Play with a wide variety of people: Jacob Garchik

Perhaps a little inside for non-musicians, Brooklyn-based trombonist Jacob Garchik’s outline of his practice regime for News from the Shed’s Jake Wunsch is an object lesson on how to be a versatile professional player. The trombonist, who leads his own bands and has recorded with among others saxophonist Anna Webber and clarinetist Oscar Noriega, also teaches trombone and arranging. But he still practises every day. playing major scales, Bach Cello Suites and for inspiration playing along with records by Miles Davis and John Coltrane. His advice for learning to swing is to listen to and play with as many people of possible, especially drummers; while the key to improvisation, he says, is to learn to manipulate aspects of harmony, rhythm, texture, register, tone color, tempo and genre. He also reveals his favorite music by fellow trombonists J.J. Johnson, Roswell Rudd and even Si Zentner playing Klezmer with Mickey Katz.