I was, like, mid to late '90s, but, uh, but yeah, it, it's g- it was great to have him back on, and he talked about a lot of stuff about how he, what projects he says yes or no to. And, um, and he, he talked about Sam, uh, at the end, like, what, for an extended period. It is really good. I think you're gonna really- Yeah ... really enjoy this. And it was actually kind of serious. The first one- Yeah ... I don't know if you remember the first time we interviewed him, the first 10 minutes was completely unhinged. Like- Lance LaDuke: Right ... Andrew Hitz: I didn't know if the episode was gonna actually make it across the finish line or not. And then that one, like, we corralled it, but this one started okay and Lance LaDuke: then- That was my working theory, was th- we don't have to work for the crazy stuff, so I gotta hit serious early. Andrew Hitz: Right. You did. You did. It was, like, right away. You were like this, like, very specific, like, insightful topic that- Lance LaDuke: Duh ... Andrew Hitz: you knew Pat would have an answer to. It was good. Anyway, so we are seven ratings shy of 200 on Apple Podcasts. Can you please help us get there by- January 1st. Our goal is this decade we want to hit 200 ratings. If you leave a review, that would also be amazing. But if seven people, or 17 or 70 people between now and January 1st could go to Apple Podcasts and just leave a rating, and, uh, unless you're gonna leave, like, a two-star rating, and then we would ask for you to wait until maybe 2022, since you won't still be listening, then you'll forget. But, uh, we would love to get, uh, a few more five-star ratings up there. It helps other people to find the podcast. And also, a big thank you to all of our Patreon patrons. If you head to patreon.com/thebrassjunkies, you can learn how to get bonus episodes with every guest, including with Patrick Sheridan, as, uh, you are about to hear. The, the week after every episode, another bonus episode with that same guest, uh, appears, and you have instant access to all of those past guests and past bonus. And there's a bunch of other podcasts, believe it or not, that we do. You can, uh, find out all about that at, uh, pedalnotemedia.com/patreon. Also, on December 28th at 9:00 PM Eastern, we are having a Patreon patron hang. How much fun was that first one, Lance? Lance LaDuke: It was okay. Andrew Hitz: I had more fun than Lance, but I think he was- Lance LaDuke: No, it was really fun. We had a dozen or so people on the call. Um, there w- there may or may not have been a, a, a, a truck injury. Uh, and/or a heist. Yeah. It's not clear which of those things was happening. Um- ... it was a hoot. It Andrew Hitz: was- It was a Lance LaDuke: lot of fun. Andrew Hitz: It was a lot of fun, yeah. And, uh, I think it was actually m- it was more than a dozen. It was, uh, yeah, there were some people coming and going, but we were, we were on... We, it's on Zoom. We, it's all recorded if you can't make it, but, uh, if you become a Patreon patron or if you already are one, which is, uh, over 100 of you, then, uh, you can join us and ask us questions and ridicule us and, um, you know, make us laugh and hurt our feelings, which- Mm-hmm I like to do simultaneously to people. So, uh, so- Do you still Lance LaDuke: have feelings? Andrew Hitz: Hopefully we will. Hopefully we will see you on December 28th at 9:00 PM Eastern. So thank you very much to all of you for your support. And, um, yeah, we, we actually remembered to read the spots during the interview. So- We do without further ado, let us get to the conversation that we had with tuba superstar Patrick Sheridan. And today on the Brass Junkies, we are joined by a tuba legend, and his name is Patrick Sheridan. Pat, how are you today? Patrick Sheridan: Excellent. Happy to be here to junkify with you two. Andrew Hitz: You're- You liar. You're not happy Patrick Sheridan: to Andrew Hitz: be Patrick Sheridan: here. Andrew Hitz: I love- Patrick Sheridan: It's true. Andrew Hitz: I just asked him, as the words were leaving my mouth, I was like, "What? Why am I saying this?" I was trying to figure out what episode he was on before. I was like, "What episode were you on before?" And he said, "You mean the number?" He was, like, dumbfounded. And he was like, "Yeah, I keep that right at the front of my brain." And, uh, that's like the, when I called the, the vet yesterday to get a prescription refilled and I wanted it to be sent to the pharmacy at Wegmans, and then the girl was like, "Okay, can you just confirm their phone number? Is 571..." Just start it off like, uh, like I would have my pharmacy's phone number memorized. And I just said, "I, I have no idea." She was like- "I'm sure it'll be fine." And I was like... Anyway, so Patrick, how are you? Patrick Sheridan: I'm good. Things are good. I'm getting ready to, uh... I'm not sure when this is gonna air, but I'm getting ready to fly to Chicago tomorrow for the Midwest Shiver Clinic. Lance LaDuke: There's- Patrick Sheridan: I'm gonna freeze. Lance LaDuke: It's gonna be cold. I remember being at a Midwest with you actually, speaking of which, and you didn't bring a- you brought, like, a windbreaker. And you said that, um, cold was just a mental state, and that- Yeah ... being cold was just a function of your mentality. And then we were out walking around, and then, um, y- your, let's just say that your theory was severely put to the test. And you questioned your life choices a couple of times, but... Patrick Sheridan: I, I was younger then. I think, uh, I'm more mentally capable now. Lance LaDuke: Yeah, that's probably true, right? That's a, Patrick Sheridan: like, a Wim Hof tuba. That's what I always tell people, like, when they get i- when they, we get in the Marine Band, right? We'd be outside and we'd be freezing at a funeral or some other outside service, right? Like a Pentagon arrival or a White House arrival, and you'd be chilly. And I would just look at the people that hadn't been in the band as long as I had, like, "Man, you just gotta relax into it. You just gotta, don't shiver. Just, like, let it, let the cold come over you and you'll be fine." And they'd look at me like, "Oh, okay." Like, I'll eat a banana before I'm nervous. Yeah, okay, fine. Right? It's one of those. So anyway, yes, you're right. I was still of that theory. I'm not of that theory now that I don't have very much insulation left on my body. Lance LaDuke: That's true. Yeah. That's a good point. And- I don't know what the circumstances were. I just remember getting Chinese food with you and Perantoni, an- another human, but who that was, I, I can't recall. Name dropper. It's probably Arnold Andrew Hitz: Jacobs or, like, John Fletcher or- Lance LaDuke: Yeah, it was definitely John Fletcher, 'cause he'd only been dead about 10 years by then. So we probably would've eaten lunch with... I'd eat lunch with him now. Oh, he Patrick Sheridan: was serving us then. Lance LaDuke: Pat, he was the server. Pat's been dead inside for at least 10 years. Oh, God. Patrick Sheridan: Absolutely. Man. That's where all my inspiration comes from. That dead place. Lance LaDuke: So s- speaking of the Marine Band, which- Ooh, this just got a little too real ... so we had Susan Rider on, um, the last episode, well, episode 126 as I have it in front of me, and we asked, um, if... 'Cause I think you guys didn't cross paths. No. And so I asked, uh- We did not overlap ... I asked that question, and she said, uh, that, that you did not overlap, but that she knew lots and lots of stories about you, that your legend lived on, and I suspect still does Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Um, at the advice of counsel, I decline to comment. Lance LaDuke: So Patrick, what are you doing in Chicago at the Midwest Shiverfest? Patrick Sheridan: Well, there's a couple, a couple of cool things. I'm... This, I, I think it's maybe our 9th, might even be our 10th year that we're playing out in front of the exhibits, and, uh, I'm joining Harry Watters. Lance LaDuke: Who's that? He- he- Patrick Sheridan: yeah, he's, uh... He's a little-known- Euphonium player small stature. Um, he's very wide in the hips, though. Um, a trombonist. Used to play in, uh, the Merchant Marines, and, uh... Lance LaDuke: Uh, I keep... I forgot, I'm, I've gotta keep some, uh, Easter eggs here, so I need to add Shiverfest and wide in the hips. That's Andrew Hitz: it. Lance LaDuke: Okay. Patrick Sheridan: That's Lance LaDuke: it. So, um, Pat, Andrew Hitz: I'm sure- You Google Patrick Sheridan: Harry Watters ... Andrew Hitz: Pat, I'm sure you don't listen to this podcast, because you've heard both Lance and I talk enough to last you 10 lifetimes, but you should look at the quote-unquote show notes that Lance puts together every episode, because all they are are Easter eggs, and it's like, it's good, like, boiled down to its essence Lance LaDuke jackassery, uh- Yeah in the form of allegedly helpful show notes. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Andrew Hitz: Yeah. It's good. Patrick Sheridan: That's awesome. I think that's Andrew Hitz: great. Patrick Sheridan: My first introduction to Lance's jackassery- Yeah ... was a scratch and sniff calendar. Lance LaDuke: That's right. Those are collector's items now. Patrick Sheridan: They are. Yeah. Well, it was, I mean, it was- And that, we know- ... it was, it was pictures of all the different various dismissed conductors of the Air Force Band, I guess, was the... Lance LaDuke: Okay. It was hard to fit into a 12-month calendar. Patrick Sheridan: It... Lance LaDuke: Yeah. There we go. It took us five Patrick Sheridan: minutes. There we go. Game, set, match. Hey, it's been nice volleying with you. Lance LaDuke: Scratch and sniff. Sniff. Okay. There we go. Now we're up to date. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Lance LaDuke: All right. Um, at risk of this going, um, on the rails, I wanna ask you a question. I... It occurred to me that I don't ask you serious... Like, you and I, for, good Lord, how long? 25 years. Patrick Sheridan: 30, 30 years. 30? Right. Lance LaDuke: Why- Is it really? Whatever it is, yeah ... Patrick Sheridan: why would we get serious now? Lance LaDuke: It's not... Well, it's, I'm, I'm interested in a thing that I suspect you'll have a good, interesting answer to. Yeah. Um, and that is how do you decide what projects to take on? Andrew Hitz: Wait, that's an actually insightful... If you guys go, like, through this interview and it's all serious, I'm gonna ask on air which one of you is dying. That's gonna scare- Hey ... the crap out of me. Patrick Sheridan: We'll just- Well- ... change the name of the podcast Lance LaDuke: to Patrick Sheridan: The Other One. Lance LaDuke: No, uh, w- and there's, a- and it's impossible. It, it won't happen, 'cause pretty soon we'll end up talking about the last time we were together when we got thrown out of a restaurant. At, at our age, I was really proud of the fact that we got tossed- ... from a place. But let's save that story. That, that, that might be a bonus episode story. It could be, yeah. Yeah. And our wives were there- I- ... which made both of them uncomfortable. Maybe we'll just end the story at that- Oh, I'm here for this point. There Andrew Hitz: you go. Yeah. Patrick Sheridan: We'll- That's right. We'll cover it later, but it's over now. Lance LaDuke: Yeah. True. Thanks Patrick Sheridan: for tuning in. Lance LaDuke: Yep. So Patrick, how do you decide what projects- How do I decide? Yeah ... to take on? 'Cause it's hard. I- You get, you, you get over... My, my, my prediction, my hunch, uh, 'cause I know Andrew does and I know I do, you get overwhelmed with, uh, opportunities to do stuff, and it's kind of interesting stuff. So how do you weed through it and d- and vet that? How do you prioritize? Patrick Sheridan: I th- I would say that that's a swinging pendulum- Hey, now ... moving target. Lance LaDuke: Grr. Patrick Sheridan: Um, Halley's Comet once in a lifetime. Uh, you know what I mean? It's, it, I, uh, it, it, it goes back and forth between, um, um, projects that are like, "Oh, this is, this is interesting," um, and do I, is there a way that I can, you know, f- slot it into the things that you have to do to pay the bills? You know what I mean? And, and, and the things that you have to do- to create momentum. Um, I, that's the... For me at this point, I'm, I'm split between four things that really occupy my day and weeks. W- w- part of it's conducting, part of it's playing, part of it's teaching, which is intertwined with, um, publishing and/or, you know, looking for places to put the pedagogy in terms of other people's publications and, or ways to, you know, new things learned that change the pedagogy. I mean, I've got several people that have, that bring me to their school biannually, and they're- b- as they've, you know, known me 15, 20 years, they're like, "Man, you're saying the same things, but there's a way different angle on it now than you used to have." Um, and I think, uh, so folly's a large part of it. In other words, that's the beauty of being a general contractor, which means unemployed. Um, uh, Which means- That we- Which means, which means entrepreneur- Hey, hey ... right? That's, that's it. En- entrepreneur- entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship. What does that mean? Don't have a regular job. Okay, great. Um- Andrew Hitz: I'm a tenure track lackey. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Well, now, you know, s- got this great word that just means what people of New York City have been doing for the last 100 years. Freelancing, right? So now, now it's a course at a university. So- Lance LaDuke: Well, let me, um, I'll, let me attest to a thing- So I, I Patrick Sheridan: guess I didn't, I'm not sure I actually answered the question. Lance LaDuke: Well, I'm gonna refine it- Go ahead, yeah ... I'm gonna refine it in a second, but I wanna tell you that, um, and I told you this when I saw you. Uh, so we were together at, uh, in Ashland, Oregon last summer for the, um, American Band College- Yep ... thing. And so I got to watch you give talks that I've- it was what you said, like watch you give talks that I've seen you give, I don't know, some version of in either a five-minute or one-hour or two-hour venue f- dozens of times over the however long we've known each other. And this one for sure was, um, distilled and, um, refined, which are, which of course are two words that always are used when you're talking about Patrick Sheridan. Distilled. Um, distilled Patrick Sheridan: and refined, yeah. Lance LaDuke: Mm-hmm. The, the, in, in a way that I hadn't seen before. And it, it, it was d- it was definitely, you know, it was, um- Uh, excuse me It's a good thing you turned around. Patrick Sheridan: Sorry. Yeah, I know, I know. What the hell? Lance LaDuke: Let me turn around from this- Speaking of distills ... Patrick Sheridan: audio recording. Lance LaDuke: And refined. What was... Yeah. Distilled and refined. Um, it was a matter of, um, there was an effortlessness to it and a mastery of it in a way where, um, I think all three of us are at times guilty of, uh, winging it a little more than maybe we should sometimes. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Absolutely. Totally. Lance LaDuke: And 'cause we can, 'cause we can just talk our way out of anything and find something funny to latch onto and distract and, uh, pay no attention to the asshole behind the curtain. Uh, but there was this, um, refinement, I think is a, a good word for it, in your presentation, in the... You, you had PowerPoint, too, which I'd never seen you use before. Um, a- and there was this distillation of these ideas and the sequence in which you delivered them that was really, really, really awesome. And I hate saying nice things about my friends in public, but it was really... I was really taken with that, and it, it stuck with me and, uh, I was really, really impressed with it. So let me revise and h- let me refine and distill my question from before. And that question is, how are the ways in which you decide to take on projects different than they were 20 years ago? Patrick Sheridan: Hmm. Um, and when I was taking on projects before, it was, it was, you know, trying to climb the heap, trying to create momentum so you could, you know, p- afford your car and maybe have a mortgage and, you know, clothe your children and, uh, stuff like that, you know. Like, so it was- Yeah ... you know, and that kind of, 'cause there's not, there wasn't, uh, there, there isn't, I guess maybe slightly, but there really wasn't a roadmap of like, okay, this is how you do it. You know what I mean? Like this, it was- Lance LaDuke: It was Wild West ... Patrick Sheridan: just, yeah. I mean, completely wide open. Um, and, uh, so especially on the tuba. In other words, it was so, uh, not explored that the idea had never entered my mind when I was in the Marine Band. I was like, "No, I have to get a master's degree in something else so I can have a regular job because I don't wanna, you know, I'm not gonna go teach at a university and I'm probably not gonna play in an orchestra. So I'm just gonna be a weekend warrior with my tuba and, uh, and play, um, and be a jazzer and, you know, play in some, some bands and, uh, do some solo work where it happens, and then just do something else with my, with my, you know, with my day." Um, because I'd, I, there, there wasn't any example that was 100% freelance. It was always folks doing the thing that I wanted to do, at least at that point, which was just play the tuba, um, uh, outside of either, you know- playing in an orchestra, playing in a wind band- Mm-hmm ... teaching at a college, and a couple of guys, playing in a brass quintet. So- Lance LaDuke: Mm-hmm ... Patrick Sheridan: it was, Lance LaDuke: uh- Patrick Sheridan: Well, Lance LaDuke: I remember, you know, talking Patrick Sheridan: to you- Because of the climate, it was just in other words, it was say yes to everything. Lance LaDuke: Right. Patrick Sheridan: You know? And, uh, um, which is, uh, uh, interesting. This is fun because, uh, it's gonna lead me to s- some of the news that I- that's gonna already have happened when everybody hears this, but it's happening tomorrow. Lance LaDuke: Oh. Patrick Sheridan: Um, and it's Air Force related, which is even more interesting. Um, so, uh, uh, which is that, uh, you know, you're just trying to create ment- you say yes to everything. If you haven't done it before, the answer is yes, and then you just figure out how to do it. Yeah. And it was usually was call Sam right away. Like- Right ... "Hey, I said yes to this. What'd you say yes to? Oh, okay. Well, let's figure out how to do it." Lance LaDuke: Yeah. Patrick Sheridan: Um, and I'll be right over, right? Um, and, uh- Lance LaDuke: I'm on your porch. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So, uh, and, and it, but it was, it stems from the thing that we did on the, the birthday, uh, uh, uh, message that you sent out o- on Sam's birthday, which I don't remember what number podcast that was- ... or for which podcast that it was. What? For, yeah, I'm s- sorry. Andrew Hitz: Don't be Patrick Sheridan: an asshole, Andrew Hitz: Patrick. Patrick Sheridan: I can't... Well, it's just part of the, my body that I can't see that part of my body's tattooed. So it's tattooed there, I just can't see that part of my body, so I can't tell. Anyway, Andrew Hitz: so- Now hold on, hold on. I have to interrupt that I asked, uh, Pat for his address 'cause we sent him a Pray For Jens, um, a, I think apron and a Brass Junkies mug, and he sent back his address with the zip code plus the four extra digits. It's like- Wow ... and I was like, "What?" Right? I said, "What, what is w- what's with the nine-digit zip code?" And he just wrote back, "I like to be thorough." So it's not the craziest- Very specific ... it's not the craziest thing that I asked you what, you know, you're like Rain Man. So I was like, you know- ... there's a chance you were gonna know the episode number, Mr. Zip Code Plus Four on a text message. It's like, you, I know- Lance LaDuke: Those definitely are not his underwear. Andrew Hitz: Right. But please, Patrick, continue. Patrick Sheridan: Um, yeah. Well, I mean, it was say yes to everything. But, uh, when that, on that b- birthday message to Sam, where that thing was like, you know, we used to talk about Bernstein all the time, and he was like, "You know, you shouldn't, you know, glorify him. You should just try to do all the things he did." And, um, so that was a part of it too, in the beginning, which was like, I thought being a tuba soloist was gonna be, for me, being a tuba soloist, and it ended up being a community band conductor and a writer and an arranger and a, um, a teacher and, uh, a, a publisher. Um, and, uh, a whole variety of different, uh, you know, things showed up. And for me, it's, that was, it was- Folly that led to that. In other words, sometimes it was opportunity. "Hey, this is the Air Force Band of Mid-America calling. We're, uh, interested in a, a, in, in a piece to feature our low brass ensemble, and we're gonna do it at Bands of America Summer Symposium in 2005. Would you guys, uh, know somebody that should write this piece for us?" Like, it was Dave Harttime, right? He called, "Hey, man, can you name a composer that we should ask to, like, do this thing for three tubas and... or two tu- three euphoniums and two tubas?" There's a group called the Four Star Brass, which is super confusing, 'cause they were called the Four Star Brass and there were five people. So it automatically everybody thought that the fucking people in the low brass couldn't count. It's like- ... what in the fuck? Lance LaDuke: Uh. Patrick Sheridan: And Harttime's like, "Dude, it's four, you know, four stars, a general." I'm like, "I know. I was in the military," but everybody else was like, "Welcome the Four Star Brass," and five low brass players stand up. And it's like, "All right. Thanks for the unwritten punchline." Lance LaDuke: Which one's not a star? Patrick Sheridan: Exactly. That's, Lance LaDuke: that's what I thought. Patrick Sheridan: Right. That's right, the dot dot dot. What... You know, I didn't see the ellipsis in the title of the group. So anyway, I, I think, uh, the, the, those... And we, you know, so I just said to Dave over the phone, I was like, "Well, Sam and I should write that." And Dave's like, "Have you ever written a piece for that and concert band before?" And I was like, "Yeah." Lance LaDuke: Of course. Patrick Sheridan: Lie. Lie. Yeah. Of course I have. I have the whole catalog of pieces like that. Lance LaDuke: What's your address? Patrick Sheridan: Exactly. Would you like the nine-digit code? Anyway, so, so the, uh, the, uh, uh, the... In the beginning it was say yes to everything, and then what ended up happening is that when it would get too busy in one area, in other words, right at the very beginning of my career, I, I, my tuba soloing thing got super busy. I mean, I, I was just like sometimes 200 concerts in a year. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, Patrick Sheridan: it was crazy. Um, and b- and be gone for 300 days easy. Um. Mm. Uh, and, um, and I j- it, it, it, I... It wasn't the happiest that I was. Mm, mm. That, that I, that I... If I, about my career, in other words, I was like, "Ah, this is what I wanted and now I got it and now I'm not sure I really wanna do this all the time." Um. Lance LaDuke: Right. Patrick Sheridan: And, uh, so folly led me down these other pathways of, you know, f- sometimes it was the folly of like, "Hey, I'd like to try that." Sometimes it was the folly of saying yes to a gig you shouldn't have said yes to. And then, you know, growing through it on the other side to get to the other side of it and then you, you've got a cool thing that happens. So, um, so let me tell you about the cool thing that happened. Um, uh, in other words, sometimes your, your projects are handed back to you years later. So you guys, uh, know that Sam and I did this, uh, sort of a cliff-diving record called The Big Bottom Band. It was called- Mm ... the record was called RooDoo VooDoo. Yes. And, um, and it was two tubas and a drummer, right? The, the typical jazz trio. And, um, uh, and, uh, we improvised the entire record. Uh- Right ... and it was all done, um... I think one piece had changes in it, uh, that were written down. I think that one's called El Loco Motif. Um, and, uh, Pause for Horse Laughter. Um, and then, uh, the other one was, uh, like a blues thing, you know, like a second line tune, but everything else was, uh, like more like whose line is it anyway, you know? Sort of des- describe a scene. You know, "Hey, man..." And then in, in other words, like the first, the title track, RooDoo VooDoo, is like, Sam's like, "You know, it's like the, the shit of a kangaroo and you're under its vex. Let's play a piece about that." And we both picked up didgeridoos and 10 minutes later there was a piece of music there. Um, so it was like, you know, small prompts that created large amount of, you know- Right ... like monkey spray painting happening. So, Lance LaDuke: um- I remember throwing like two dozen titles at you guys at one point, too, when you- Mm. I remember when you were getting ready to do that, that meant nothing. I wish I had that somewhere. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, honestly, Lance LaDuke: me too. RooDoo VooDoo is a beautiful... Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, that was the, that ended up being the title track. And then, uh, but like, you know, like one of 'em was, he looked at me and he goes, "You know, we sh- you know what we haven't played yet?" And I was like, "No, Sam, what have we not played yet?" He goes, "A space Viking mambo." That's right. I'm like, "Oh, okay. Perfect." And then that was it. That was the prompt for that track. That's Lance LaDuke: right. That's right. Patrick Sheridan: So anyway- So, uh- So, you know, we, we... I think Sam was like, one of his favorite sort of genres of, uh, uh, like literature and cinema and music, um, was the, the 1950s crime drama, right? The- The black and white sort of, uh, maybe even into the '60s too, like, you know, Perry Mason, but like, but, but more dramatized, you know? Uh, Alfred Hitchcock sort of ideas, right? So, um, so the we, we, he would always talked about, uh, one of his colleagues at A- ASU as G-Nasty. Um, and uh, so we would talk about G-Nasty because G-Nasty had a, he was very, uh, anal retentive and, um, and if you, you know, like moved stuff in his office, he would notice that the pencil had been rotated 12 degrees, and he would t- turn it back. And, and so we were always talking about like what a great private eye G-Nasty would've made. Um, because he noticed everything. Like, you could literally take like, you know, I mean, I'm talking about Gail Wilson, right? I mean, you guys know who I'm talking about. So we used to, he used to talk about G-Nasty all the time, right? So it was hilarious. So like, and then he would like make grad students go down to Gail's office with like little crumbs of dirt, and then like set it in the corner, and then wait in the middle of a lesson to see like how long before Gail would go get his little vacuum and go like, "Geez, man, these grad students, damn it," and then go vacuum up the- Lance LaDuke: Oh, oh. He Patrick Sheridan: froze ... he was a private eye, he would be. So I promise there's a point to this story. So anyway, so- Andrew Hitz: Who cares? Patrick Sheridan: So anyway- Andrew Hitz: That would be once in a Patrick Sheridan: row ... there's a part of this recording on the Big Bottom Band record. He, he's like, "We should do a suite to G-Nasty." And I was like, "All right, so we're gonna play out a crime drama." So- Lance LaDuke: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah ... Patrick Sheridan: the first movement's called The Crime, right? This is the chronicles of G-Nasty, private eye. The first movement's called The Crime, and, uh, it's like this dirty, like, you know, blues, like, you know, lower Manhattan, 3:00 AM in the Meat District kind of a thing where you meet somebody you don't wanna meet, and you're not gonna get out of there alive. So that's the beginning. A- and so that movement was called The Crime. Then in the middle, of course, G-Nasty's now on the case, so he's gotta go out checking out what's going on, and of course, he meets the broad. So that was the, all we did. He's like, Sam's like, "We're gonna play a tango. It's gonna be about the broad that G-Nasty meets, but the broad, we're not really sure if she's a good one or a bad one. So think of a size four beautiful woman in a size zero dress. Let's play a tango. Go." So that's how that piece came out, right? And then the last movement was that G-Nasty, um, he solved the crime, but he ended up falling in love with the broad who happened to be, um, the police chief's daughter. So the last movement was called Getting Caught, and we had done this whole recording. And we hadn't really called the movements really anything. We just knew that we were sort of improvising on G-Nasty. And Clarke Rigsby, the great sound engineer here in Arizona said, "You know what you guys haven't done yet as a field, you haven't done, like, some Peter Gunn theme." And we were already- Yeah in this '50s crime drama thing. And so right away, it's this ba do boop bop boop boop bop boop ba do boop. This motif comes out of both Sam and I, and we start to improvise on this piece of music. So, um, um, but which was, you know, nothing. It was just like getting caught, in other words. It's like what's gonna happen when the police chief catches the broad in bed with G-Nasty when they're doing the, the G-Nasty. Um, and, uh, uh, and so that was the prompt for what ended up being like, I, probably there were, like, 45 minutes of improvisation, which we cut down into, like, a 12-minute, 13-minute suite on this record. Okay, so that was 2004, um, and, uh, or 2003, something like that we did the recording. And- So now roll forward to the fall of 2004, no, maybe Christmas 2004. Dave Hartshorne calls, right? Says, "Air Force Band of Mid-America, 'Hey, we need a piece. We wanna feature the four star brass out in front, three euphoniums, two tubas.' You guys know anybody?" "Yeah, how about us? Let me ask, let me ask the captain," Captain Don Schofield, who's now Colonel Don Schofield, the director of United States Air Force Band in Washington, DC. Mm. And, um, and, uh, so he was like, uh, "Yeah. Let, go ahead. Let 'em write it. Perfect. You know, it's a low brass feature. Why not?" Um, he didn't even ask if we, you know, if we had a degree in s- s- you know, anything other than bullshitting, right? So, um, which we have seven doctorates in. And, um- Lance LaDuke: Yeah, I was gonna say. Many honorary. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, exactly. Um, and, uh, s- mine are written on Charmin, actually. Thank you. Um, so, uh- ... the, uh, so we wrote the piece of music, right? And then, uh, and it was, what we based it on this riff, um, and this improvisation from Getting Caught. Um, which was hilarious 'cause it was this getting... It was this, the theme for how we improvised was based on, like, you know, people getting caught in bed, and then we're, we ended up using it as a riff for the United States Air Force. Um, anyway, so- Yeah, I know. Exactly. Right. So if you know that... Anyway, we don't even need to talk about that. So moving forward, um, uh, everybody's diving under the desk at this moment. It's really nice to see this. Anyway, that's what Hitz looks like when he's shaking behind a piece of paper. Lance LaDuke: S- Patrick Sheridan: so, so we, we, we sort of crafted from that improvisation, a piece of music for three euphoniums, two tubas in, and concert band, which they recorded, and then they ended up calling the whole record To the Edge of Space, which is what we called the piece of music. Andrew Hitz: Ah. Patrick Sheridan: And, uh, uh, and then, uh, you know, we got a chance to play that at a lot of places, and so, so did those guys. They played at a whole bunch of places, and, um, took it on tour. And, uh, Sam and I did it with the United States Army Band with three of the euphonium players from, uh, Pershing's Own, and, uh, when Tom Rotundi was the, the commander of the band. And then, uh, that was the year that we went down to ABA. So we were, you know, Gary Green was like, "Hey, man, we're gonna do this piece with, uh, the, the Frost Wind Ensemble at the American Bandmasters Association thing. Boston Brass was gonna... We were there. And you guys were there." And so we were like, "Yeah, that'd be great. Awesome." So we asked, Colonel Rotundi is like, "Hey, man, can we get those three euphonium players? Can you fly them down for the ABA convention?" He was like, "Oh, yeah, totally." So we got to do this piece at the ABA convention, which was a, really a, a corker, right? To play a funk piece of music at, at the American turtleneck convention. And, um, um, and then, and then, and then f- Uh, we got a chance to, uh... And so then they, they get that three euphonium players came down and, and it was, and Gary conducted it, and it was really great. We had a super time, and the reception was really great for the piece. And anyway, so it had a, it kind of had a nice little life, right? And, uh, anybody asks for it, we just give it to them, and they, they can play it if they've got five low brass players that can, that can swat through some of that, those licks. It's like have at it. So anyway, roll forward. A, a week and a half ago I get, uh, a message from, uh, Brooke Emery, who's one of the- Oh, yeah moderators and a clarinetist in the United States Air Force Band, and she's like, "Hey- so, uh, we're playing, we're the feature military band this year at Midwest. And I was like, "Oh, cool." Right. And, and we're wanting to, you know, Colonel Schofield wants to, you know, pay tribute to Sam at our concert, so we're gonna play To the Edge of Space. And I was like, "That's awesome." And Colonel Schofield asked if you wouldn't mind conducting the work- Hey ... on both of the shows. And I was like, "H- holy cow." Yeah, so, so that's, that's happening, by the time everybody hears this, will have happened. That's happening tomorrow night at both of the Air Force Band concerts. Lance LaDuke: That's fantastic. Heard it. There you go. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, you heard it here before social media heard it, so it was really, really, I mean, I was s- super humbled. And, uh, uh, but it just like, what a cool... 'Cause the piece is really joyful and fun and funky, and, um, and has a great backstory to it. Uh, and, uh- ... and to, to have it, you know, showcased at, at Midwest is, of course, unbelievable. Andrew Hitz: So speaking of unbelievable- One Patrick Sheridan: of the top ba- bands, so. Yeah, so that's that. So there. So that's, I mean, that's the- Pretty cool ... I don't, don't even vet projects like that. You just continue to just say, "Sure." Andrew Hitz: Yeah, Patrick Sheridan: that's awesome. You know, I'll hold the stick in front of a funk piece and go, "Mm-hmm, mm-hmm." Andrew Hitz: That's awesome. So speaking of unbelievable- Yeah, Patrick Sheridan: thanks. Anyway ... Andrew Hitz: I would like to, uh, thank Parker Mouthpieces- Yeah ... for providing the hosting for this- That's unbelievable ... unbelievable podcast, The Brass Junkies. Mm-hmm. Uh. Uh, Parker Mouthpieces offers fine customizable component mouthpieces for horn- Ooh trombone, euphonium, and tuba. Yeah. Including the Andrew Hitz artist model tuba mouthpiece- Ooh ... and the Lance LaDuke model euphonium mouthpiece. What? You can find out more at parkermouthpieces.com, or- Or follow them ... follow them on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Twitter, Twitter, Twitter, Twitter. Maybe, maybe Parker should start making batons. Or- Oh ... wait a minute. Parker, if you're listening, you need to start making turtlenecks. Good idea. Actually, and just the turtleneck, so you can- Turtleneck ... take a shirt and you can add a turtleneck to it, or you don't even have to wear a shirt. You can just wear the turtleneck. Just the- Patrick Sheridan: Turtle dickie. Andrew Hitz: That's it. Gr- uh, Lance- Patrick Sheridan: Turtle dickie ... Andrew Hitz: whenever, whenever someone would ask what the dress was at some concert, before Jeff Conner had the opportunity to, uh, to answer, Lance would always say chrome jockstrap and antlers. And- Which is Lance LaDuke: Pat's line. Andrew Hitz: Mm-hmm ... which is Pat's line. And- Yeah ... so now it could be a chro- chrome jockstrap, antlers, and just the turtleneck, or just the neck. Turtle Lance LaDuke: dickie. Just the turtle dickie. Is the official term. Andrew Hitz: Okay. Lance LaDuke: Pat coined it. Andrew Hitz: There we go. Lance LaDuke: So it is written, so it shall be. Andrew Hitz: There, there we go. So Lance LaDuke: can Andrew Hitz: everyone please- So it's woven Patrick Sheridan: out of, it's woven out of shredded batons. Andrew Hitz: Like Or, Patrick Sheridan: and, and, uh, and then they use that, they, they, they take, they take sage and old wind conducting degrees and they put them together and then they burn them. And then the essence of that is the, the smell that emanates from the neck. Andrew Hitz: I was just gonna say, could we weave it from, yeah, from from doctorates of people who don't get conducting gigs afterwards. But that's mean. Lance LaDuke: Oh- Andrew Hitz: At the advice of Lance LaDuke: counsel- Like remind me- ... Andrew Hitz: I decline to Patrick Sheridan: comment. Lance LaDuke: That's it. So remind me to tell a story about that same, uh, ABA concert at the University of Miami for the bonus episode. I do, I think that's a better bonus episode story than- Andrew Hitz: All right. Lance LaDuke: Yeah, that- ... a full episode. So there's two. That was a good- Patrick Sheridan: There are some bonus, there's bonus information from that convention that is, yeah, is best left... Whatever happened to your life just now? Like something went dim. Lance LaDuke: I know. There are some- Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, I know. Thanks. That was great for the audience, Pat. Yeah, mention something that's happening that they're not gonna see. Okay, great. Let's go over that again. Andrew Hitz: I was Patrick Sheridan: recording- And we've got it ringing all the time. That's, that's, that's not the plate in my head. It's actually the school across the street ringing their school bell. Andrew Hitz: I was, Patrick Sheridan: uh- The plate in my head is a different vibration. Lance LaDuke: It's in G. Andrew Hitz: I was recording an episode of the Jacobs Quotes podcast, which is a monthly podcast for, uh, for Patreon patrons of the Brass Junkies. And I, I always take two quotes from Jacobs and then I, um, while I say less about them in three to four minutes than Mr. Jacobs did in the 10 words that he actually said. But I, you know, I expand on them and, uh, and I actually mentioned the quote above. I wasn't even reading either, and I mentioned the quote above. And then I was like, "I'm not, there's no above. You guys are listening. What? I'm losing my mind." And then I just hit stop and then, and then I hit stop and I just recorded it again. So it was like three and a half minutes in. I was like, "Dude, come on." Um, anyway- Um, so I actually wanna get back to that last... We're not gonna talk about this the whole time, but I wanna get back to that last question. So, so nowadays, I mean, you said like projects like that find you, but I'm assuming that there are projects that find you that you have to say no to. Like, so how do you figure out what you say yes to and what you say no to when they're not as obviously incredible as the one that you just mentioned? Lance LaDuke: Sure. Patrick Sheridan: Of course. Um, uh, I, I mean, it's starting to, the, the, there's enough momentum now. In other words, you- in the beginning of a career, you're trying to gain momentum. Then when there's momentum, then you can kind of like, "Okay, well- Lance LaDuke: Curate ... Patrick Sheridan: I'd like to..." Uh, exactly. "These are the people I like to work with and they're calling again, so I'm definitely gonna say yes to them. And these are the people that I don't like to work with and they're calling again, so I'm gonna tell them I'm already booked. And these are the people that are, uh, that are new and they're calling and it's similar to what I already have 10 of on the books for the year, so I'm gonna tell them I'm busy and try to push it to the next year." Um, or it hits in a moment where it's like, "Oh, thank goodness, I'm glad I'm-" I need to buy peanut butter, I'm glad you called. Um, and, um, so you know, it, it goes like that. I, the, the, at this point there, the, as you noticed in the sort of the, the vehemence or maybe the intensity of the things that I talked about at ABC, I think that part of that is just f- f- you know, the, the, the feeling of mortality, you know? Right. Ob- obviously in June, Sam's death was, uh, on our, on our minds. Um, but as our, were r- several of my friends who are battling with cancer now and other diseases. Um, and, uh, but then also, you know, on the precipice of my 51st birthday in July. So I'm not sure that the numbers mean anything, but it was just more of those like, "Okay, well if you're gonna make a move now, you better make a move." Because there's no, you don't make a move later on. It's like, and, um, the energy was good and so the, the, right now I'm in that sort of space where it's like, "Okay, well, what are you gonna do?" Because there's quite a few things that are on my pet project list, um, that don't pay anything, uh, that I really wanna do. And m- just I wanna do them while I can still do them or while that, that part of the attention allows for them. In other words, like, it doesn't matter that I have most, like most of my career is not playing the tuba now. Most of my career is doing other things. It's just barely a third some years. And some years, like last year, it was almost exclusively being a sousaphone player as a bass player. And the, the number of solo dates was, was quite, was, was not very many. Mm. Which was fine. Um, and, uh, because there were other things that were paying like solo dates, like conducting and clinicing and things like that. Um, and then there are other years where there's 10 orchestra dates and, uh, a couple of nice university band dates, and then I'm full for playing. I'm like, "Okay, that's enough." And then I leave the other dates open for, for doing other things. Um, stick or teaching. Um, and uh, or sitting at home and writing music for my, for my community group or for clients. Um, and uh, so that's the, the sort of word. For me at this moment it, there's, you know, wanting to come up with a next steps that sort of address- what we've learned pedagogically in terms of using it in an ensemble setting, using it, uh, for clearing head space, which of course is great for practicing and performing, and then what we've learned from the folks that have used it because they were in a music ensemble that in the health and wellness arena or did things in the high performance athletic arena, um, that, and they attributed their achievements anecdotally to things that they changed with their breathing that they learned from us. Um, and so, uh, those things are very front burner. How to end up getting some momentum to, to fund it and to how to f- you know, put it out in the world for people to use, um, is the just some of the little bit of the last steps. Um, so there's that. But then there's a big pile of music I wanna write, um, that, uh, inspiration, um, from the, uh, you know, so all the stuff I did with Sam. I mean, we improvised in a group together and it's funny now there's like Dan Buckfitch and, uh, Andrew, uh, forgetting his name. He's the director of bands at the University of New Hampshire. Andrew, he's a great writer. Um, ah, I can't think of his name. Anyway, um, uh, they're, they're, he's a good composer. Um, they're writing a piece of music together and, um, and, uh, they're taking all these suggestions of motifs from high school kids from this band and- Oh uh, Dan's taken some of them and Andrew's taken the other one. Andrew Boysen. Go ahead, say his last name. Grief. Um, and, uh, hello, 51. And, um, and so- Tell Andrew Hitz: me about Patrick Sheridan: it. Yeah. Jeepers creepers. And, uh, so, um- Who are you? Yeah, so anyway, we were doing this, but we were using the sort of this, that we, that both Sam and myself, um, were d- were doing in terms of arranging and orchestrating, which is the sort of the craft side of composition. In other words, the, the creative side is generating the, the, the, the melodies and the, the counter melodies and then the construction and what are you gonna do harmonically. And then the craft side is then once you've made all those decisions and you've, you know, worked in the, the, the, the tunes, um, is the craft part. In other words, like, oh, we're gonna do this here and this is what the, the plan says to do here. And so that's just the craft of orchestrating after that. And so, um, the, this, this group, the Big Bottom Band, which actually started as Dos Amigos, um, um, was the, the, the, the creative engine, in other words, getting together regularly to improvise. Like when we would do a, the brass gym became a thing, um, that was codified. We'd always do what we call the jazz gym, which was just brass gym with way more wicked theory involved in it. And, um, uh, and then we would always end up just improvising, just playing. Somebody would say, "Hey, let's try this. Hey, let's do this. Hey, w- have you thought about this before? No, let's play like that." Um, and um, or we would play like- Be ways to, to sort of get free, to loosen up. And, uh, then, um, we would end up writing projects like that. Like, uh, the, the solo vehicle. We did two solo vehicles for me. Uh, one's called the Strait of Hormuz, the other, uh, which is this really cool, uh, sectional piece that we wrote actually for... We premiered at Midwest with, uh, Penn High School from Indiana in 2008, I think. And, um, and then another one, which is a jazz concerto called Grappelling, which is a tribute to, um, Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelli. Lance LaDuke: Hmm. Patrick Sheridan: Um, and, um, you know, we'd, those were, you know, like literally sit down with a blank sheet of paper, make a timeline, write, write some words on that were some descriptive, some were, um, harmony-based, some were like, "Let's take, move the bridge here." And, um, and then, "Uh, well, you take that section and I'll take this section, and then we'll, we'll get together and we'll sort of start to craft it." And then I would sit in front of Finale and he'd, you know, look over my shoulder and music would, would happen and come together. And now it's... And then we submitted a couple of those things to a couple of the, the, the competitions, right? And they were like, wrote back and said, "You're gonna have to put one na- person's name on the, on the thing. There's, there's no way to compose with two people." And we're like, "What the fuck are you talking about?" The sections- There are rules ... what about, what about if- what about five people? Like, you know, like, you know, it's just like, right. It's, "No, that's called a jazz group. That's not composition." Oh, I see. I see. I see. The other major. Yeah. I forgot. That must be printed in lemon juice on the back of my degree. Um, so- Lance LaDuke: We're a hyphenate. Patrick Sheridan: Anyway, so that, that was the, the, this, this idea of, uh, of, of... So that, that, that part of it, in other words, I've got- Uh, uh, years of this from both Sam and I improvising together, but also that's just kinda now how I reward myself. And I think Brian McWhorter, a professor of, uh- Mm ... trumpet at University of Oregon calls it, uh, slactice, right? He, he, he practices professional and it's serious, and then for his kids, it's like every five minutes that they would practice, he would reward them with f- five minutes of slactice, which was silly practice, which you could just do whatever the hell you wanted to do. You could blow in the other end of the trumpet. You know, you could piss in fertilizer. I mean, it was whatever you wanted to do to- ... sort of performance art yourself. But it was silly practice, in other words. It was really just about expression, which always led to a big, huge pile of laughter. Um, and, um, and, uh, something creative sometimes would spawn from something like that. But it was this idea of connecting joy to the act of making music without it always being, you know, hammer nails and go to work. Um, and, uh, um, and I, I, I talk about that a lot. I think I might've talked about it this summer, this idea of play. That's the verb we use when we talk about music. Right. We don't talk about w- that we work Wagner. We, we, we play music. It's always my private delight on the airplane, "Hey, what do you do for a living?" And everybody says the same thing. They, they work in a place, like a hospital. "I work in a hospital." "Oh, what do you do?" "Oh, I work in this field." Or they work in a field, right? "I'm a lawyer. I'm an accountant." And, and then like, "Oh, where do you work?" And that's the verb we use. And they're like, "Well, what do you do?" "Oh, I'm a musician." And the next thing they say is, "What do you play?" Mm. And I'm always, like, in my head laughing my ass off. I'm like, "Oh, I love that you use the word play. You go to work, ha ha." Um, and, uh, I get to play for a living. That's what I do. Um, but it's like we don't... It's, it's such an intense business. It's so competitive, whether you do it, um, vocationally like we do, whether you do it aspirationally like so many people do, which is where they gotta find the time in their day to practice a little bit so they can make their contribution to whatever group that they're playing in or whatever choir they sing in- Mm um, so that their soul gets fed the way it needs to get fed, that debits and credits or case law or whatever it is is not filling for them. And, um- That, uh, it's, it, it doesn't feel like that we take enough of a chance to think about that... It's play. It's like little kids. Andrew Hitz: Mm-hmm. Patrick Sheridan: And then when little kids are playing, there aren't any rules, right? It's not like some guy in a backyard with a clipboard going like, "No, no, no. Move that grain of sand to the left." Unless they have already... Unless they already play euphonium, and then that's a different thing. Lance LaDuke: That's true. Patrick Sheridan: So- Lance LaDuke: Can Patrick Sheridan: I use an Lance LaDuke: alternate Andrew Hitz: fingering on that? Patrick Sheridan: At the advice of counsel, I decline to comment. Andrew Hitz: The sixth partial- Yeah ... which is naturally flat. Patrick Sheridan: I, so I mean, that's always felt like, like the greatest, probably the greatest number of people that played the bassoon were proctologists because both professions require you to be able to put your thumb in more than 10 places, so. Andrew Hitz: Hey, that's pretty good. Jeez. That's yours? Patrick Sheridan: When we- Andrew Hitz: Oh, you should- It might Patrick Sheridan: be Andrew Hitz: you should email- Email Pat ... email Pat. Yeah, email Pat, not us. Uh- I'll just write bassoons and thumbs. Patrick Sheridan: Yes. You can email me at jenslindemann@ucla.edu. I answer all my emails there. Andrew Hitz: Speaking, speaking of, uh, bassoons Lance, uh, should you, uh, tell the beautiful people about the Pappert People? Lance LaDuke: I would love to talk about the Pappert People. There's a link in the show notes below my beautiful and illuminating show notes that will take you to a page devoted- Andrew Hitz: You- ... Lance LaDuke: to the programs- Wait. Hold Andrew Hitz: on ... Lance LaDuke: and tutorials you Andrew Hitz: can get. Hold on. You paused before- Yeah ... the show notes so long that it was like, it was like a Mad Lib. It was like my beautiful and what, uh, what did you say? Inspirational- Lance LaDuke: Oh, we should totally do these as Mad Libs ... show Andrew Hitz: notes. Lance LaDuke: Right. Wait. Mad Libs, hold on. Patrick Sheridan: Wait while I unscramble this. Lance LaDuke: Mad Libs. Oh, this is great. Anyway, if you click on that link in the- show notes below, you will find a page that will tell you everything you need to know about what's going on at the Duquesne University Mary Pappert School of Music. Um, they have been a longstanding supporter of the show, and I would like to take this opportunity to express my deep, unrelenting, unceasing thanks for Jim. Jim Uncomfortable pause. Nova. What is he- For making this possible ... why does he keep blowing his nose more? The camera, the, this phone fell over, so we're looking at its ceiling. We're looking at the lights. Andrew Hitz: Oh, boy. Lance LaDuke: It's fantastic. Oh, sorry. It's all right. No, it was worth it. Oh. So thank you, Andrew Hitz: Jim- Lance LaDuke: Jim Andrew Hitz: Uncomfortable Pause Nova? ... for that. I like it. That is spectacular. Lance LaDuke: His wife, uh, runs one of the youth orchestras here in Pittsburgh. And I conducted the Brass Roots on Friday. She played horn. I hadn't had the opportunity to hear her. She's a fantastic horn player. Man, really, really, uh, great player, so that was fun. There you go. Way more talented than- Patrick Sheridan: What's Lance LaDuke: the name of the group? Uh, the Brass Roots. Patrick Sheridan: Pausa? Lance LaDuke: Pausa. The Brass Roots. Yep. Pausa. Caesura. Andrew Hitz: Oh, uh, speaking, speaking of the Brass Roots, um, I would like to... Th- There is a, there's a few levels of funny here. So Lance has a former student whose name is Abby Lannon, who Abby is a total badass. Who? Yeah. Um, she, she does some work for, uh, for Pedal Note Media. Uh, and uh, I was gonna try and have a phone call with her today, but, uh, not in a bad way, but today has just gone completely sideways, so I text her and said, "I don't think I'm gonna be able to talk today." She said, "No worries." And then I took a quick sh- screenshot of, uh, the two of you beautiful people and said, "Right now." And then she wrote, "Icons." And then I wrote- ... I wrote, I think without a hint of i- irony, and then I wrote back, this is while we were talking, I then wrote, "I just see two of my jackass buddies." And then this is the part where there are some layers here. She said, "Is it wrong of me to say that Pat just looks like a slightly older, more fashionable Lance in this Lance LaDuke: image?" Older? Andrew Hitz: There's- I Lance LaDuke: know. That's my favorite part. Andrew Hitz: That's why, that's why I said that there's some layers to this, because, because Pat is younger, but she called you more fashionable, so she unintentionally insulted both of you, which is awesome. And then I wrote, "Oh-" Lance LaDuke: She intentionally insulted me. She unintentionally insulted Pat. Andrew Hitz: And then I wrote, "Okay, this is going on the air in a minute. Uh, laughing my ass off." She wrote, "Oh, no, Lance just let me borrow his trombone too." That's right. "Now I'm in trouble." And then I said, "He hasn't used it in years." Also true. And then she said, "He'd obviously just take it away out of spite." So that's- Yeah. That's pretty funny right there. Lance LaDuke: Abby Lannon needs to return Lance's trombone. Andrew Hitz: Show Lance LaDuke: notes. Andrew Hitz: That's it. That is, that is spectacular. Lance LaDuke: That's pretty funny. Andrew Hitz: So, um, so b- let... Well, this has been a, this has been, like, a bizarrely serious episode. Um, and we- It's Patrick Sheridan: awesome. I've answered none of your questions too. Andrew Hitz: That's the best part. Well, no, you've, you've, you've answered Patrick Sheridan: them in a- It's nice chatting with you though. Andrew Hitz: Like- Lance LaDuke: Well, at your advanced age. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, exactly. I mean, you are, you're such a- When you're young like me- ... Lance LaDuke: you Andrew Hitz: don't have these problems. Patrick Sheridan: You have to make a choice. You either gotta know it all or you gotta look good. That's right. So I'm gonna go with fashionable. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, I mean- I'm gonna Patrick Sheridan: go with fashionable. Andrew Hitz: And I guess in his defense- I'm old too ... rather, in, in Pat's defense, rather than preparing for this interview, he was, yeah, he was busy looking in the mirror, just making sure he looked good for this audio-only podcast. I know. The, uh, so, so Pat, uh, let's, uh, if you don't mind, talk where, where are you right now with, uh, with the Sam thing? Like, he's been gone for a while now. You know, we're recording this in December, so he has been gone for, uh, what, eight, almost eight and a half months. But like, where, where are you with that whole process? Patrick Sheridan: I'm not sure what you mean by that question, but I, I, I... I'll- let me just tell you what I, the interesting part of what I, because I'm so thick and I didn't expect this to happen. So, you know, he passed away on, in April, and, uh, I just figured that, you know, everybody would, would mourn by themselves or with each other or, like, with his family, right? Um, and I'm an idiot. I only have four valves. Um, I don't, I don't, they don't let me play F tuba with, like, nine valves, and I don't have any graduate degrees in music. So I didn't expect, uh, that with the person that they knew, uh, or at least saw a lot with Sam, which was me. So that was, uh, I didn't expect that. So I was really probably mid-July where I was talking to some of my friends, uh, and they're like, "You probably haven't had any space to grieve yet." And I'm like, "No, I, I haven't actually. I've not-" There hasn't been enough room to do that yet. Um, th- there's just been, uh, you know, really being there for other people. Um, which of course has been, was, has been great because there have been a lot of people that, who were a part of the Sam, uh, legacy, that all the stories I knew from hanging out with him for so long that I'd never met before or had only met in passing- Andrew Hitz: Right Patrick Sheridan: or briefly, that, uh, I ended up, you know, having great email exchanges or conversations with, either in person or over the telephone. So th- th- that was, that's been this really very awesome thing, which is, I st- I stated before for you guys. Um, the, uh, so then anyway, um, part of being, doing what we do and our, our, our schedules as musicians are very entwined with the academic calendar, and the academic calendar is intertwined with the professional music calendar. So there's always a dead space, right, late August to ear- and early September wh- hardly anybody works during that time, and I don't hardly ever work then. And, um, so annually since Michelle and I, 2011 and we became vegan and mostly vegan in 2012, um, and, uh, uh, so, um, I do a fast in the fall. Uh, I always have been doing, uh, sometimes intermittent fasting, but mostly juice fasting, and I can get it started in late August because I'm home. I, uh, I was like, "Oh, I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do another fast this fall." And, uh, so anyway, that's, you're like, "What the hell does this have to do with Sam?" Um, but, uh, um, I can, the look on your face, Lance- No ... Andrew Hitz: it's Patrick Sheridan: beautiful. Andrew Hitz: Well, when I asked the question, I knew you were gonna have an answer, but when you said, "I'm not sure what you mean by that question," I was like, "Well, I don't either, so you need to figure it out." So, and now, and now you're talking- Yeah, well- ... about, like, juice fasting, which is like, you know, it's, it's the- Right ... it's the Pat show. Work it out, yeah. Yeah, it's, it's fine. Patrick Sheridan: It's, it's all the way around. Well, I, I talk in pano, so I gotta work my way all the way around to get to the point. Andrew Hitz: Right. I talk in pano. Patrick Sheridan: It's like my haircut, right? So... Andrew Hitz: You talk in fashionable pano. Well, sorry. Patrick Sheridan: My Andrew Hitz: hairline- Uh, hold on ... Patrick Sheridan: my hairline is a pano, so... Andrew Hitz: I don't wanna, I don't wanna misquote Abby. She did not call you fashionable. She called you slightly more fashionable than Lance, which are- Oh, no. Those are two very different things. Lance LaDuke: Oh, no. Andrew Hitz: Anyway, I'm Lance LaDuke: just like saying- I was remembering Mo is the smart student ... Andrew Hitz: yeah, exactly. That's, that's what I was getting at, yes. Patrick Sheridan: It's fine, I'll take it. I'll take it. Andrew Hitz: So all right, so Patrick Sheridan: juice fast. So, uh, anyway, so, so the, so anyway, but the thing that I noticed the most about this, like years ago when I started fasting, and I've done maybe 15 or 20 fasts since then, is that besides the obvious nice rejuvenation and you s- your, your digestive system goes to sleep, so your parasympathetic system has way more energy for, for, for every other function in your body, is that there's a head space to fasting that is really incredible. Um, there's a clarity of thought, um, that's awesome, and there's, uh, also a quiet that accompanies not eating, um, that is, uh, something that my brain doesn't ever, hardly ever, ever get until like the day nine or 10 of a vacation in the woods, you know? And, um, and fasting puts my head in that space. So the amount of, uh, all kinds of things, uh, that I needed to process about, uh, I knew that I needed the head space of a fast to be able to do the processing. Lance LaDuke: Hmm. Patrick Sheridan: If that makes any sense. So I had planned in the middle of July when I was talking to some of my buddies, were like, "Oh, you haven't really..." No, I haven't, I haven't had time. I haven't had any space to do that, that the fast that I was gonna do in August, uh, the one where I would, you know, the, the main intention of the fast was gonna be to grieve for Sam. And then the other one, because the other part about fasting, which is an odd thing, is that there's an explosion of energy that comes from not eating, which is weird. Um, that, and that, I, you know, there's... I, I don't wanna get into creed, but there are things that I believe in, and one of them is energy. So I was like, you know, a couple of my buddies are, are s- I thought you meant the crappy Andrew Hitz: rock band Creed. I was like, boy, this Patrick Sheridan: is- The bad rock band, yeah. Andrew Hitz: Can't we talk about Nickelback? Patrick Sheridan: Oh, Lance LaDuke: man. Patrick Sheridan: I like the backs of dimes better. Oh. Anyway, so, um- Said one euphonium player to the other looking at an alternative fingering chart. Um- Andrew Hitz: I've never seen that much money. This should've been our plan all along, Lance. We should have asked him about, about processing Sam's death and then not let him answer for the full hour. Mm-hmm. That would've been... 10% of our audience would've called it the greatest episode of The Brass Junkies ever, and then we would've lost, like, half our Patreon patrons also. Those both would've happened. So I'm sorry, Pat. Please, please tell us about your feelings and working through them. No- We, we care. Creed. Creed. Energy. Patrick Sheridan: So my, so my creed, my energy are- Lance LaDuke: I would like to speak to you about- No ... my energy chakras. Oh. But first, let's breathe. Breathe. Breathe. So breathe from your diaphragm. I was just about to say that. Yeah. Wait, let me get mine. Andrew Hitz: Belly- Lance LaDuke: Okay, now ... Andrew Hitz: belly breathing. Oh, I have a good story for the bonus episode also, but Pat, the funny thing is, we keep interrupting. I actually do legitimately wanna hear your answer- but I'm incapable of not talking. Please c- I actually mean this. Continue. Patrick Sheridan: I'm gonna, I'm gonna pause for, so that Lance can type- Show notes. Anyway, um- Creed Lance LaDuke: versus Nickelback. Patrick Sheridan: Exactly. Lance LaDuke: I was already way ahead of you. Now I just typed show notes into the show notes. Patrick Sheridan: Uh, uh, I had planned to, to sort of o- you know, two intentions for the fast. One was to give myself some head space to grieve Sam, and the other one was, uh, to offer up some, you know, some energy and, and, uh, to two of my buddies that were, that are suffering, that are, you know, just fighting for life. So, um, so I started in, uh, the middle of August, and, uh, 60 days in my fast. Um, this time it started off as a juice fast, and then it turned into, uh, just the supplements in the morning, noon, and evening, and water. About almost two gallons a day. So I ended up fasting out to 60 days, which was the middle of October. And, um, I think it was right about the time actually I talked to you guys actually, for Sam's birthday. And, uh, I just got, you know, I got out of the shower, looked in the mirror and I was like, "Well, what's my body been doing for energy? Well, it's been taking the fat off my body." So, and I can still see energy hanging from my body. So I guess I'm gonna continue to fast, so. Uh, I, I ate on Thanksgiving, so I fasted for 100 days. And, uh, uh- Wow ... and it was, uh, yeah, it was, it was amazing. It was a, I mean, I'm, you know, you can, you can see the difference. Yeah. But that's the part, the, the, the bonus is the, was the, the, the enough head space to do kind of grieving. And it was not- Mm ... it's not like, you know, sob with Kleenex grieving. It's like process all kinds of feelings that are The feel, sense of loss, but all kinds of other ones too. 'Cause when you work together with somebody for a really long time, and you own a business together for a long time, this, you know, you see, you both see the whole spectrum of all of each other's behaviors. And, uh, so there was lots to, lots to go through. Mm. And, um, so yeah, so it was good. It was a really good fall. I think the best thing that was really nice was to see at WBEC, which was 798, 99 of the fast, uh, up in Seattle and see, uh, uh, Jose and Domingo were both like, "Oh my God, you're, you're glowing. How are you?" And I'm like, "I'm really much better. I'm much better, thank you. I'm feeling way better." 'Cause we were all- Andrew Hitz: Mm-hmm Patrick Sheridan: pretty bunched up in June at, in, when we were hanging out Lance LaDuke: at the memorial, Patrick Sheridan: right? Andrew Hitz: Yep. Patrick Sheridan: Good time. We all had a good cath- lots of cathartic laughter, but we were all in process for sure. Andrew Hitz: Yep. Patrick Sheridan: And, uh- Andrew Hitz: Yeah, that was an intense Patrick Sheridan: flight Andrew Hitz: home ... so, Patrick Sheridan: yeah, yeah, totally. I'm sure. So, so I'm thanking for asking. I'm doing, I'm doing great. I'm feeling really, really, really good, and, um, uh, and the, the, that's the sort of the, the nice part of it, the bonus part of this. Like, oh man, I wrote this ... The Air Force band is doing it as a tribute to him, and I get to conduct it. Like, holy cow, what a great present. Um, is the, is the, the better one, which is like, you know, we've improvised together forever, and he showed me how to do that. And, and I got to be, you know, m- myself amongst many, many people were privy to be able to watch him write and watch his creative process as a writer. Or lucky enough to be able to play his brass quintet charts. Um, and, um, you know, if you're a student of it, look at the score and, and then check out what he was doing and, um, and then go from there. And then, you know, the best part of touring is just like the, I think the thing that, you know, despite his phobia of flying that Wynton gets about running around in a bus, you know, with the band, is that, that whole Duke Ellington thing of being on the road. And you can, post-concert you can dissect the concert, you can play sides, you can, you know, you can- Transcribe. There's, there's so much that can happen when you are together, and we did a lot of time in a car. Mm-hmm. A lot of time in a car. Lance LaDuke: Yeah. Patrick Sheridan: Which sounds odd for musicians to be getting things done in a car, but it was frequently after a concert. It was like, "Hey, man, let's, let's do the first five hours of the drive tonight and sleep in." Um, so it was lots of... Lots, I mean, days and days and days of time like that hanging out. And, um, uh, uh, so the... That part is the... That's the, the, the bucket list compositionally, which is, uh, you know, uh, I got a tons of, of stuff that we did together, but also just the ability to know how to get free and to use things as simple as Space Viking Mambo- Mm-hmm to be able to create a piece of music from- ... uh, is the, is the feeling of, uh, gratitude, um, on the other side of his death- Lance LaDuke: Mm ... Patrick Sheridan: which is, is a, is an uplifting and very nice energy, um, um, to be in of like, "Oh, well, I can do this and I know how to do this, and my friend showed me how to do it." Andrew Hitz: That's awesome. Patrick Sheridan: Um, I mean, and, and, and, and in- introduce me to people that I can ask when I don't know, and not only ask because they're alive, but also ask because they're not here anymore. I can- Andrew Hitz: Mm-hmm ... Patrick Sheridan: dig up an Alfred Reed score or a Mahler score and take what I need to get from it to do what I wanna do with music. So there's a lot of that that's, that's, that's fun. And then there's the other part, like where I'm going to New Orleans for the Jazz Educators Network Conference, and Harry's coming down. We're gonna play down there. And Kevin Clark, the leader of the Deuce of Dixieland, great trumpet player, um, is of course there. And so we're, we're playing a bunch at, for JEN Outreach. Um, and we're playing at the National Park Services Jazz Heritage Museum a couple of times. We'll be on WWOZ, um, at the beginning of January. But, um, s- that's from ha- ha- hanging out with Sam in the early '90s when he's running around with Vignola, and then we're, the three of us are in a car. Uh, yeah, and, uh, and then he's like... And then it was like, oh, it's hot, 'cause, uh, Tom Holtz posted one of these pictures from ITEC talking about Sam- Yeah ... was like, what was that? '96 or '95? '95. And, uh, he play- uh, played with Travelin' Light. That was also when Carmen Miranda made an appearance, I believe, on that same show. That was the same show. And, uh, yeah, and, um, uh, like, that, those were the... That was the beginning of like, you know, sitting in the back of a car with Frank, frankly, quite a few times, and him like, "Hey, man, let's, let's play this tune." I'm like, "Well, I don't know that tune." He's like, "Yeah, well, you'll figure it out." And, uh, um, so the, the, the, the creative doors were blown off and the style doors were blown off by, uh, by those guys. And so that's the... What you're left over with is the ability to be able to go do this. You r- you know what I mean? Like, I embarked studying with Arnold Jacobs to play in an orchestra. I ended up, after studying with Jim Self and Arnold Jacobs and Dan Perantoni in the President's Own United States Marine Band- master's degree in finance, and then finally as a 12-year-old, remembered that as a 12-year-old, Harvey Phillips had said, "You know, you should be playing jazz all the time." And then sitting in the car with Sam, he's like, "Here, man, get, get your mouthpiece out. We're going to work. What are you doing? Why are you playing that F over the C chord? Are you deaf?" You know? Like, and it's like right away. So like, and started in on me. And then, so you're on the other side. You're given this, the ability to, you know, stand on your own two feet creatively, and as a craftsman in the business, to be able to orchestrate, right? Take any kind of projects that, that have to do with that part of the business. And then the, the, the, the part that every single one of my teachers recognized, whether they taught me formally or, or informally, which was Sam, um, uh, they just simply smiled wryly and waited when I would be like, "No, I'm not gonna... I'm not teaching and I, I don't wanna be involved in teaching," and la, la, la, la. So whatever it was, excuse me, that I exhibited at those early ages, they knew I was gonna be a teacher. They just all kind of went, "Yeah, whatever, Sheridan. You, you'll, you'll figure it out." But that part of it as it started to, uh you know, f- fester. Um, did t- turn into a passion and, uh, in terms of teaching was, uh, that was one other one of these great things to be able to teach with him and, and bring a- another, another... He was coming at it from a chamber music place. I was coming at it from a soloist place, or he'd come at it from a writing place and I would come at it from a, an improvisation place. Um, that, that, uh, unique opportunity to have, you know, two people's pedagogies and philosophies line up enough, but be different enough to make a, a, a huge impact with, with teachers, um, is extremely gratifying. And so it's not sad at all to show up in a band room now, um, and work breathing exercises or do some sort of groove thing, or do some sort of geography where you split them apart or you make them sit close together and, and, um, it's, it's the whole... To the end it's like, okay, who knows who the Empire Brass is? And like, okay, well you got YouTube. Now who knows who Rolf Smedvig is? Who knows who Sam Pilafian is? Okay, you need to know those, who that is. And then, you know what I mean? It's the I, it's the, I remember why, it's the, it's, well, I don't know. It's 'cause we're old, right? We've reached that age where it's like, "Oh, well, we're the guys in the middle. We gotta connect the, the, the, you know- That's right ... the future to the past." Yep. Yeah. And, um, uh, and, and it, and it, it doesn't feel like a responsibility. It feels like this really... It did before. It feels this really awesome, great... Very happy to do it and, and, and to be in, or to be given the opportunity to be the one in the middle passing the information on. Yeah, to give- And being able to hopefully, you know, be an example of what, you know, they were, they were trying to imparten, um, which was, they did for everybody. Um, and, uh, that's the, you know, get to talk about. That was like, I did a, did an honor band and we talked about, I did, I did, uh, um, uh, Symphonic Dance Number Three, Fiesta, Clifton Williams, and I did the Washington Post. And so I was talking about being in the Marine Band, talking about Sousa, and talking about, uh, and then all the really great ba- band conductors who love Sousa. Fred Fennell, all that was my friend Sam's, uh, college band director. Oh, and by the way, when he was in, uh, Florida All-State, he did the high school premiere of this symphonic, of this piece of music, and Clifton Williams was conducting it. And when he went to the University of Miami, uh, Clifton Williams and Fred Fennell and Alfred Reed and Jerry Coker were all on his faculty. Right, so in other words, like, you can- Yeah ... be doing honor band, talking about all this stuff, and c- making all this history happen, and you can see the ones that are really switched on are s- they're already on YouTube searching all the stuff you're talking about. And the nice thing about those YouTube algorithms Offer up a playlist too, so if people get interested, they can, they can go super deep by just noticing what the algorithm is suggesting because of the nature of their search. Andrew Hitz: Yep. Patrick Sheridan: Um, and, uh, that's, that's cool. That's cool. Uh, that makes me happy when that happens. And, uh, and, uh, and, uh, and the thing now that's very easy to process as a joyful thing that was, that was pretty sad in the beginning was the, the, the... In other words, I've gone back to the April 5th and sort of gone by people's feeds who were posting very emotional and cool stories that I didn't know, um, from before. And to note, to then to note, like, how... 'Cause I was way too emotional during all, like, leading up to his death and then for many months after, uh, to notice how many of those moments of, "That's Sam," or, "This is when," or, "I remember when this happened," or, you know what I mean? Mm-hmm. Like, all those things that we were hearing about, I s- I was right s- I sat right next to him for hundreds of those moments. Lance LaDuke: Hmm. Patrick Sheridan: I, I s- I watched those moments happen for, for, for kids over and over and over and over, and for teachers over and over. Like, people having, like, the summit meeting where they're like, had every Empire recording. They, you know, they, and then they'd, like, they'd follow him when he went to Travelin' Light, and then they would love his playing, and they loved his teaching, and then they would meet him at a clinic, and they would have this moment. We all did, right? And I would be standing right there watching them have the moment going, and it'd be years into our working together. So was just, you'd just be able to sit there and witness that happening. And I was like, "Ah, you know, I, I loved those moments when they were happening," but people are recalling them. It's a, it's a different type of feeling to remember those moments when you were watching people have that moment of inspiration that propelled them in m- in many cases, you know, different directions in their life. Andrew Hitz: Hmm. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Andrew Hitz: It's beautiful. Good stuff, man. Good stuff. All right. Well, we gotta get out of here 'cause I got a hard out soon, and we gotta do a bonus episode, but, uh, you of course know about, uh, our dear friend Jens Lindemann, and, um- There he Lance LaDuke: is. Andrew Hitz: There he is. Yep. That's, uh- He's warming Patrick Sheridan: up. Andrew Hitz: Yeah. That's his- Warming up Patrick Sheridan: on the piccolo Andrew Hitz: trumpet ... that's his low register on- ... on the pic. So what- Patrick Sheridan: Brandenburg. That was his Brandenburg. Andrew Hitz: What, what, what advice, what advice do you have for Jens in this, uh, desperate time of need for him with his, with his chops? Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Well, I mean, it continues, right? I mean, we all sit on the sidelines waiting for it to get better, and, um, you know, patience and friendship, there's a wall at the end of that, and I think, you know, many of us have reached that, which is why we reach out to ... the friendship circle of Jens, which is really just a patience circle with that child. Lance LaDuke: Right. Patrick Sheridan: Um, uh, to, uh, to have, you know, external positive energy sent, uh, our way because, you know, we're really, you know, we- we're done with him. I mean, like, well, how can you t- that- that kind of tone, the way he phrases. Andrew Hitz: The way he phra- I th- And I hate his face ... you Patrick Sheridan: know, like a little- Andrew Hitz: The tone of his ... Patrick Sheridan: the little anchor tongue that makes, you know, like, come on. Andrew Hitz: Come on. Patrick Sheridan: What is that? What's that? That bilingual German stuff. I mean, what is that about? Right. I don't even... You know, come on. Andrew Hitz: And his face. I mean, yeah. Patrick Sheridan: Come on. I mean, there's so, I mean, there's so much to, to cover here. Right. The acreage- Right ... of his- Andrew Hitz: The acreage. Hectares ... Patrick Sheridan: it's just, I mean, unbelievable. Unbelievable. I can't even... I mean, that they, they haven't shut his social media accounts down by now. Andrew Hitz: Right? Patrick Sheridan: Right. Andrew Hitz: Intervention. He's like a, he's a walking- Yeah ... uh, yeah, violation of terms of service. He's a walking Patrick Sheridan: violation. They created a whole new lane for him to get in and out of Canada, right? They have global access. They created a treble clef access for him. It's this little hole you have to squeeze yourself through with skinny jeans and bad shirts. Andrew Hitz: All Lance LaDuke: right. We've- Skinny jeans and bad shirts is going, so that's- Andrew Hitz: That would be a good, uh... Yep, yep. He's like a- That's Lance LaDuke: his memoir, I think. Andrew Hitz: Yeah. He's like a, uh, an older, slightly more fashionable version of Lance. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. There you go. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. I mean, I mean, and the good... You know, the upside was, is that, that, you know, there was a, j- there was a momentary, uh, like a plateau in his descent into ineptitude when he broke his elbow. At least the- ... there was like, he didn't, wasn't getting worse when his elbow was broken. Andrew Hitz: There's just so much empathy from us. It's, it's, uh... Yep, Pat just made himself cry. He's gotta blow his nose some more. So- That's right ... all right. Well- Yeah, Patrick Sheridan: I'm gonna take a bite of my sorrow soup here. Andrew Hitz: This has been Patrick Sheridan: Sorrow. Andrew Hitz: This, this has been wonderful, Pat. I'm, I'm so glad that you and your nine-digit zip code could, uh, join us today. So, um, safe travels to Midwest and, um, yeah. Thanks for, thanks for coming, man. Your check is in the mail Patrick Sheridan: Well, thanks for doing this, you guys. It's, uh, highly entertaining for so many people, and, uh, even though I don't remember the numbers of your podcast, I do, I do listen to them. And I do enjoy them, so thanks for including me as often as you include me. I appreciate it. He's enjoyed all five Andrew Hitz: episodes. Yeah. I, Patrick Sheridan: I may, I may have... That momentum in my career may have to be coming to an end today as we have revealed more today than we probably should have. However, since it's g- it's gonna air way after tomorrow- Andrew Hitz: Yeah, you're fine. Patrick Sheridan: You're fine ... anyway, it's good to see you guys. I wish we could do this in person sometime. I know. It'd be nice to like- Andrew Hitz: Right? ... Patrick Sheridan: like actually, you know, like with the little, like, like in a restaurant, like, where there's, like, coffee glasses and shit clanking in the background. Yeah, Andrew Hitz: man. Patrick Sheridan: You know, the sound of bassoonists shaving their reeds in the corner. Andrew Hitz: So guess what? We actually have not announced this yet, but, uh, we are gonna do a live version of this at, uh, NERTEC, at the Northeast Regional Tubaphonium Conference, uh, in Ithaca in March, which is gonna be really fun. So I don't know if we're gonna broadcast it live or whether we're just gonna record it live with an audience, but it's gonna be in the recital hall. Um, yeah, it's like the only thing scheduled at that time. It's gonna be good, so I'm hoping that we can use that as, uh- Patrick Sheridan: Cool. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, yeah, it's gonna be good. Very cool. So anyway, all right. Well, that is gonna do it for this episode of The Brass Junkies. You've been listening to The Brass Junkies on the Pedal Note Media Podcast Network. If you would like to hear the bonus episode featuring today's guest, please visit patreon.com/thebrassjunkies to learn how you can support the show and instantly access all bonus materials as well as gain access to a special patron only Facebook group. The Brass Junkies is produced by the amazing, wonderful, and truly inspirational Will Houchin. The theme music was composed by Fernando Deddos and performed by Andrew Hitz and Lance LaDuke. We are @Pray4Jens on Twitter and Instagram and have a Facebook page at facebook.com/Pray4Jens. You can find out more about The Brass Junkies and all the other Pedal Note Media podcasts at pedalnotemedia.com. This has been a presentation of the Pedal Note Media Podcast Network.

Andrew Hitz: Hello, and welcome to the latest episode of The Brass Junkies. I am one of your hosts, Andrew Hitz, and I am joined by the lovely and inspirational Lance LaDuke. Lance, how are you this morning? I'm Lance LaDuke: feeling very inspirational. Andrew Hitz: I You sound it, man. You, uh, you absolutely sound it. Uh, we have, um, well, a, a very special guest. We call them all special, but I generally don't mean it, but, um, but he is special. Uh, it is, uh, Patrick Sheridan, uh, who is a, uh, friends. I'm guessing if you are listening to this podcast, um, then you know who he is. He's a wicked, good tuba player, as we say, up in New England, and, um, has been a friend of Lance's for, uh, for decades and a friend of mine for, um. Yeah, a long time too. 15 years, something like that. And for Lance, it's even longer than that. Lance LaDuke: 26 years, I think. Andrew Hitz: Yeah. Long, long time. So, um, we are, uh, mixing up, uh, how we're doing, uh, the intros now, where, uh, it'll just be Lance and I, um, yapping. Uh, and then we will, uh, we'll just, uh, plug right into the, uh, to the conversation. And, um, we, uh, we just talked to Pat about a whole lot of really cool stuff, uh, kind of where he came from, um, in terms of the, um, the Marine Band and, and all of that. And then, uh, what he's new and do doing, doing now with the, uh, Salt River Brass and, um, and how the Brass Gym and Breathing Gym stuff came about. And, um, Lance LaDuke: Band Director Academy, which is coming up this summer. Andrew Hitz: And he told, uh, one of, uh, one of my favorite Pat and, uh, and Lance stories, uh, ever actually. Um, it might be my favorite. Uh, pat. That's a, that's a good one. You gotta stay, stick around until the end to hear that part. So, um, I think Lance is going to, uh, talk to you about, uh, this cool thing we got going on with, uh, with Patreon. A way that you can, uh, help us to, uh, support the show. Lance LaDuke: We have had fantastic, uh, outpourings of support for this show. It's been overwhelming. Uh, the, i, I regularly will make a trip to a school and, uh, will be doing a brass event and if somebody will come up and say they're a huge fan of the, of the podcast, which is great, and we really appreciate all that sort of feedback. We appreciate, uh, the shout outs that you give us on social media and the shares. One tangible way that you can help us. Uh, to offset the cost of putting the show on is to visit Patreon, P-A-T-R-E-O-N, and at Patreon you can, uh, give us a donation per episode. And we have some fantastic, uh, patrons already who are helping offset the cost of, actually, I think we have enough right now that the, the, the spec, the hosting, which is a not insignificant, uh, uh, cost for the year is covered. And we would love to get some more patrons to sort of help offset the cost of the rest of, uh, putting the show on. So if, uh, you're looking for a way to support us, uh, monetarily, that's a spectacular way to do so. So if you go to patreon.com, you search for us at, uh, the Brass Junkies, I think if it's just slash. The Brass Junkies. Um, you can, uh, donate $1 an episode, $3 an episode, $5 an episode. You can set a limit on how much you're charged in any given month or over the course of the year. Um, and, uh, it's a, it a huge, huge help to us. You won't get charged until the, um, episode, each episode is aired. And actually, uh, this is an insider tip. If you do sign up at Patreon, you actually get access to the episode about a half a day early. So I dunno, if you're like super, super addicted to the show, um, and you want to get access to it 12 hours or 18 hours or so, uh, ahead of everybody else, that's a quick way to do so. So visit Patreon. We really appreciate your help. We tried to set up an event for our Patreon patrons and uh, I dropped the ball on that. My, my, uh, culpa and we're going to probably look at rolling out some Patreon. Patron specific events and, uh, specialists, um, over the next few months, keep an eye out. Uh, and the only way you'll find out about that is if you are one of our patrons. So for the patrons, thanks very much. If you're considering it. Thank you very much. If you're supporting us any way, any which way you're doing it, thanks very much. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, it's, uh, it, it doesn't sound like $2, uh, an episode would, uh, would be all that helpful, but, um, but it, it, uh, it really is. 'cause we've, as he just said, we got a lot of ongoing costs. Um, and, uh, it, uh, is very helpful, uh, for you to, uh, to help us with that. And, um, and it all, uh, it all adds up, uh, one person at a time. So, uh, but we are very indebted to all of you who, uh, like Lance said, have been sharing this and telling friends and uh, and giving us feedback. So it's, uh, it makes all the hard work worth it. So, uh, and um, one last thing is, uh, I wanted to let you know that, um, that if you, um, if you enjoy Pat in the interview today, that, um, he did an interview for me in my book, um, A Band Director's Guide to Everything Tuba, a collection of interviews with the experts, um, which is a, um. He talks about breathing and anatomy, and it's, uh, it's startling how insightful his interview is. Um, in fact, I'm, uh, by the time this airs, it will have already launched, uh, the second volume of that, which is the, uh, the trombone book. Um, his interview is so good that I put it in the trombone book as well, which, um, uh, features interviews with, uh, Joe Alessi and, uh, Ralph Sauer and, uh, my, um, beautiful and inspiring colleague, Lance LaDuke here. And, um, you can, uh, get all of that, uh, at uh, banddirectorsguide.com. Uh, without further ado, we are going to, um, get uh, right into our conversation with Patrick Sheridan. And this morning we are joined by a world renowned tuba player, Patrick Sheridan. Uh, Patrick, what does it feel like to be renowned all over the world? Patrick Sheridan: Well, you know, when your picture hangs in the post office, um, it's tough to grocery shop at your local place. Andrew Hitz: This is, uh, it's a valid point. Wouldn't you agree, Lance? Lance LaDuke: Absolutely. Andrew Hitz: Lance, do they Lance LaDuke: still have post offices? Andrew Hitz: Yeah. Lance, pat. Do you guys know each? Lance LaDuke: We were, uh, separated at birth. Andrew Hitz: Yeah. Oh yeah, that's right. I forgot. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. We're escapees from a sheep cloning facility. Lance LaDuke: People don't know. His original name was Romulus and mine was Remus. Andrew Hitz: Look Escapees from a sheep. Yeah, man, we all right. We, we got weird right outta the gate. I like that. That was like at the 30, 32nd mark. So, um, yeah, there's a potential for this interview to, we could fill up this entire hour with just inside jokes between the three of us, which would be the most off-putting episode in podcast history. Lance LaDuke: That's still hilarious. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, it would be funny for funny to us. So Lance LaDuke: I'm putting the over under on, uh, our ability to even use any of this at about three minutes. Andrew Hitz: We told Lance, told, uh, told Patrick right before we started, he said, he said, we try not to swear, but if you do, we'll bleep it out. And um, that was the funniest thing, uh, by the sounds of it that Pat has heard in the month of April so far, so, and we're, we're a couple weeks in. So, uh, we tend to have, uh, we're all road or ex road musicians, so it's, uh, it's hard to not speak with colorful language. Wouldn't, wouldn't you agree? Patrick Sheridan: It's like a comma. Andrew Hitz: It's like, so Lance, do you want to, do you wanna lead the grilling here? Lance LaDuke: Say comma and have it sound dirty before? That's pretty good. Andrew Hitz: It is. Pun punctuation can be inappropriate. Lance LaDuke: Oh, don't talk to me about the semicolon. Andrew Hitz: Was that your Lance LaDuke: ellipsis is coming my way? Andrew Hitz: Was that, was that your sheep voice? Lance LaDuke: Not Pat. How long have we known each other? Let's see. Patrick was in the Marine Band. I was in the United States Air Force Band, and this was in the early nineties. And Pat enjoyed being in the military band as much as I did, and we recognize each other's scent and found our way to one another and the rest is whatever it is. When did you go into the Marine Band Pat? Patrick Sheridan: 1989 is when I joined the band. Lance LaDuke: There's still a plaque up, right? Patrick Sheridan: For Lance LaDuke: when Patrick Sheridan: commemorating Andrew Hitz: when he left. Patrick Sheridan: Rubber cemented scratch and sniff something inside of somebody's locker somewhere. Andrew Hitz: Scratch and sniff plaque. There you go. See those kind of brainstorms only come from someone with, uh, with an MBA. So there's a little, little glimpse into the mind. That is Patrick. She. Lance LaDuke: Let's do this 30, uh, not 30 seconds. Gimme 72 seconds of, um, how it, what happened before you went into the Marine Band. Up to the Marine Band. Because I would like to, personally, I'd like to go with what you're doing now on what you will be doing rather than spend a bunch of time on Patrick History, which is probably find outable elsewhere. But can you give us a quick synopsis in 72 seconds of Birth to Marine Band? Go Patrick Sheridan: find Outable. I like that. That's my favorite website. Um, well, I started, I started, uh, playing music, uh, on the piano, uh, was a requirement of my mom that, uh, my brother and I take piano lessons, uh, all the way through high school, which explains why I got outta high school when I was seven. Um, because I loved the piano so much. Uh, no, I, so I started on piano and, uh, was taking lessons with my mom and, uh. Uh, was actually at a, it was kindergarten when I, uh, decided that I wanted to be in the band. Um, and I was, it was a elementary school assembly and, uh, uh, the, the jazz band was playing the sixth grade jazz band was playing, and they were playing, you know, the hits of the day. So this is the Renaissance era. So it would've been like, you know, uh, you almost submarine, uh, the, the, the, like, herb Albert hits like crazy, you know, this kind of stuff. So they were jamming out and the, the, the room was, you know, full of, you know, k through six kids and they finished, and it was the seventies. So the, the hair was, you know, parted down the middle and you couldn't see the guy's eyes, except for when he was the drummer, when he was hitting. And they'd flip it back and the hair would go all over the place. Um, uh, and, uh, and they finished playing and the, the room went off and, and all the girls were like screaming at the top of their lungs. And I was like, well, that's it. I gotta get in the band for the chicks. This is it right here. They had that moment in kindergarten standing there looking around like. Okay. Drums. It is band now. So every day in the lunchroom from kindergarten until they let me in the band, at the end of third grade, beginning of fourth grade, I asked the band, he's like, Hey, I gotta get in the band today. He's like, well, what's what? What? Why? I'm like, I gotta play the drums. He's like, why the drums? I was like, for the chicks? For the chicks. Didn't you see what happened at that concert? So I was like, out of my mind to get in the band. So then come the day, you're supposed to pick your band instrument. So I had already picked it right in kindergarten. So it's fourth grade and we're end of third grade. And I'm standing in line, but it's an alphabetical order. So my name, you know, not forward in the alphabet. If I'd have been a LaDuke or a Hitz, I'd have been a drummer, but I was a Sheridan. So by the time they got to me, they had decided that 11 drummers in beginning band was the line. Oh. So that me, an even dozen would've been too far. Um, and if you sense any sort of like irony or irate us or some sort of undue, uh, like. Lance LaDuke: I word Patrick Sheridan: homicidal thoughts about drummers. This is where it started. Anyway, so, uh, they said, no, you can't, you can't play the drums. We already have 11 so you can play anything else. So there was literally a sousaphone in the corner that had no bell on it. It had so much rust on it. You had to have a tetanus shot before you played it. Andrew Hitz: The tetanus tuba. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, definitely. Right. So I was like, you know, I, so I said, okay, fine. So they, we put that, we brought it home. So it was that sousaphone with no bells, basically B sousaphone. Right. So I learned my whole life was in b uh, and uh, go ahead. Let's run with that and, uh, am I past my seventies? Two seconds yet. Please stop me when it is. And, uh, Lance LaDuke: no, it's, the time moves differently Andrew Hitz: in podcast. We're up against a hard break, Patrick. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, I know. I could feel it coming. Um. Lance LaDuke: Weather on the eights. Andrew Hitz: Lance, do you want to, do you wanna make a helicopter noise and give us a traffic report? Lance LaDuke: Looks like we have a milk truck backed up on the I 84 Cottage tees everywhere. Humanity Kurds are covering small children. Kds Andrew Hitz: run, Lance LaDuke: run Andrew Hitz: children covered in Kurds on the interstate. Sorry, Patrick, we actually, we really care about your story. Please continue. Patrick Sheridan: No, I like Kurds anyway. I'm from, you know, I grew up in Minnesota, so they were right across the border in Andrew Hitz: grew where Patrick Sheridan: Minnesota. Yeah. You know, Lance LaDuke: stripes. Did you eat a hot dish? Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, when I was ha on the sousaphone there playing my pokas, I was getting the hot dish down in, through the lead pipe, coming to me down in little pits. And it was good because the, it took the green out of the tube, you know, I'm saying. Andrew Hitz: Took the green out of the tube. Patrick Sheridan: Wow. Dead silence. That was awesome. Andrew Hitz: Yeah, Patrick Sheridan: everybody, I'll be here for the next. Welcome to my Andrew Hitz: world, people. Lance LaDuke: You're not gonna get that finish. Andrew Hitz: Oh, so, so, so be sousaphone. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Be sousaphone right now. Anyway, so, so that was it. So that's how I started. And then my, my band director was really smart. He is like, well, if I wanna keep this cat on, on tuba, I have to figure out a way to feature him. So like, my very first concert, they played a piece called, Hey, Mr. Banjo, which is this chorus that the, the, like, the choir could sing and then somebody from the band would, you know, blow for 12 bars. And so it was, Hey, Mr. Clarinet, hey Mr. Whatever. So it was, Hey Mr. Tuba. And then there was a tuba solo. And so I, he sort of gave me what I was seeking since kindergarten, you know. Uh, which was a chance to inflict something. Um, and, uh, uh, so I got, I got hooked on it, and it was really not about the tuba, it was really about, uh, chance to communicate, you know, that was the, that was the real deal. So I, I played all that stuff. My mom was, uh, one of those, I had, she registered me for every one of those talent shows that you can do in Minnesota, like the Minneapolis Aqua Tenal and the Minnesota State Fair. And all this different, like things where you could enter competitions against, uh, you know, uh, uh, people that were working during the day doing something else and then would come sing New York, New York or something at a competition. It was a great lesson early on because it kept coming in second place and it was like, well, until you can sing New York, New York, you can do whatever you want on the t and light yourself on fire. It doesn't matter if somebody shows up and sings New York, New York, you might as well go home. Which is a great lesson. That's why I'm still sitting here talking on a BA podcast instead of working. Andrew Hitz: Um, so hey, we are the premier podcast of two jackasses interviewing brass players. Lance LaDuke: Ding, ding, ding, Andrew Hitz: ding, Patrick Sheridan: ding. Pencil, Andrew Hitz: pencil. We have found our niche. Patrick Sheridan: That's it. That's it. So then roll forward. Andrew Hitz: Uh, Patrick Sheridan: yeah, so I, that was it. I mean, I went, you know, there was a, there was a stop off in high school that was at a all boys Catholic military school. That was part of my formation that make me mostly demented still. Um, and um, uh, and then I went to Northwestern and studied with Jacobs, uh, you know, downtown and, uh, played in Civic and spent a year at Arizona State where it was Perantoni in the fall and Jim Self in the spring. And the studio had Tony Nen and Jeff Anderson and Mo Anderson, and, um. Uh, and a variety of other characters that all have jobs and work were Tom Holtz. Uh, it was a, it was some amazing, uh, gang of people that were all there at the same time. And then, uh, a bunch of us got jobs at the end of that year that, so boom there, there's the Marine Band. So that's kind of how it went. Great. Now we can talk about something else. Lance LaDuke: You decided that, uh, perhaps military life wasn't for you. You got out and did something that surprised many people, which was, uh, you went and got an MBA from the University of Michigan. So what was the thought? I mean, how, why? Patrick Sheridan: Sure. I was sitting in the Marine Band, uh, playing in a great, uh, uh, concert band. You know, when you play two in a band like that, you're playing cello parts and bass parts and you getting to, you know, play basically the whole page. And, um, so I really love that. And, um. There were some auditions, uh, for orchestras and, you know, I got the music and started to work on it when I, while I was in the Marine Band and I was at that moment in my life, the thought of, uh, uh, of having less to do in an organization than what I was doing in the Marine Band in terms of concert work, uh, just wasn't interesting to me. The thought of going to college to teach at that point in I was in my early twenties, uh, was, didn't, wasn't registering for me. And the opportunities that I had in the band, uh, to be featured as a soloist were the things that were interesting to me and I, and I couldn't see. From the view from my sousaphone in Arlington National Cemetery, uh, uh, a view forward, uh, to work as a tuba soloist. So I thought, well, that's, you know, there were lots of tuba soloists in the early nineties. Uh, but they had jobs in, in universities, or they had, they have jobs in, uh, uh, orchestras and on the weekends they would get out and, uh, that they weren't, weren't working, and they'd get out and go play solos with the groups. Um, and so I thought, well, I, I can do that. I can have that as my weekend warrior thing, and then I'll just go use my brain and do something else for a living. Uh, so the, the Masters in business is what offered me an entry level point to a terminal education point. In other words, like, you know, the, the, a PhD in business is a teaching degree, um, uh, like a DMA, you know, you have to have it to teach at a college, but it's not really a degree that you seek out to use in the workplace. Um, you know, orchestras aren't looking for people with DMAs. They're looking for people that can play. So the DMA really isn't a performance degree, it's a. It's a teaching degree, so it's the same as a PhD in business. So that the, the thought in the business market is that that terminal degree for education is the MBA. So I was like, well, that offered me sort of, this, at least a paper ticket to try to punch my card on the other side of the aisle, you know, out of music. Um, so that I could have a job during the week that, uh, paid well and used my brain to do the things that I always was good at in school, math, science, whatever it was. School was never a problem for me. So I'm like, well, I can use my brain during the week and have a job, and then on the weekends I can go be a tuba soloist and if it ever crossed over into the thing where I could do something more full-time, and then I would take the opportunity to do that. But the MBA would offer me a chance to do something else and make a decent living. And so I thought, I just dipped my toe in the water of like, okay, I'll see how I do on the gmat, and then I'll apply to some colleges and see where I get in. And the, the, the best place I got in was at that time. But one of the top 10 business schools in the, in the world, which was the University of Michigan, the Ross Business School. So I, I went and uh, had a great experience learning the, those things and then, you know, spent very little time on the other side working, 'cause I miss music. So I came back to music, sort of armed with this other viewpoint, um, about how to look at art, which actually, Andrew, you and I talked about on. The Entrepreneurial Musician. Andrew Hitz: Yeah. That, uh, you, uh, read my mind. I was gonna, uh, give a plug. Uh, he was the second interview, uh, that I did, uh, for TEM, uh, which you can find by going to pedalnotemedia.com. And then, uh, if you scroll all the way down in the, uh, the TEM blog, you'll find, uh, links to, uh, to our conversation, which was really fascinating. Um, just, uh, talking about, uh, well actually, uh, maybe one question that you got into a little bit, uh, or you got into, excuse me in detail, um, in that interview, but if you could just touch on how did, how did your career, um, path, um, get changed when you came back to the music side, uh, as a result of going so deep on the, on the business side, in terms of studying? Patrick Sheridan: Uh, it just, uh, it, it, you know, it, it freed me. Well, you know, I mean, maybe it handcuffed me, maybe it freed me, but it freed me from ever having to think about like, oh, it's really important to play this piece because, um, uh, I, I think you can have, you can afford that sort of. Beautiful artistic ethos when you're a violinist or a pianist or something that has a commercial traction that the average concert going audience wants to go here. And so there doesn't have to be some sort of, uh, fireworks or, uh, clowns in the lobby to, uh, get people to come to a concert where the tuba is featured in the front of the orchestra. Um, so, uh, I think that's the, what, what was the main thing that changed was that it was like, this is a product. It has to be priced a certain way. You have to know where to promote it and what you're gonna be and how you're gonna do it. And it, and so it forces you as an artist in that regard with that viewpoint to. Forget about, like, oh, it's about the art. No, it's about putting together a product that people are gonna want to have. And the art of programming and the content and the sequence, um, is the same as the art of the approach and the conversation that has to go on with people to convince them that they should hire, um, uh, you know, what I was offering. So, uh, it was just a more clinical, uh, view, and it was easy to have that feeling because that's the way it all was. When in business school, everything was just a clinical case study. Uh, it was devoid of emotion about like, but I want to play the Vaughan Williams. Uh, you know, that kind of stuff. Like some sort of artistic righteousness that come. I'm not sure where that comes from, but, uh, uh, I'm not sure that I had it, but I, it definitely died in business school. Uh, it was like, it just became very clinical. Like, if you're gonna put something together and you guys both know this from working as, uh, uh, you know, entrepreneurs in the, in the business, that, that's it. It. We could stand around all day. It'd be beautiful if we had the option to be, just think about like, well, it's, we're gonna play this piece because people need to hear it. Um, versus, uh, we have to make sure we can rebook and, uh, feed our families. And so that requires a completely different approach. Lance LaDuke: What I remember talking to you shortly after you left the MBA and I, did you go work on the Mercantile Exchange for a little bit? Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. I so went downtown and was also get some stuff for Leo Burnett on the marketing side. And, um, you know, it was an, it was good to be away, but at the same time it was the, it, it was the, it was just a good, uh, a perspective shift of like, okay, I walked away from something that I didn't, wasn't done experimenting with, or, or I felt more armed, like, oh, okay. In two ways. One was like I was armed with some knowledge about I could probably apply these templates that I learned in business school to. A tuba solo career, as funny as that sounds. Um, and, uh, laugh the tuba players and the euphonium players in the room, right? And, uh, uh, and the, uh, but it was also the other side of it, which was that, uh, um, uh, more of like, okay, since I have these templates to sort of apply, uh, to working this as a business, I don't, I, I can also have this, I have this MBA. And so that was in the first years of doing what I was doing, I would get really busy and at the end of every year I'd apply for some sort of job that was not in music, just to see if that piece of paper that I'd spent money on, uh, and time on was worth anything, uh, still. And it was so, so it was also this sort of backup thing, in other words like, well, if it, you know, if there's nothing to do as a tuba soloist or, you know, and that's of course evolved, but, uh, um. Then I have this piece of paper that allows, that's like my ticket. I can sort of take it out and go, see, I have this, and then I can go do something else. Um, so there was also freeing from that standpoint. In other words, there was, there was a, a hedge that made jumping off the cliff a little bit, feel a little bit safer, I guess. Lance LaDuke: So short, fast forward, I remember. Boy. We're old now, man. I, this is like crazy. I remember a day, I believe it was a Tuesday in June, the honeysuckle was blossoming. And so were you, Andrew Hitz: so, uh, Lance LaDuke: you were, there Patrick Sheridan: was curd on the highway. Andrew Hitz: Oh, that'd be a good band name. Kurds on the highway. Lance LaDuke: That's Andrew Hitz: because it sounds like turds on the highway also, which is also funny. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. For that, that, that debut track the slippery Andrew Hitz: slope. Lance LaDuke: So you, um, within pretty short order ended up, uh, traveling the world literally for, well I think you were out about a 300 days a year there for a little while, right? Patrick Sheridan: There were a couple years where I crossed over the two 90 mark. Into the three hundreds, yes. Andrew Hitz: Geez. Lance LaDuke: So what, um. Let's talk about that and you can talk about it from any angle you wish. I mean, it's just sort of crazy, careful, most of the listeners to imagine being on the road for 300 days a year. But mechanic, like how, how did you get that set up? What were the gigs like? How, how, like what, that's a crazy number for anybody. Um, and I remember talking to you at the time and wondering how you were still walking around the planet. Patrick Sheridan: Well, I wasn't, I was in pretty bad shape. It was a giant 400 pound human with a not a great marriage. You know, there was, there was some serious personal costs to. Traveling that much, that's for sure. Andrew Hitz: See, that's actually when I met you, so I just thought that that was your natural state. Let's Lance LaDuke: observe the Sheridan in the wild. Andrew Hitz: Yes, he is going to eat all of that. He seems he seems normal for a completely messed up guy. Patrick Sheridan: That's why this is called Brass Junkies. Yeah. Oh my God. It's an intervention. Andrew Hitz: This Lance LaDuke: will air on a and e. Andrew Hitz: There's, there's a film crew waiting to come in your living room. Room. I'm walking around the house Patrick Sheridan: looking for Ellen DeGeneres. Andrew Hitz: I'm telling you, she's, she's dancing in your driveway. Wait, Patrick Sheridan: are you speaking? Holy cow. Right? She was kind enough to wear white pants again. Lance LaDuke: Dance Patrick. Dance. Andrew Hitz: Oh goodness. So no more, more about you Patrick, what was the question? More about you. What, how are you on the road? 400 days a year. Yeah, Patrick Sheridan: uh, I, it, it was, it was a combination of things. There were some things that sort of hit right in the, the middle nineties that sort of came together. So there was, uh, a new development of instruments from Boosey & Hawkes, uh, from Besson. And I was involved in sort of the finishing end of that and then huge amount of promotion for that. So that got me to Europe quite a bit, um, and sort of was able to intersect with the brass band world and the, the concert band world, which is huge, um, in that part of the world. And, uh, there's a lot of times doing promotion, uh, for instruments. Uh, and then that sort of led to some things where I was teaching, uh, at a couple of universities as a guest because I was there so often. Um, so I could sort of be a regular visiting professor at a few universities that, and provide some value other than the usual sort of drive by three hour masterclass and then move on. I could see people. Once a month, every six weeks or so, um, be sort of this extra teacher. So that was super fun. And that was probably the, the, in that time where I started to, started to think about like, oh, I have to figure, you have to, it's like being a doctor, like you're gonna, if you're gonna teach, you better know what you're talking about and, uh, try to make sure that you're not screwing people up. And um, so that was sort of the, the beginning of, or sort of a, actually coming back from having studied a lot of things that had to do with anatomy and physiology in college at the behest of Jacobs who said I had to take these classes. Um, and it sort of came back around 'cause I started to do this teaching alongside of all the playing. So, uh, that sort of started up then, and then the, the rest of it was, you know, was, is everything that I could do. And I was like, there were allied concert tours with Rich Reinauer, uh, there, which were plentiful for a while. And, uh, as long as we wanted to do that, you know. Drive 500 miles, play a concert, drive 500 miles, play a concert, uh, lifestyle, which is pretty brutal. Um, and, uh, uh, to, uh, you know, playing with some orchestras, lots of community band work. Um, and, uh, and then I, you know, I, in the right after, I mean, I don't think I had been back sort of into quote unquote being a tuba soloist, which in the beginning was teaching 80 half hour lessons a week at a couple of different high schools in Chicago. And, you know, running out on the weekends once, every once in a while, um, that was the, that's how the first year looked. Uh. To, uh, I moved to Arizona and became Sam Pilafian's neighbor. And, uh, that was, uh, you know, the beginning of, uh, about about an 18 year stretch of, of, uh, this great collaboration that was on a teaching level and on a playing level. And it just sort of like everyday cab biting, uh, level about teaching and playing and creativity. Uh, that was, uh, yeah, that helped shape a lot of things that, you know, Brass Gym, Breathing Gym, Dos Amigos, all kinds of stuff came from, from that, uh, great time just 'cause we were neighbors and, and, uh, you know, and Sam's one of the great sort of promoters of people doing something different. So he, he was definitely behind the, in fact, it was in, it was, that was sort of how it, the breakout came. We, the, it was the very first Symphonia recording, Sam was the president of TUBA. Um, and, uh, or otherwise known as, uh, euphoniums and Tuba for Musical Excellence. Eat Me if for the, for the listeners out there and, uh, Lance LaDuke: thank you. Patrick Sheridan: That's from Steve Rosse, by the way. He's the, he's the original, uh, that was the write in vote in 96 for the new name. Anyway, didn't make it. We went with it instead. Uh, thanks for leaving the bags off of that LaDuke. Uh, so anyway, the, uh, so Sam was in town to do the first Symphonia recording, currently the president of ITEA Tuba, whatever it was at the time. And, uh, uh, and he was like, Hey man, you gotta do this solo thing. Gotta, you know, how he can be super persuasive. So it was like, oh, he was staying with us, uh, in Chicago. And, uh, you know, I, and I had already had these feelings of like, yeah, I really had some unfinished business. And, uh, so then, uh, you know, by the end of that I was like, yeah, I think I'm gonna put my toe in, see what happens. And then about a year, less than a year later, we had moved out to Arizona. Lance LaDuke: So, and two things. Uh, why did you move to Arizona? And the other part, and you can pick which other one first, but, uh, how did you get involved in instrument design? Like, how, how did you learn to do that? Patrick Sheridan: Okay, cool. The, uh, Arizona thing was, uh, twofold. One was, uh, like, you know, being in a place where it was, there wasn't a lot of financial pressure. So Arizona in the mid nineties was an extremely inexpensive place to live. Um, and, uh, so with, uh, half a household having a freelance career, it was, uh, it made the pressure easier from a practical standpoint, it's was great being in the middle of the country to fly everywhere. And it had a big international airport that had direct flights overseas. But, uh, living in a place like that also means that the airport shuts down and there's delays and blah, blah, blah. And it doesn't happen in Arizona hardly ever. Uh, so it was a, also a practical thing, but the, you know, sort of the other one was like, I kind of, you know, need to, I need, uh, a bouncing, you know, someone to bounce stuff off of. I need a, a, a, you know, a a an ad, an advocate, and a devil's advocate all at the same time. Some, some, you know, to make sure that my thinking was straight and clear. 'cause when you get to a certain level of play or a certain level of thinking, there's not a lot of people around you that'll look at you and go, that would say anything other than, yeah. Great. Sounds great. Go for it. You know, sort of like the parents that have given up on their live in 28-year-old, Hey guys, I got a job at the ice cream shop. Oh, great honey. You know, it's not, that's how like everybody would respond. Hey, does that sound good? Oh, pat, it sounds great, honey. You know, it's like, oh, okay, great. I'm not, I'm not getting any truth out of this. So Andrew Hitz: that's what I think every time I see some celebrity who's wearing some like, just unbelievably stupid hat that they don't have a single person, uh, in their inner circle, who is the person designated to say, Hey dude, you're famous. You're a sexing symbol, and you look like an ass. Take that off. They all just go, yes, you look great. And then they let them go out. So you needed someone to tell you you sounded like an ass. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, exactly. Or that the idea was crazy or no, you know, you shouldn't be playing that piece, or you should be, you know, and I, and so that was a, Sam provided a great, uh. You know, bouncing board. And he is also from, from the standpoint of having known him since I was a little kid, uh, I, you know, I I, it was a, it's a, it's a special relationship we have in terms of the truth. Like, I can just, I just like, no, dude, shut up. Tell me the truth. And then he would, okay, man, okay. You know, so it was, that was a, that was super important at the beginning to make sure that, that from everything, from a sales approach to an organization, to the leave behinds, to the, the material, the way it looked, to the concert order, to the content of it, to what you're gonna say to an audience, all those, all, all of that sort of forming of the thing that became the, the product that I do now, um, was, uh, a collaboration with another, uh, another brain who had already done, done it twice, Empire and traveled life. Lance LaDuke: And then, uh, the horn design stuff. How'd that Patrick Sheridan: come up? And then, yeah. So, you know, that was a, I had some, I did some stuff in the beginning to my own Yamaha with Dave Kratz, who's a horn player in the Army Band, and a, and a fellow, uh, you know, uh, like a mental patient. Right. Lance LaDuke: Hey, pat, good to see you. Reassembled your tuba. Looked like Eiffel Tower. Blow in here. Mental. Patrick Sheridan: He's awesome. He is a genius, but it was, he's awesome. Yeah. Came with a level. Craze. That was so fun. You'd go visit him. For me, it was twofold. I was gonna learn something about instrument design and, and how he was gonna fix my tuba. And it was also like getting to go to the zoo and watching the monkeys, you know, do their thing up against the wall. 'cause it was like, that's like, Dave was like, you never knew what was gonna happen. And it was, it was awesome. I think he was like on some sort of anthrax antibodies or something to make him act like that. But it was a beautiful thing. So it was a, it was always an enjoyable thing. But he was like, well, he's like any, anybody with a passion for something. He was into every detail of every part of everything. So I learned a lot from him. And that's fond of, uh, you should read this book on acoustics and you should read this book about metallurgy. And, and then, uh, um, uh, I got out and had a brief stint repping the instruments of Yamaha, which I was playing at the time. And, uh. I learned some things from, uh, the Japanese engineers that I had contact with. And then when I went to, uh, Besson, the first time I went, I went to London for two weeks and we worked on the what became the 9 8 3 E five two, and the, the sort of finishing it. They had done a ton of work previously and then, um, the B flat version of it as well, excuse me. And, um, uh, in that two weeks there was a, that approach at Besson at the time was a really very much sort of a combination of New World and old world. So the, they had a guy that understood how to do what he needed to do to make things friendly for the engineers so they could implement it on a mass production line. But truth be told, he was the, the, the mad professor in the, in the back room, um, who could, you know, take a flat piece of metal and make a lead pipe or a bell or whatever, he could make anything from scratch. So he knew the whole. Hand side as, as well as the, how to integrate that into sort of a machine mass replication process. So I learned a ton of practical information from just standing and watching and talking and having musical reactions to playing and watch what that would mean in terms of which, you know, what hammer he'd used, what he would change, which part of the instrument he would change based on what I was saying musically, and then what that would mean the next time I would play the instrument. And so trial and error and getting a chance to be next to people like that. So that was Paul Lawrence at Besson, and then later Besson did a big collaboration with Walter Sel. I learned a ton from Walter. Uh, and uh, and then along the way you meet the people in the business like Thomas Lube from Yamaha and uh, uh, Bob Malone. And, and you have conversations or you have, you know, or you look at their work or you, there's a, you, it's just like anything else. You get a passion for it. And you start to delve in and, and, uh, have different types of conversations with people that are experts in those areas. And, uh, via trial and error and being a fan of the history of the development of brass instruments, uh, and getting a chance that mean we've had for years, uh, you know, um, in our midst. A great historian of brass manufacturing and development, Steve Dillon and, uh, his, you know, uh, his, the, the brains behind the hands, uh, Matt Walters. And, uh, so to talk to either one of those guys, uh, is a, is a huge lesson as well. And Matt, of course, has been a, a huge, and Steve contributors to, uh, uh, great instruments for tuba players and euphonium players to be able to play, uh, trombones as well, trumpets as well. Um, so, uh, that's, those are, yeah, that's kind of where it came from. That, and it was, uh. Well, you guys know me well enough. It's like I don't if I'm gonna do anything, then it's like, okay, I'm gonna gotta jump all the way in. I can't, uh, sort of dink around if, if I sort of put my toe in, it sits in the corner and gathers dust. You know, Andrew Hitz: your toe sits in the corner and gathers dust. Is it removable? Yes. Patrick Sheridan: Well, they're big, um, sheep toe toes. But it this, so it, it's, uh, it was that sort of idea like, and that, but I had this great access to information of people that were all equally passionate about what they've been doing. And, and several of them, uh, uh, like Walter mid-career, Paul Lawrence, that had a huge career, um, and near retirement, uh, you know, expressing interest in making sure people knew the information and that that, that there was some sort of thread of knowledge to, to move it forward and that it, 'cause there's still a. For as much science as, and, and we would like to have to replicate things. Exactly. There's still a little bit of, uh, uh, area gray areas that make certain things play better than others that are, in many cases, not exactly replicatable, you know, one Bob Malone trumpet to the next one, Monette trumpet to the next special to one, not to the other player, you know? So, um, that, on that level of development is still a very interesting sort of, uh, mixture of experimentation and emotion. And on the, the sort of the college slash student level, it's about trying to find the things that we can replicate over and over and over and over again, um, for consistency and trying to do them on the highest level. So they are, you know, hopefully as good as, as close as a handmade special instrument as possible. That's a fun, uh, um. A challenge to be involved with, with, uh, and for, in the last two cases for me, that they sort of comes with these other ex, you know, extra challenges of, uh, working in a, trying to create, uh, models of instruments that have multinational appeal where there's so much nationalistic tradition about certain instruments is a, is a huge challenge to, to companies to be able to create a, a global trumpet, even though there are niche pockets of very specialized things that would require things. So trying to come up with a, a, an instrument that'll hit the 85% of the market, um, it's a, is a, it's a worthy challenge. And it's, uh, working now with Jupiter for the last years, it's great to be involved because they have still have some cost advantages, which can allow more people to enter the market of playing music than, uh, the market of $15,000 tubas, which has shown up and not gone away. So. Andrew Hitz: Well, let's, um, let's Patrick Sheridan: jump, jump, which excludes people, you know, it ke keeps people from being able to do the things that they'd like to do. Andrew Hitz: Sure. Patrick Sheridan: Uh, because the cost of entrance is, uh, it's like, oh, tuba or car, Andrew Hitz: right? Uh, you can buy the car to then not play the tuba gigs to take you to the lack of gigs. Right. Um, the, uh, let's jump to, uh, present day. Patrick. Uh, you, uh, have your hands on a whole lot of stuff, uh, including, uh, Salt River Brass, but why don't you, uh, tell us, uh, what your, what your main passions are today? Patrick Sheridan: Work. Just trying to work. Um, I, I, I mean, it's a variety of things. Now. There's, uh, I get to play the tuba as a solo instrument frequently, which is awesome that there's still a market for that, and I can still do that. Uh, I also teach a lot, um, as a guest that universities in high schools, uh, frequently, sometimes. Um, sort of in the vein of, uh, outreach for a large retail organization like Music and Arts, uh, or, uh, musical instrument manufacturer like Jupiter Band Instruments, uh, or, uh, more of an educational thing, uh, where I'm in the music ed departments, having me in to work with the bands and to talk with the music ed students about, you know, becoming teachers, uh, or working at a teacher in service to teach things like breathing or brass basics or professional techniques, et cetera. Um, so that's sort of the variety of work that goes on during the year. It's kind of concert clinical work. Um, there's some work that I do in the house as well, which is almost all, uh, the, the private teaching is, I would say it's, it's, I wouldn't say it's exclusively, 'cause I'm not trying to make it that way, but it's sort of the clientele that comes is almost all of it. Uh. The nature of, uh, fixing, uh, issues that are either anxiety related or, uh, neurologically related. Uh, so that's the private stuff that I do in my house, and that's not very much. Uh, but it is some. And then I've had the great fortune of sort of in the, my early in my career, traveling to Europe and seeing all these wonderful brass band and concert bands, which are, you know, they'd say they call 'em amateur groups over there 'cause just simply 'cause they're unpaid. Here, amateur sort of has this connotation of quality and over there it just means not paid. Um, it's not a, it's not a quality designation, but I got to see these groups that just run for the sake of. The creating culture for their local town and creating musical opportunity to make that connection for people that love to play music. Uh, and love that, like I, the, the, the director of the Dutch Marine Band in the early nineties, in mid nineties and retired Bathhouse was, uh, I, I, he was, uh, this phenomenal clarinet player that became this phenomenal conductor of an incredible band. And he kept the whole time this little town concert band in a very close to his, uh, the town where he lived and was the music director of this concert band. Uh, it's a community band, a beautiful good group, but it's much more about connecting to the community than it was about working with quality music because he was working with one of the greatest concert bands on the planet at the time. Uh, so this, that he had this ethos that every Thursday night was, no, no, this is town band. We go to town band, we all go together. It's all family. And we go early to get stuff set and we put up the chairs in the stands and then we have a rehearsal and then we stay late and drink beer and we talk about family and music and, and that was sacred. And I, and so I, I was like, wow, I really desire that for, for myself because when you work all the time, not at home and the things that you do that everybody enjoys so much everywhere else, Lance LaDuke: uh, Patrick Sheridan: it's like, ah, man, it would be nice to do this at home. And, uh, so one day I'm actually in the grocery store in the, in the local Fry's here. And the, this, this little old lady I saw a lot in the store was behind me listening to me talk to the cash register operator of where I'd been. Somewhere doing a concert somewhere. And this little lady behind me, she says, well, do you ever play here that we could, somewhere that we could come hear you? And I was like, I thought, and my answer was no. 'cause I, they, that was the truth at the time. I was like, no, actually you'd have to come to my house and bring a lawn chair and sit out front, um, Andrew Hitz: with Ellen. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, right. Look for the white pants. Turn left. That's right. So, uh, uh, uh, so that was one of those things that I had sort of desired and it was this sort of weird set of serendipity to, uh, Bobek who's director of bands at University of Idaho, uh, where Dan Buck Fitch teaches, actually he brought him there. That's another story. Uh, was retired and moved here and was playing in the Salt River Brass. And we knew each other. 'cause he's a great phony player and he taught lots of people that live here. Deanna Otto was one of his students, so she went to undergrad there. And uh, so he was like, Hey, would you ever think about. Conducting, uh, a brass band. And I was like, oh, Salt River Brass. Well, that'd be fun. We were actually in Finland at the exa conference and uh, uh, and I was like, that'd be fun. And, uh, just lemme know sometimes. So they, the next year asked me to do a Christmas concert and, and I enjoyed it and it was, the relationship grew and eventually, I think by 2003, uh, I was doing most of the concerts every year and, uh, enjoyed the, this local lab opportunity to have a place to conduct, write, arrange, uh, teach and, and invest in my home. The culture, you know, the cultural scene of my hometown, which I'd never had the opportunity to do before. So it's been fun to be involved to, uh, watch it, you know, uh, evolve into something different than it was and uh, and to be able to now have these really fun opportunities. And we made a record with Harry Watters. Harry's one of our regular guests. We've had lots of great soloists come out. Lance has been out to, to play and to sing with the band One Christmas. It was awesome. And, uh, next year we're doing, uh, we have retro some coming for the second time and we're doing a, a brass band world premiere of, uh, a new Alan UTI concerto, uh, called Three Whirlwinds. And, uh, I'm doing a, this new thing that I did with the Army Band, we're gonna do that with Brass Band by Rob Han called Collusion, which is a concerto he wrote for me and Pete Kins writing me a new piece, which will premiere next year as well. So it's a, turned into this really, uh, wonderful thing that has quite a high artistic ethos and um, and it, it provides all the great personal things for me. But at the same time, it's, you know, we closed the concert last year, our season last year with, uh, Pictures at an Exhibition, and the band just played tremendously. So it's a professional level ensemble. That's providing a great cultural service to the city of Mesa. And we play in a beautiful hall and, uh, the band's Financially Solvent, which is like this great beautiful little community band success story. So that's been really fun to have that. Andrew Hitz: Hmm. Patrick Sheridan: As a personal thing, it's like bowling night, you know, and, and as well as a, a, a development thing, you know, for the, for all of the things that I, that I like to do that are beyond playing, which conduct, write, teach, lead, it's a great place to have a, you know, 16 years, one night a week, 30 minutes of a breathing slash playing lab of how to breathe, how to improve, how to play, how to integrate those things as a sort of a upfront reversal technique for offering a community band. People that wanna improve, that don't have a lot of time to invest in the, in their playing because they're professionals doing something else during the day. Uh, and, and a way to hone that and tweak that where it's now, uh, you know, Sam and I have this. It's coming up on our second year of running a thing called the Band Director Academy, which is at the University of Oregon, which is a, uh, for up and coming music ed students, but mostly geared towards professionals who've been in the business a while who are looking for something, uh, post doc postmas, post undergrad, uh, as, uh, practical techniques for running their or, uh, uh, uh, their ensembles at their school. And that's was really born of the years of Sam running jazz bands and guessing as concert band clinician. And for the years of me running the Salt River Brass or turned into this thing, we have a codified, practical approach for integrating a lot of great basics into a concert band or orchestra or chamber music personal. Andrew Hitz: So cool. How much stuff you've got going on. Um, which, uh, well, not only how much stuff you have going on between the Band Director Academy and, um, and the, uh, and all the stuff that you've done, uh, what, what, um, what el what is there left for you? Like what, what have you not accomplished that you are looking to accomplish in the future? Patrick Sheridan: Hmm. There's a couple things that, you know, I'd like to be able to, uh, participate in. I'd like to let the conducting thing continue to develop. I, I, I, I, I feel like I'd like to be able to do that. I, I had a couple of different opportunities. One was at UCLA after the director of bands there for a long time. Tom Lee retired. There was a, a gap of a few years and, uh, I, I took the, the group, the wind ensemble at UCLA for one year, and I, I fell in love with the, the band directing aspect of it. The, the ensemble was fun. But that was, that's was the, wasn't really about directing a band. It was this, this idea of leading an ensemble of students. And, uh, and having some part of the investment in, um, the, you know, developing their taste in music, uh, and uh, and providing them an opportunity for, to engage in things that, that, that they wouldn't have received otherwise. That, that was the part that I really loved. I was like, oh, I wish I could live close enough to, to sort of do the rest of it and sort of have this, you know, instead of eight or 10 or 12 tuba players and euphonium players in a studio, but having 65 or 70, um, students across all the instruments at a school and, and, and, and being a part of their, that kind of development was, I really liked that. So I, I expect to try to, for me to be seeking something like that in the future, whether it's as a university related thing or if it's more related to maybe being a pops conductor, you know, sort of combining the things that I've done forever in terms of. Being a comedian on stage with, uh, you know, good thoughts about programming and trying to offer some products that maybe that that world would like to see. Um, that's about, I mean, and, you know, and I, there's some things I'd like to do with the Breathing Gym in terms of getting it available online and a subscription based sort of an idea where you could, you know, hook up in any, and hook in in any way. In other words, I could be here as an athlete wanting to do these sequences. I could be here as a trouble player wanting to develop my whatever. Or I might have COPD and you, we've got exercises that help people with those types of situations. So, so everything from the, the athletic training to the musical training to, uh, health and wellness and, uh, quality of life situations for, uh, people that have, um, you know. Suffer from a variety of difficulties health-wise, that breathing can help, that we've seen connect in lots of anecdotal ways and some small study ways at Indiana University and locally here at Banner Healthcare. But it'd be nice to, to get that up and running. And that's, that's a, that is such a while obliquely connected In terms of the music side, the athletic and the health and wellness side is really not connected to music at all. And I think it's my fear of it getting successful or going sort of taking my life over that would take me away from music that sort of made me leave it on the shelf. Like it feels a little bit like Pandora's Box. Right. Um, and, uh, and I, and I, so that's the sort of the, I'm still sort of like, yeah, but I got stuff that I really want to do in music still. Uh, but those, that's kind of what's there. I'd like to do more conducting and I'd like to try to blow the Breathing Gym out to so that for wider access to people and, and. And, uh, 'cause I know it's helped lots of people in lots of ways from COPD to pediatric asthma, to, uh, uh, anxiety to, uh, smoking cessation. It's been used by loads of people for a variety of, uh, clinical applications. Um, and it's just because it's, you know, the, you don't have to do too much internet searching to find out that timed breathing is a good thing. Um, but it's the, it's the fact that, that Sam and I are come from the world of teaching. So it's this codified approach that, uh, is what so many clinicians outside of the music world like about it. Andrew Hitz: Not to, uh, not to plug the, the, uh, the TEM interview again, but I'm going to, uh, if anyone, uh, has any, uh, is wondering at all how that, you know, that all that Breathing Gym stuff, uh, came about. Um, which the, the materials, um, that, uh, both, uh, Sam was teaching forever and a day, and Pat, or teaching were around long before, uh, it was called the Breathing Gym. And it was anything that you could purchase. And, um, he goes into detail about how that went from, you know, curriculum that was, uh, distributed, uh, orally in, in. And through some like photocopied handouts in multiple languages, um, back in the eighties and, um, and, uh, first half of the nineties to, uh, to a fully formed, uh, product, uh, for sale and, uh, you know, multiple, uh, products. Um, it's a really fascinating story. So there'll be a, a link to that, um, that episode, uh, in the show notes. But if you have any interest in that at all, it's, it's really, it's fascinating how it all, uh, unfolded. Um, you mentioned UCLA, um, and, uh, so you, uh, I'm sure are, uh, are aware and, uh, concerned, uh, as the rest of us are about, uh, your former colleague at UCLA Jens Lindemann, uh, his, uh, chop problems. So we just, uh, we, we like to give every, every, uh, guest an opportunity to, uh, to give him some advice or some words of encouragement or, um, whatever they feel is appropriate. So, uh, what would you, uh, Jens listens to every episode the day it comes out. So what, what advice would you give to him for his, uh, for his chop problems? Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Well, I mean, you know, there comes a tipping point and, uh, when it's time to look, you know, over your shoulder and think it was a good run. Andrew Hitz: So, so basically, basically give up. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. I mean, without saying it Andrew Hitz: there, it's, I don't, I don't know what you really say. Yeah. I don't know how what you add to that. Lance, Lance LaDuke: what do you want us to plug? Uh, Patrick Sheridan: it reminds me so much of the, exactly the same thing in, in the early days of Brass Band of Battle Creek. Um, when, like, when Marty would constantly look down at me or over at Dan Neeley or at or at the badger and go, oh man, this sounds great, but there's this little, there's this little buzz in your sound. Have you noticed that lately? And every once in a while he'd hook a fish like he got the badger more than one time. Aw. You know? And then Chris would look at me and he's like, do you hear that too? And I'd be like, yeah, man, sad. I dunno what the hell is going on? And he'd freak out and he'd, like, nine mouthpiece would come out with 65 rims. Doug Elliott would be in the other room on a lathe with a golden shower of light shining down upon his tree. It was like, it was, it was unbelievable what would happen. So it's same thing. Do you still have that video Lance, that you took of me that we remember you like. Huh? We were in Miami for, uh, a, a, b something, a b, C to goldfish, I think. And, uh, Andrew Hitz: a something A-B-A-A-B-C, A B, I don't Patrick Sheridan: remember. Yeah. And you took, we were walking into the hotel and you took a video of me and you're like, Hey, pat, give, give us a couple words about Jens. And I went off. Problem. I, that was a great thing. I don't think I, I don't think I had a phone at the time that would allow me to save anything like that. So Lance LaDuke: I will Patrick Sheridan: look. Anyway, it reminds me of Marty so much of doing that in the Brass Band of Battle Creek. He would just to mess with everybody. There's that funny thing in here, and he'd get him like at the break and off to the side. He make him so paranoid. Lance LaDuke: Hey man, tell the story. See, I've told this story many, many times, but I want to hear your version of the story of the day that we kissed. Andrew Hitz: This is a, this is an all timer. If you're, if you're driving, pull over. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Well, I mean the context is is that there was years of you and I pulling crazy crap at all types of public venues, and I love how you just for being like mental patients in public. Andrew Hitz: Right. I love how you just put that in past tense. Well, we Lance LaDuke: don't Patrick Sheridan: past tense Lance LaDuke: together so much past Patrick Sheridan: tense to the kiss. Lance LaDuke: Okay. Andrew Hitz: Okay. Lance LaDuke: Okay. We used to get to misbehave in public together at the same time, and now it's more the, you know, the court order has not been lifted, so we still have to live three times zones away. Patrick Sheridan: I know we have to meet at a small city in Iceland. Otherwise it's all, it's like it's done. It's like some sort of pre directed place from Edward Snowden. Andrew Hitz: I think you guys were mentioned in the Panama Papers actually. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, I got that offshore, uh, hot dish and tuba company. Lance LaDuke: It's canal. I just keep forgetting the c It's my fault. Patrick Sheridan: I know. C anal. I love that channel in Europe, by the way. All, sometimes it comes with a plus. Andrew Hitz: All right, so back to the back to, this is bad when I'm trying to corral us back on task and I'm trying to get you to resume the story about one, the two of you kissed in public. Okay. Patrick Sheridan: So anyway, so Lance and I had this, you know, we already had a reputation of being, you know, jackasses in public. Had a variety of events in a variety of states of consciousness, shall we say. And uh, so we're in a lobby after, before or after, I don't really remember. I think it was after a concert or between concerts. Um, and uh, I think it was when we played outside with Doc Severinsen. Yeah. Uh, with the brass band, best Lance LaDuke: band festival or some. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, something, something. Anyway, so we're, but it was in Battle Creek and so we're in the lobby of some schmancy hotel in downtown, um, Battle Creek, Michigan. And which probably can be only one place, I guess. Then Andrew Hitz: I was just thinking downtown. Okay, thanks Patrick Sheridan: for clarifying. Down Chancy schmancy Battle Creek. Wow. It's can only be one place. Uh, the copper bar. Um, no. Anyway, so the. There was, everybody was hanging out and people were laughing and giggling and doing what musicians do after concerts. And there was probably, there might have been, you know, a tab running over and I don't mean the diet soda at the bar and uh, Andrew Hitz: tabs got sass, right. It Patrick Sheridan: was thirsty throats, you know, and, uh, so I think there was a lot of double tongue on the program. Anyway, so the. Lance and I were looking at each other like, Hey, let's do something really crazy. What could it be? Oh, let's kiss each other. Let's go for it. So we're like, and we were laughing going, that'll be awesome. Let's do it. So we went at it like, like it was horn, you know, it was like, it was, it was beautiful moment for two men in the middle of a lobby, especially if you consider the moment in history in the mid nineties, actually. Right. And, and we got that and looked around and nobody saw it. So instead of saying, okay, maybe we should just move on, that was awkward. We're like, nah, let's do it again. Let's tell everybody what's about to happen. Andrew Hitz: Oh. Patrick Sheridan: So we're both like, Hey guys, come on. Look, we're gonna kiss. And they're like, what? So what? Andrew Hitz: What? So what? Patrick Sheridan: Whatever, man. Andrew Hitz: This is the first Patrick Sheridan: time we've seen you guys in pants for three days. Andrew Hitz: No, Patrick Sheridan: we care Andrew Hitz: Kissing. Patrick Sheridan: That's right. Oh, you're gonna touch lips with clothes on. Okay. You don't see any other animals around what could possibly happen. You know, this is just like, it was another was, it was hilarious. 'cause like, oh, we could, it was the most outrageous thing we could do. And then when we asked everybody to check it out because they missed it, they were like, that's not that outrageous. Shut up, Andrew Hitz: not thick enough. That's, that's, nobody saw it. If two guys do a gag kiss in the woods and no one's there to hear it, did it happen? Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. What happens in West Virginia? Andrew Hitz: Yeah. There you go. Uh, all right. Uh, where, where can we find you online? Patrick? You Lance LaDuke: better get out Andrew Hitz: quick so that people can block this website. Yeah. You have a, well, you're, you're, uh, at Patty O Sheridan right on, uh, Twitter. Patrick Sheridan: On a Twitter that's pro they're in the Facebook feed are probably the, the things that are the most current besides my website, which was designed in 1964. Andrew Hitz: Yes. It, it, it is funny, the i, the bio, the last time I saw it was like, and last year Patrick joined the Marine Band. It's like, yes, some, it's just a little, little behind the times. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah, I know. It's the, it's my online proof that I have one room in my house that. A filthy mess, which is true. And it was like the whole house is in perfect shape. And then you go into my office and it's just piles of stuff that you can look in and it's like, wow, there's a paper clipping from the moon landing. That's great. Pat, what do you have with that? Andrew Hitz: Well, well this has, uh, this has been a pleasure. I, uh, well, Patrick Sheridan: thank you for, uh, having me. It's nice to be had. Andrew Hitz: Yep, of course. Of course. In fact, you were scheduled earlier, but then there was some sort of a family emergency, like a swimming accident or something like that, that, uh, Patrick Sheridan: somebody Yeah, Katie had hit her head diving in the pool or something like Andrew Hitz: that. Yep. So Patrick Sheridan: we. Andrew Hitz: Always a good, always a good idea to have water in the pool. It's very, it's very important. Patrick Sheridan: It didn't say that in the directions when we bought it at the Walmart. It didn't say that Andrew Hitz: at the wa. There you have it. Uh, I I, Patrick Sheridan: I I learned that later. It said water not included. Andrew Hitz: Nah. Yes. Patrick Sheridan: Include that. I'm supposed to put it in. Andrew Hitz: Perfect. Patrick Sheridan: Yeah. Andrew Hitz: Lance, am I forgetting anything or are we done with this uh, lovely human? Lance LaDuke: Well, we're gonna have to have another, uh, episode, I think where we unpack, I mean. You know, pat sat on Barbara Bush's lap at one point in his life, and that's a story that needs to be told, but not now. Let's save that. Actually, that's a perfect teaser for Patrick Sheridan, part two. Andrew Hitz: That is a perfect teaser. Yes. Um, well, thank you Patrick. And, um, and thank you Lance. Really, it's a, no, all it's, it's an honor. No, thank you. It really is an honor. Lance LaDuke: No, thank Andrew Hitz: you. You're my muse. Lance LaDuke: No, thank you. Andrew Hitz: All right. And, uh, that will do it. And Lance LaDuke: now back to Cottage Cheese Andrew Hitz: on the Yes. KD kds. And that does it for another episode of The Brass Junkies. You've been listening to The Brass Junkies on the Pedal Note Media Podcast Network. If you would like to help support the podcast, in order to make more episodes like this one possible, please visit pedalnotemedia.com/donate for more details. Also be sure to check out our latest recording, The Brass Recording Project at brassrecordingproject.com. The Brass Junkies is produced by Austin Boyer and Buddy Deshler of the Fredericksburg Brass Institute. Executive producers are Andrew Hitz and Lance LaDuke. This has been a presentation of the Pedal Note Media Podcast Network.