2025 Holiday Special!
Welcome to the show notes for Episode #148 of The Other Side of the Bell – A Trumpet Podcast. In this episode, host John Snell is joined by special guests Eric Baker, Mike Zonshine, Kenny Rampton, Liesl Whitaker and Vinnie Ciesielski.
So long 2025, hello 2026!
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Eric sharing his trick for playing a great horse neiiighhh on the trumpet, perhaps the bane of trumpet players’ existence over the holidays.
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Mike’s recent outdoor concert in Los Angeles, playing arrangements by none other than Keith Snell, John’s dad.
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Kenny’s holiday menu, centered around the Big Green Egg, might be a small reflection of a mid-life crisis?
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Liesl sharing some holiday family traditions in the Whitaker/Rampton household.
Episode Guest Links
Upcoming Events
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Trumpet Festival of the Southeast, Jan. 17, 2026, Kennesaw State University, Georgia
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Texas Music Educators Association Conference, Feb. 11-14 2026, San Antonio, Texas
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Dylan Music, Feb. 26-28, Woodbridge, New Jersey
Podcast Credits
- “A Room with a View“ – composed and performed by Howie Shear
- Audio Engineer – Ted Cragg
- Podcast Host – John Snell
Transcript
Please note, this transcript is automatically generated. It may contain spelling and other errors. If you would like to assist us in editing or translating this transcript, please let us know at info@bobreeves.com.
[00:00:00]
JOHN SNELL: Hello, and welcome to the other side of the bell. I’m John Snell, a trumpet specialist here at Bob Reeves Brass, and we have a really special holiday episode today. Joining me from all across the country. We have Mike Zonshine, Kenny Rampton, Eric Baker, and eventually Vinnie Ciesielski and like all good plans, uh. We were gonna have them pop in throughout the hour and everyone was here promptly at 9:00 AM And uh, so we’re just gonna open it up and have some holiday cheer.
I have my, uh, my eggnog here and, uh, so wherever you are, I hope you’re celebrating somehow, uh, with eggnog or coffee or hydrating with water. But guys, how’s it going? Happy holidays.
MIKE ZONSHINE: Happy holidays.
JOHN SNELL: Happy holidays.
KENNY RAMPTON: It’s good to be here. Good to see you, John. Yeah, great to be here. Thanks, John. [00:01:00] Yeah.
JOHN SNELL: And uh, and Eric, since you joined first, well actually Mike joined first, so, uh, but we were talking Eric, before we started recording here.
Um, Eric, you just got back from Midwest. How was that? Uh, Midwest Band Clinic in Chicago.
ERIC BAKER: It was wonderful. It was my first time to go to Midwest. A great time reconnecting with old friends, meeting tons of new friends, and getting to play with one of those stellar bands from Texas, the South Grand Prairie High School Band.
They put on a phenomenal show and I got to be a very small part of it. It
JOHN SNELL: was
ERIC BAKER: wonderful,
JOHN SNELL: amazing, great, great photos on Instagram. Looked like a epic hang with Wayne and some of the other players out there.
ERIC BAKER: Fantastic. Yeah. The Cancer Blows event that, uh, that they put on was just tremendous. So Jenz was there, Jose Sa, Baja Wayne, uh, Esteban popped in, gotta have a picture with him.
So it was a good night.
JOHN SNELL: Fun. That’s, and Mike, I I, I just got to hear you play the other day. Uh, fun Brass quinte concert playing all of my dad’s arrangements. It was a, uh, just a, I mean, I made my dad’s holiday, so I just wanna publicly thank you for, for putting that on and getting my dad [00:02:00] down there to, to hear his arrangements.
And, uh, but you’ve been, you’ve been busy as well. Yeah.
MIKE ZONSHINE: Well, let me just talk about that real quickly. You know, when there was that offer to play, uh, this. Brass quintet thing outside. Um, one of the organizations for which I work is called the Pasadena Conservatory of Music, and they asked if, uh, we could put together a faculty quintet and, uh, play outside of this legendary bookstore in Pasadena, California.
And. The first thing that came to my mind was, is that I wonder when the last time Keith Snell heard some of his own arrangements played. So I called John and I asked him if he would be willing to get his dad and to bring him down, and he said yes, and we had a fabulous quintet. And, uh, I put together a book of all of the arrangements that I could find of Keith’s, and we got to play for him.
It’s the first time that I’ve seen Keith since before the pandemic, and some of the tunes went really well. Some of the tunes didn’t. Um, and, uh, we had a great time. It was a lot of fun [00:03:00] and, uh, I, I think, uh, just seeing your dad and seeing him react to the, to the music was, uh, maybe the best part of the holiday season for me so far.
JOHN SNELL: Really was special. And for those folks that don’t know, so my, my, my mother has Alzheimer’s and so my dad has been, um, you know, her 24 7 caregiver for a few years now. So he literally doesn’t get out of the house much, let alone to enjoy, you know, Christmas outside, see people, hear music, that sort of thing.
And, uh, uh, it really speaks to the power of music and, uh, you know, when we’re out. They’re slaving away playing our gigs and that, um, uh, that sort of thing. And, you know, it can bear down on us as musicians. You really don’t know the impact that it can have on the person listening. Um, ’cause you don’t know where they are in their life.
And so, very, very special moment, Mike. So thank you for that. Kenny, what have you been doing these, uh, this holiday season?
KENNY RAMPTON: Well, we just finished a run of our holiday concerts at Jazz Lincoln Center. Yesterday was our last two shows. We had two concerts yesterday, had eight [00:04:00] concerts over the week and um, now we’re off.
I’ve got a few weeks off. From, uh, jazz Lincoln Center. I’m from Sesame Street. Um, so I’m home. I’m happy to be home and looking forward to doing some cooking on the Big Green Egg for uh, oh yeah, my son who is here, um, oh, what fun. My son is here from college. He’s on a winter break, um mm-hmm. And lethal.
Daughter just got here today. Lisa went and picked her up. She just got back a few minutes ago, in fact. Um, oh, lovely. And um, well, maybe she can hop on for a minute. She’ll probably hop in and say hi. She, yeah, she was trying to sign in with her iPad and having some problems with it, so she’ll probably come and jump in the screen here at some point and say hello to everybody.
But, um, her son and, and, uh, her son’s girlfriend are coming in as well. So we’re gonna have a house full for the holidays and I plan on doing some cooking and, you know, enjoying everybody’s company, watching some good movies. I think we want to have a little tribute to, uh, to Rob Reer and [00:05:00] watch a bunch of his movies and mm-hmm.
You know, and, um, just en enjoy Fellowship and family man. So it’s, um, it’s been a kind of a crazy year for me. I’ve had some health issues and some things I had to deal with and discovered. I have a metal allergy and I had to get a titanium mouthpiece. Oh, geez. Um, been, been through, been through the ringer of the last several months, but, uh, things are, are doing.
I’m, I’m doing great. I gotta. Mouthpiece from, um, from Ivan Giddens. Mm-hmm. Um, who makes titanium mouthpiece. He’s one of two people that I found that, that made them. Elliot Mason, who’s our lead, or, or one of our trombone players in the Jazz Lincoln Center, has a metal allergy and he plays on a titanium mouthpiece and he recommended it.
And so. So, you know, I worked through it. Things are good. I’m happy to be playing the trumpet. I, I’ve been struggling all year with playing and didn’t know why and now I know. And, um, this past week has just been such a joy to play. Um, it’s really the first time in about a year that I’ve. Really [00:06:00] just enjoyed playing and it wasn’t a struggle.
Like every note all year long has been like my fingers crossed, hoping it would come out, you know, is how it’s felt all year long. So now I’ve gotta the other side of that. So I’m very happy and, um, you know, loving playing music man.
JOHN SNELL: Wonderful. Oh man, that’s not a holiday blessing. That’s great to hear Kenny and great.
Yeah. Doesn’t like spending time with family and being, you know, thankful for that. Uh, I’m going to, we’re gonna play a little game here to the panel, right? This, we had some fun with this on the trombone podcast, um, except for when, uh, I couldn’t think of a non trombone player. So, the way this works, let me, let me give you the, uh, the, the rundown.
I’m gonna give you three names. Two of them will be star celebrity, something that played trumpet, at least at some point in their life. And then one will not be. And then you guys can, uh, vote or guess who you think the Nont trumpet player is in the group. So yeah, if you want some [00:07:00] great, uh, uh, some wonderful hosting, go over the Trombone Port Corner Pod podcast.
Look at me, try to think of a name other than the seven people on my list, any name billion, 5 billion people in the world that I couldn’t think of anyone else to name, to think of a non trombone player. So I just named three trombone players. Uh, so knowing myself, I actually wrote down a nont trumpet player this time so I can read it and hopefully you guys can guess.
So with that being said, here we go. Is that Vinny? I’m trying. Okay. Well, at least you’re there. We, you know, for the, the audio listeners, um, you know, the non YouTube folks, we can still hear you. Um, and then if the, the camera works at some point, then the YouTube folks can, will be able to see you and, uh, but.
They can, they can pretend, uh, they can, uh, imagine what you look like in all your festive gear.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Probably best not to actually see me at this point. That’s probably the best thing, so, okay.
JOHN SNELL: Um, so the first, we’re gonna do a few rounds of this throughout the episode if you guys are hanging around or not. Uh, this one’s gonna be [00:08:00] musical themed.
So, of these three pe, uh, three people I named, which one of them does not or has not played trumpet as far as we know, uh, Paul McCartney, Taylor Swift. And from your neck of the woods, Vinny Shania Twain. 20, I think it’s, I think it’s Taytay.
KENNY RAMPTON: Taytay. Is that, I know Paul McCartney has played Trump. I don’t know about the other two.
No idea. Okay.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah. I’m voting Taylor Swift. I’m
MIKE ZONSHINE: voting Taylor Swift. Taylor
JOHN SNELL: Swift. Oh, you guys are so good. Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. Can I find
KENNY RAMPTON: plays trumpet, huh?
JOHN SNELL: Yeah. Or did in marching bands. Yeah. And I think saxophone too, if I might, if, if, uh, Wikipedia and or chat GPT is correct. So, which it clearly is.
Yeah. Every time. Oh, always. Yeah. I got my first, uh, my first, uh, cons, yeah. Mouthpiece consultation a few weeks ago where the person argued with me because Chat, chat, GPT said something else. [00:09:00] Oh, that’s a good story. I swear. I swear I’m gonna drink eggnog to that one Cheer. You didn’t feel like I
MIKE ZONSHINE: wanna hear details about that.
JOHN SNELL: You story time, John. No you don’t. Places. It’s just a con, it’s just a continuation of what we’ve done here for 60 years. Originally it was, well my, you know, my section mates think I shouldn’t use a 42 s. I should use a one and a half C for lead. And then. Later on, it was the, you know, some of the forums that shall not be ma named, well, you know, the, the, the forums said that I should be using a A 40 Es to play symphonic music, not a, a 43 and a half B.
And. Facebook, uh, my Facebook friends, and now, now it’s moved to chat GPT. So that’s where we’re going with the world. Amazing. That’s fine. You know, uh, the customer is always right, so if you want to take, uh, chat GT’s advice over, uh, hours here at the shop, that’s fine, that’s fine. And I’m sure you guys deal with that with, uh, with teaching.
You know, those of you that have private students, um, [00:10:00] your students are gonna come in and question what you say because. What Chad GPT told ’em to do with their asure. So anyway, not to go on a tangent. Um, very important topic this time of year, the pedagogical, um, what’s the word? Um, fine points to the horse winning.
Hmm. First of all, how many of you guys had have, how many horse Winnies have hit had you do had, if you had to do this year, how many slave rides? Only three. I mean, I heard Mike do two. Eric, three, yeah. Only three Winnies this year. Kenny, any, uh, any horse Winnies in the No, I haven’t,
KENNY RAMPTON: I haven’t had to do a horse Winnie in a few years now, but I do ’em by choice.
I, you know, I do ’em at home every chance I get. Uh,
JOHN SNELL: you never know when you’re gonna called to do sleigh ride.
KENNY RAMPTON: Exactly,
JOHN SNELL: because I’ve heard some great ones. I’ve heard some bad one.
MIKE ZONSHINE: I don’t know where I fall into that category. Well, you did some, some great ones, Mike. I, I just what I [00:11:00] do to make sure that I really don’t screw it up.
I put my fingertips on my left hand under the valve, and then I press down, and then I shake you, shake I shake. It’s, it’s, you know, what about the, it’s a medical issue.
JOHN SNELL: Uh, oh. Eric has, uh, Eric has something behind him.
ERIC BAKER: There’s no mouthpiece. Don’t worry. Okay. This won’t be played, but yeah. Similar to Mike. So I’ll just do the third valve, you know, put a, put a finger under the third valve.
There and then leave the other two up. And that gives just enough resistance and a little bit of a warbly, Winnie. But some people don’t put any valves down and just shake the heck out of it. And it sounds awesome.
JOHN SNELL: I mean, that’s, that’s my technique. I just have a natural shake when I play. ’cause you know, I’m, I’m thinking about that horse, Winnie, uh, the whole concert.
And then I joke, and then I just shake and whatever comes out, comes out. Have Eric, have you, you’ve done it with the, the horse head on, right? Have I seen that in your videos? Yeah, yeah. You may have,
ERIC BAKER: [00:12:00] you may have seen that. So last year we did a horse head video, which was not new, but the, the algorithm loved it.
And so that, that did very well across many platforms. And then, uh, this year we just decided to multiply it by three. So all of us, uh, in the section of the West Texas Symphony this year dawned various horse masks and, uh, got up to do the Winnie and it is a little disconcerting to have, you know, put that thing on.
You’re effectively blind. You might be able to see outta the nostrils. Uh, you’re kind of searching for your horn, trying to maneuver it in there, and you just go to town. But the patrons love it. People think it’s funny. It, it just brings some fun joy to, you know, what is otherwise a stressful job often.
And, uh, so it’s, it’s fun. I love it. I think I saw a video of that on Facebook, probably. Probably. We had a great time. Great time feeling.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah. I mean, I think the important thing is go for it. Right? Like, you know, yeah. We, we, we trumpet players tend to overthink it and it’s like you can’t do it too loudly.
Right. That’s right. You know,
ERIC BAKER: you just start
JOHN SNELL: just higher than
ERIC BAKER: you think and [00:13:00] play as loud as possible. Really. Yeah.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah. I mean, we should be good at that. But it’s funny because when, when we don’t need to do that, we, we play too loud. But when it’s actually called for, we choke up. Well, the funny thing about
MIKE ZONSHINE: it is, is that it’s the last tune of the night every time.
Right. And you’re tired and then you find yourself thinking, I’m getting nervous about a horse winning. Really? Yeah. This is what I’m getting uptight about. Ugh. Yeah.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah. Uh, so speaking of, uh, Christmas Carols and Kenny, I’ll start with you. What’s, uh, what’s your favorite, which one do you look forward to either playing or listening to this time of year?
KENNY RAMPTON: You know, my go-to favorite forever has prob probably been the Christmas song, the Mel Tour May Tune. Mm-hmm. Made Famous by Nat King Cole. I’ve, I’ve just always loved that song. Um, partially my mother was very close with a woman named Myrna Williams, who was Mel Torme sister. Oh, wow. She’s passed away now.
I used to play that for her when I was a kid, you know, and I’ve just always loved that song. [00:14:00] Um, so that, that’s probably my favorite Christmas song.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Yeah. We got, uh, Vinny are you there now? Can you hear us? I, yeah, I’m here, but I don’t think we’re gonna get any audio. I apologize guys. Can you hear me? I’m just using
KENNY RAMPTON: my phone if, you know, I
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: try.
It’s. Something’s going on with our internet here. The, uh, mighty at t uh, Google, uh, fiber is, uh, is having a little, having a little issue, just a imagine a bald, uh, 63-year-old, newly minted, 63-year-old Santa Claus. And, uh, that’ll, that’ll probably cover, cover everything. But you, you know, I wouldn’t want to be up there next to all you handsome guys anyway.
Well, three of you are handsome
JOHN SNELL: Uhoh. Do the make us do math this early in the morning. Um, well, so Vinny, since you, since you joined us, uh, um, and you just recorded a album of more Christmas carols, um, well first of all, everyone else kind of chime checked in. You wanna tell us about that album and then finish up with what [00:15:00] your favorite Carol is?
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: I, I will really briefly, uh, if, if, uh, if that’s even possible in my, in my lexicon. So it’s a band called Vinny and the Hitman we’re, um, 14 piece band. It’s a huge money maker. I mean, enormous money maker. Uh, it’s, it’s my retirement plan. Uh. It’s, uh, you know, it’s, it’s so far, it’s actually going in the wrong direction.
I’m not quite sure how that works, but, uh, yeah, man, we, we got together a couple of years ago on our first record and, and some amazing things happen, which you guys will understand, and I wanna credit the people that deserve the credit. I went and saw Jerry Goldenson and he’s the guy that’s in charge of KHS, which is Jupiter xo, Altus, you know, all those brands.
They got like 25 brands and, and he’s like the Don. I’m like, he’s like, well, what do you need? I said, I, I actually need some money. He said, well, I don’t have any money. What else you need? I said, I need three days of studio time and a video crew. And he said, gimme a day. Came back, [00:16:00] bought us three days of studio time at a world class studio here in Franklin, just south of Nashville, and a five camera video shoot.
And we did the record for nothing.
JOHN SNELL: Amazing. Amazing.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Unbelievable. And so, yeah, that’s Mary. Happy ho ho. No, that was the first one. The second one, oh, is, that’s the first one. Yeah. Second one, uh, is called me Happy Hoho. And we, um, still all public domain stuff. We were getting ready to go in the studio on a, on a Wednesday, set up on Tuesday.
My engineer, who’s the only guy on the face of the planet that can do this, uh, at this particular studio, I said, man, it’s great to hear from you. Looking forward to seeing you. He said, I just got back from the ER and I’m contagious. I can’t do the session. Yeah, and it was, it, I, I immediately went into, I was really, really, um, torn between, are you sure you’re sick?
You know that thing? And man, you gotta get better. So we did the whole thing remote. I had the drums by the following Monday, the bass. By Wednesday we started cutting horns, [00:17:00] did the whole thing, and we made it, um, arranging, cutting, mixing, mastering, all in about a month. Got it out on Black Friday, and it’s great.
Like, uh, the trumpet feature is Louis Duds. Well. Um, let’s see, who else? Uh, Trent Austin, uh, myself, Emmanuel Ethel of Will Leathers, who is the new principal, trumpet player for, uh, for Nashville and is a gen, in my opinion, a generational player. He is a freak show man. Yeah, because he plays absolutely flawlessly on the classical side and then switches his gear a little bit and I’ve watched him just first of all, play great jazz.
Then just go from the lowest pedal tone to the highest triple note I ever heard and come back down with absolute. So that one’s called, um, once again in Royal David City, which is just really good. Starts out beautiful and ends up with a silly high note fest, which is [00:18:00] the part that I took part in. None of the beautiful, all of the ugly.
Um, and then the, the trombone feature, which is I saw three ships, um, is. God. Roy Ag, who lives here in town, was Prince’s last, uh, trombone player. Amazing and incredible, uh, human being and a great artist, uh, Tom Malone. Um. Dan Levine, who I’m sure you know Kenny well. Yeah. Um, uh, Steve Decker, who’s a friend of mine since 19 80, 1 of the guys in the band and the Bill Reichenbach, which was just absolutely a thrill and it’s a great arrangement and, uh, I can’t get it out of my head.
And sales have been great and the, the big thing for us is we do, um, we do school concerts for kids. So we’ve k through college age and we had some music. Is in good hands here in Nashville because these little kindergartners, six years old are, I’m not kidding. You are talking about Miles [00:19:00] Davis. Hmm. And, and Dizz and Bird.
Like when you mention, I’m like, do you guys know who Bird is? And they start clapping because they’ve listened to him in class and I’m like. What in the world is happening here, but they also know Earth, wind, and Fire and Chicago and Aretha and Taylor Swift. So, uh, we’ve really been having a great time going out to the schools and, and, uh, and hawking our whale wars as it was.
It’s a really great record. It’s super fun and. We’re just, uh, we’re just happy to be, uh, I think we’re gonna break even the first year. And then we did it, we did it on, and this is interesting, we did it on a joint venture. I don’t know if you guys have ever done that. It’s a union contract where you get absolutely nothing upfront.
Mm-hmm. But then an agreed upon percentage of the, uh, of the backend. So we did the first one, we did two days of sessions. Those guys have already gotten upwards of a thousand dollars for those sessions, and because it’s [00:20:00] public domain and everybody knows it forever, it’s gonna be a $5,000 session. In 10 years, it’ll be the best session anybody’s ever done in 10 years.
So it’s really cool. Amazing, amazing.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah. Yeah. Super brilliant. Vinny, keep. I love that, that education connection too. Getting music in front of people, uh, and especially young kids for the next generation. ’cause once you hear it, once you get that joy, once you get that spirit, then it’s infectious. Um, so favorite, favorite, uh, is, is it a, a public domain?
Carol Vinny is your favorite colleague, tune or? Well,
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: right now, right now it’s that damn trombone feature. If you hear that and you’re not moved, you just don’t have a, you need to be doing something else. ’cause those guys are, and and just as a side note, I know I’m kind of, uh. Talking way too much, but um.
Every single person on that list. When I contacted them, bill Reichenbach, I met him back in the nineties and he doesn’t know me from Adam, but every single one of them. As soon as I explained what we were doing and why we were doing it for the kids and you know, [00:21:00] and teaching the kids kind of how to get from where they are to where we are, um, everyone said yes immediately.
Some said yes before I even explained it to ’em, and they understood that they weren’t getting any money upfront. It was. Absolutely incredible. I was blown away. So Merry Christmas, y’all.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah, Vinny. Love it. Love it. From the heart of Nashville. Uh, Eric, let’s, uh, let’s go to you and, and for those of you listening, uh, on Spotify or on the podcast, like you’re missing out on half the Fun, we have so many folks in their fest of finest.
Um, although, yeah, yeah. Kenny, what does, is that, uh, duke on your shirt up there? Is that Duke Ellington? Yes. Yeah. In your jazz t Yeah, it’s
KENNY RAMPTON: from a essentially Ellington Festival. And I got my Del
JOHN SNELL: Quadro hat. There we go. There we go. Uh, but Eric is like, uh, yeah, he, I think he wins for the most festive green background.
He’s on another level. Yeah.
ERIC BAKER: Santa Hat. I got the email, I read the [00:22:00] fine print. It said, come in some holiday festive attire. And I’m a rule follower John. So,
JOHN SNELL: so, so with, with that being said, uh, what’s your favorite holiday tune?
ERIC BAKER: I think I’m a sucker for a good silent night at the end. You know, we’ll do a lot of like Christmas Eve services often out here in West Texas, and it’ll often end with everyone dimming the lights, everyone’s holding a candle, singing a few verses of silent night, often acapella, uh, that just, it’s very moving.
So if I had to pick one, that’s probably it, just for the experience of it all.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah, we, we talked about that on the trombone Carol, uh, trombone car, trombone corner. Um, the, uh, yeah, Hans Gruber, and it was supposed to be, uh, there’s a whole story behind it. Jay Freeman. So go over to the trombone corner and listen Jay Freeman talk about the story, uh, about that.
Uh, uh, uh. The writing of that and how it was performed and um, yeah. Well it’s always a special moment when I get to play that and, uh, uh, either with my dad’s arrangement in quintet or in church and yeah, dimming the lights and yeah, very, [00:23:00] something very goes to our core of humanity. And such a simple melody.
MIKE ZONSHINE: Uh, Mike, your turn. You know, I had a feeling you were gonna ask about this, and growing up in a Jewish household, I have a different relationship with these Christmas carols. So I thought I’d, I,
JOHN SNELL: it doesn’t have to be Christmas, it could be a holiday, it could be non-denominational, it could be rock of ages, whatever.
So I
MIKE ZONSHINE: thought I’d go in a slightly different direction. I thought I’d share with you my top four favorite Christmas records.
JOHN SNELL: Oh, I over prepared. I love this.
MIKE ZONSHINE: So you can’t have this Christmas without playing this at least four or five times. The Lewis Armstrong. Mm-hmm. Thousand percent.
And, uh, I have to mention this because it’s probably why I play brass instruments, but this empire brass joy to the world, I think is one of the most inspirational musical achievements and brass record, uh, Christmas album. An album that always brings me lots [00:24:00] of great joy. I’m not sure my wife agrees, but the Herb Alpert Christmas record.
Yeah, I absolutely love this record and all the cool choral stuff. Right on. And, uh, I don’t expect that anybody on this podcast knows who I am, but I would feel remiss not to mention my absolute favorite musical inspiration in the entire world. The Beach Boys Christmas record.
By the way, the second side of it is all, uh, big band arrangements with the group, uh, by Dick Reynolds, you know, the famous arranger. And it’s, it’s, it’s absolutely gorgeous.
JOHN SNELL: Thank you for that, Mike. And as always, over prepared, uh, you know, overachiever. And that’s why everyone out here is so successful.
That’s it’s secrets to success. Uh, reading the fine print and, uh, going above and beyond. Well, it looks like Liesl has joined us. Liesl Whitaker, happy holidays, Liesl. Yay. Happy holidays. And, uh, yeah, you were out, uh, picking up [00:25:00] family. So, uh, Kenny was telling us you guys have a wonderful family, uh, celebration coming up the, during the holidays.
LIESL WHITAKER: We hope so. Yeah, we hope so. Um, my, my son’s girlfriend is a little under the weather. We’re hoping she’ll be okay, uh, before they have to make the trip up, but, you know, yeah, my daughter is here, Kenny’s son is here, and, uh, you know, finally winding it all down after, uh, a, you know, pretty busy week. Glad to be, glad to be getting some time down.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah. Well, well deserved. Uh, might as well join in. What’s, uh, do you have a favorite holiday tune, Christmas or otherwise?
LIESL WHITAKER: Um, my favorite song is kind of obscure. It’s actually, uh, it’s my favorite holiday song is, uh, from the sound. The, the recording, the, uh, cast recording of, um, in the Good Old Summertime is a song called Merry Christmas by Judy Garland, who she sings it, I don’t know who wrote it, and it’s a little bit obscure, but it’s just, uh, it’s a really beautiful song that I, I think that’s my favorite Christmas song of, of all, uh, [00:26:00] that’s all.
JOHN SNELL: Always gets you in the spirit. Uh, so then, yeah. You know,
LIESL WHITAKER: I’m a big fan of the Muppet Christmas album. Just, just to put it out there. There
JOHN SNELL: you go. Is that the John Denver Muppet Christmas? Uh, it’s
LIESL WHITAKER: called a Red and Green Christmas. Oh, really? Yeah, I remember
JOHN SNELL: that one.
LIESL WHITAKER: I mean, until you’ve heard Miss Piggy sing, uh, Santa Baby.
You haven’t Heard Santa Baby?
JOHN SNELL: Yeah, I’m gonna have, I’m gonna have to find that. ’cause my, my, my favorite Christmas album is, is John Denver and The Muppets. Well,
LIESL WHITAKER: another, another good one.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, there, uh, there’s so many. Well, the whole album, I can listen front to back and whenever we decorate the house, that’s what we put on.
So, uh, yeah. Hey, John. Hey John,
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: uh, can we get to what’s super, super important here? What. Is Kenny making on the smoker? And listen, Kenny, when you tell us talk real slow
LIESL WHITAKER: before go, just before he goes. My daughter gets in the car today and I said, you [00:27:00] know, I think Kenny’s gonna be, uh, cooking on the Green Egg today.
And he goes, mom. You know, that’s Kenny’s midlife crisis, right?
Yeah. Kenny, I’m
KENNY RAMPTON: not cooking on it now. It’s all, all over. You got like,
ERIC BAKER: you got like two choices when you get to midlife as a man. It’s either like World War II documentary or starting to smoke a bunch of meats, and that’s all you got.
KENNY RAMPTON: You know, I’m doing both
actually. It’s American Revolution, isn’t it? Yeah. There you go. Documentary. That’s new. Ken Burns.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Yeah, the new Ken Burns. That’s, that’s, that’s a good one, man. Yeah.
KENNY RAMPTON: Yeah.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: All right. What are we making, Kenny? Yeah,
KENNY RAMPTON: well, I’ve got a whole, I’ve got a whole menu planned out for the week. In my midlife crisis. Um, if this is midlife shit, I’m gonna be, I’m gonna live to be 120, um, for Christmas Eve dinner, I’m planning to do over the top chili.
Oh [00:28:00] yeah. Meat’s gonna start the tomato base for that. Today with fresh tomatoes, we’ve been using tomatoes that she grew on our garden. Um, we had a great crop this year, but we actually, we’ve gone through those, so we went and bought tomatoes, so, but it’s, it’s always fresh tomatoes. Rehydrates the dried beans and make the chili base on that.
Put it in a dutch oven, put that in the big green egg, put a gr on top of it, and then smoke chuck roast on top of it. Yeah, baby. So all the spice and the, and the rendered fat drips down into the chili. Fat. Fat, fat, fat, fat. Yeah. You dig? So that’s, that’s, that’s a good thing. We can’t see Vinny.
MIKE ZONSHINE: Yeah man, for Christmas.
I can hear him,
KENNY RAMPTON: Lord. Excuse me. Moleys excited about the chili. That’s one of our dogs. We got two dogs, moley and Annie. So doing that. Some cornbread, some mac and cheese make homemade mac and cheese ’cause all the [00:29:00] kids love that. Then Christmas morning I’m making a, um. Egg, uh, cheese and sausage casserole.
Um, Liesel’s gonna do chocolate chip pancakes for everybody and Wow. Wow. Um, debating whether we’re gonna do just regular traditional bacon. Um, or I do have pork belly. Yes. So I was thinking about slow smoking some pork belly. Woo. Um, but one of, one of the kids doesn’t like, they, they, you know, only like to eat the bacon when it’s like really crispy, traditional bacon and, um.
But I love pork belly, so I, you know, we can slice the pork belly so it’s like thick bacon, you know, and maybe do some pork belly burned end too. Oh. Um, why do you have to choose? I was gonna say Los, do both. We, I suppose we don’t. And then Christmas night we’re gonna do a ham, you know, and, and, you know. I’m, I’m kind [00:30:00] of, you know, I’m into it, man.
Having fun cooking and
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: do you have a routine where you’re sitting out and you’re just kinda watching that waft of smoke coming out and doing long tones? That’s really important too. There’s always a trumpet. No, no.
LIESL WHITAKER: But now he’s gonna try.
KENNY RAMPTON: But yeah, but now you’ve inspired me to try that.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Hey, listen, when you take your horn out of the bag on the next, uh, on the next gig and it smells like bacon, man, you’re gonna get more gigs and you can shake a shake that, you know, Kenny’s a great player, but he always smells really good.
JOHN SNELL: Well, there was, there used to be, there was a Zaja oil that they had a bacon scent of. Oh, did they really? Did they? Oh yeah. Was, I mean, it is a novelty, but when you’re doing a valve alignment and you get it on your clothes and you’re like, ah, like what is this? Why, why, why do I smell like fake bacon? Uh, you say
KENNY RAMPTON: that like it’s a bad thing.
Yeah.
MIKE ZONSHINE: So, penny, are there no kosher options at your house?[00:31:00]
KENNY RAMPTON: I’m sorry. I guess not, man.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: I maybe, maybe the mac and cheese. You could probably figure that out, right? It’s right. I have to cook
KENNY RAMPTON: it in a separate oven though, for it to be truly cosher. Right.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: That is true. We work on that
KENNY RAMPTON: a second. I don’t make that kind of. That’s what it
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: is. The second green egg, Kenny, I feel a plan coming together.
This is just for my Jewish friends. There we go. Then you got two bangers going, let’s set up a GoFundMe.
JOHN SNELL: Well, we’re gonna have to ’cause So this is the first annual holiday episode of the other side of the bell, the second. Annual will be at your place. We’ve, I’ve just invited us all over. I hope you guys don’t mind’s doing Ben.
You know, the more, the merrier. Uh, bring your sleeping bags men. Yeah.
KENNY RAMPTON: Bring your horns. We’ll play long thos and eat pork. We’ll help cook and beef. Beef, God. Yeah. Or beef something.
JOHN SNELL: I love it. Um, so let’s do another round of, uh, name the Nont Trumpet Plane Celebrity. And this one, the [00:32:00] theme is, uh, uh, hosts, right?
Uh, late night hosts. Otherwise. Um, so of the three, tell me which one is not or has not played the trumpet. We have Stephen Colbert, drew Carey, and James Cordon. Any guesses? Cord? I’ll go with James Cordon. We got three. Mike Zine. Three. Okay. Oh, oh. Oh, Vinny, I can’t see you. What did, what did you say? No, I got,
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: I’m, I’m number three.
I thought I saw one pop up there, but yeah. M I’m number three A cordon. Everyone’s Dr.
JOHN SNELL: Okay, well it’s actually Stephen Colbert. Sure.
ERIC BAKER: What? Yes. All right. Now hold on. I’m gonna have to take issue with this. Okay. Uh oh. Because there is a fantastic, uh, clip of him. Oh, maybe you’re right because he’s holding a trumpet uhhuh and the band starts to count him in, right?
Yeah. Batis is of, they’re playing and he’s like, about to play and then he just like waits and empties this bit about like, oh, I, I’ve seen that. It’s just goes on and on and on. Well, let me, so I guess technically I don’t think he ever does play the trumpet [00:33:00] possibly in, in that clip. Lemme see. Lemme see.
JOHN SNELL: Maybe this may be like a, one of those moments. Uh oh, well, yeah, there’s one of him in, uh, uh. Uh, Sandoval going back and forth, but I don’t think he’s technically there’s one with him and win Trump. He does mouth trumpet. Does that count? Who’s considered the,
ERIC BAKER: uh, some of those mouth trumpet players on TikTok are gonna start taking my gigs, man, they’re a little too good.
I think that was Well, so
JOHN SNELL: the internet says that John Lampley was like. Ghosting for him. Ah, that makes sense. Uh, so, well, I don’t must be true. I mean, trumpet hive mind could prove me wrong, but, so j James Gordon, uh, Gordon played, uh, Cornett in the Salvation Army growing up. And um, and then the other person I mentioned, who was that?
Uh, drew Carey. Drew Carey, yeah. Was a trumpet, trumpet player growing up. I think he played
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: in some horn bands. I think he played in like a Chicago cover band for a while and that kind of stuff. He, he was. He was a, a bit accomplished. Yeah. I mean, he was not a bad player. Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:34:00]
JOHN SNELL: So there you go.
Little, little trumpet facts. Uh, got us. Yeah. Break the ice at parties. Um, so what’s, uh, you know, we got all the help we can get, right? Oh gosh. Uh, looking forward, uh, we can kind of go around the room. Uh, what are you guys looking forward to in 2026 once we get through the holidays? Eric, let’s start with you.
ERIC BAKER: Oh man. Um, you know, it starts pretty quick. We’ve got New Year’s Eve and then we’ve got a couple of gigs in early January. Um, no major projects that I have nothing measure outside of the normal stuff we do with the Symphony Nebraska. Tet Kitty shows a lot of teaching. Um, things are going well, so I just don’t wanna rock the boat.
I just wanna keep it moving straight ahead and, uh. Enjoy in myself, so
JOHN SNELL: nothing major for me. Well, yeah, I mean, you had a big, big end of the year, right? Because on the podcast you were getting ready to do your, uh, solo with the orchestra in November. Yeah. And now we’re through that. So, uh, how, how did that go?
ERIC BAKER: I’m still alive, John. He still, [00:35:00] everyone The world is still turning. No, it went great. Thank you for asking. It was Stephen Haig’s American Nomad. It’s about 10 years old. Uh, Chuck Lazarus premiered it up in the Minnesota Orchestra and it’s great because in addition to being, you know, kind of a great American.
Classical trumpet concerto with orchestra. Every movement also requires the player to improvise a little bit. So it’s a really fun way to kind of bridge that gap and bring something new and fresh to our community in West Texas. And I think it would go well anywhere. It’s a, it’s a very well written concerto.
It’s easy to put together for an orchestra, unlimited rehearsals. Uh, it sounds great. It was fun to play. So kudos to Steve and Chuck for being a good, um. Good, uh, people to call and, uh, inspiration to kinda help me prepare for that. So yeah, that and then Midwest and I’m kind of ready to just chill and rest a little bit.
So, so
JOHN SNELL: you’re, you’re cruising into 2026. Yeah. Sounds good. Vinny, how about you? What do you got going on next year? Or what are you gonna focus on projects plane wise?
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Um, I don’t have a New Year’s Eve gig. I’ve been fortunate [00:36:00] over the last like. I guess it’s been God, like 10 years that in some form or fashion, I’ve been on TV every New Year’s, which has been awesome.
Some of them were pre-taped. I saw
JOHN SNELL: you on the news, Vinny. Yeah, that was, I saw your mugshot that in the post
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: office. Big, big. But um, I think it was two years ago, the band, my, my band was on Huckabee’s show and at the exact same time I was doing a CBS New Year’s Show from here in Nashville. And my mom, who is a, you know, a technically, you know.
Limited. She’s 87, she’s kicking butt. But you know, she tells me her phone is making a bunch of mistakes, wink, wink. Um, she wanted to watch both of them at the, at the same time, but she doesn’t have a split screen. So, but I don’t have a New Year’s Eve gig. Beth and I are thinking about going down to visit, uh, universal down in Orlando for three or four days.
And then, um, I’m starting a big gospel project right at the beginning of the year. Um, and then, uh. [00:37:00] We have a lady down in Florida, actually, she’s, she’s not with us anymore. She just passed away. She’s pre, uh, preacher’s wife. She wrote 90 Praise and Worship Tunes, and she wants to make ’em all into instrumental records.
And so we’re gonna kind of keep that legacy alive. And, and then, uh, Vinny and the Hitman has another, uh. Session in February. Where do you guys know Kenny Anderson used to play with Tom Jones, Miami Sound Machine. He’s a tenor sax player. Mm-hmm. So we’re doing a big Miami sound machine cover, uh, medley, and he’s gonna play the lead on that.
And, uh, you know, and, uh, we’re, we’re, uh, covering Frankenstein by Edgar Winter. And so it’s gonna be, it’s gonna be a ton of fun and, and uh, just kind of grooving. And then we get into summer and, uh, we are in the pool. Every lunchtime, my wife works from home, so we jump in the pool. And again, I, I agree with you, keeping it moving forward in a positive direction and, and just, uh, continuing to kick as much ARS as we [00:38:00] can down this way.
Love it in Nashville. Yeah.
JOHN SNELL: Love it. Vinny. Mr. Zine, let’s go to you and.
MIKE ZONSHINE: You know, I don’t know that I have too many professional things that I can brag about, so I’m just looking forward to world peace. I hear it’s coming this year and that people of all types of creeds and, and, and differences are finally gonna understand each other, and I’m just really looking forward to the, the, the new world order.
JOHN SNELL: Oh, amen. Mike, thank you for going big. Taking the high road. Absolutely. Absolutely. It’s been, it’s been a year for all of us I know. And ups and downs and, uh, yeah. Hopefully 2026. And, uh, to quote my dear friend, uh, Gary Grant, hopefully it’ll be music and sounds and harmony that bring us together and realize that we’re, you know, more alike than we are different.
Right. That’s good. Um. Let’s go on to the, uh, rampton, uh, Whitaker, uh, household. Who wants [00:39:00] to go first?
Four, six.
LIESL WHITAKER: Uh, you know, just hope to not get worse
on on and get gooder.
LIESL WHITAKER: Try and get gooder. Try not to get worse. Hope I can pay my mortgage and feed my dogs, and, uh, that I can still walk by the end of the year.
’cause I didn’t break.
JOHN SNELL: Oh, yeah. Yeah, that’s good.
LIESL WHITAKER: Oh, and I mentor a couple kids along the way.
JOHN SNELL: Yeah, yeah. Give, give back. And Kenny, with your, your new, uh, titanium giddings mouthpiece, you’re gonna be, uh, taking the road by storm.
KENNY RAMPTON: Uh, well, I just hope to. Like Liesel said, man, make it the end of the year. Still be able to walk and, you know, just learn and grow, man.
You know, I have a few projects next year that I’m, I’m looking forward to, and some trips with Jazz Lincoln Center. We’re going to Japan, uh, for a tour. I haven’t been to Japan in quite some time, so I’m looking forward to going to Japan again. Nice. Um, and, you know, some, some other things coming up professionally that are, you [00:40:00] know, I’m looking forward to.
Liesel and I both do a fair amount amount of like teaching and mentoring younger players. And, um, I always learn, I learn more than the kids, you know, I always learn a lot from doing that, you know, and, um, I, I really enjoy that more than probably anything else that I do is working with kids and seeing when that light goes on and, and they get it.
And seeing that, you know, that that’s really what legacy is to me, is, is how you affect the future and working with kids. So I look forward to doing more of that and, and starting to really develop a formula for, for the future to be able to do that. You know, at some point when I retire from touring and, and doing stuff I’ve been doing to really kind of set myself up and, and, and we’re talking about doing it together.
To go around, do workshops, clinics, masterclasses, residencies, things like that, working with kids, you know, and [00:41:00] that’s something that I really love doing. And, you know, the, Lisa and I actively, we, we talk about it all the time and we’re starting to put some, um, plans into action, you know, and do more of that.
So I, I look forward to really developing that and seeing where that’s, how that’s gonna grow and what it’s gonna grow into.
JOHN SNELL: Wonderful, wonderful. Very inspiring. And yeah, definitely need more of that. And Kenny, I mean, you’re still part of the, um, the jazz outreach initiative, right? In Vegas. You still take part in that or help out with that?
KENNY RAMPTON: Yeah, well I’m the founder of it, um, co-founder of it. Mm-hmm. And, um, I stepped down as a president ’cause I realized that I really don’t know anything about business. I brought somebody else in
to
KENNY RAMPTON: really run it, who’s a businessman. And, um, I’m the artistic director, so I’m still involved with that. Run it with my.
Co-founder Gary Cordell, who’s another wonderful trumpet player. And, and probably, you know, one of my best friends in life, I’ve, you know, we went to college together, we studied, studied with Walter Blanton mm-hmm. Who was a Bill Adams student from Indiana University. And we both [00:42:00] came up doing Adam routine.
I still do it every day, um, as is Gary, you know. Um, so, you know, Gary and I started the organization together and I’ll, I’ll be involved with that probably till the. Day I die. It’s, you know, it’s really taken on a life of its own. So I’m, I’m still working with those guys and having fun with it. Wonderful,
JOHN SNELL: amazing stuff.
And I, I mean, it’s great to see so many of you on here. And for those listening, this was a, uh, hastily planned holiday episode. Uh. Based off of the success of the Trombone Corner one I did. And, uh, the original plan was all of the folks that have joined me today, we’re gonna pop in for five minutes or so and ask a, you know, answer a few questions and then go on about their daily lives.
And then everyone joined in early and everyone stayed the full hour, which I’m eternally grateful for. And, uh, again, goes to show the true holiday spirit. So with that, we have one more round of. Name the non-celebrity trumpet player, and this one is, uh, gonna be in the actor celebrity category [00:43:00] now. Uh, so give us your best guess of these three, which one is not a trumpet player.
We have Richard Gere. Dwayne the Rock Johnson and Clint
ERIC BAKER: Eastwood. Oh, John, that’s a trick question. None of them are trumpet players. They’re all far too good looking to be trumpet players. They, they would never have played trumpet.
Oh,
JOHN SNELL: that’s a good one. It it, yeah, it’s, I’m
MIKE ZONSHINE: going for Clint Eastwood.
LIESL WHITAKER: I’m gonna go one or two.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Oh, I bet
MIKE ZONSHINE: I, Clint, I
ERIC BAKER: bet he played in band as a kid.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Um, I’ve, I’ve, I, I don’t think it’s Clint. I think I may recall seeing him actually play. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh,
JOHN SNELL: we we’re getting, who were the other two? I think I hearing committee’s.
Next record The Rock. We have Dre, Dwayne Rock, Richard Ge. Richard Ge, Clint Eastwood, and I forgot which order I did. I’m [00:44:00] go, I’m going with the Rock
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: too. I’m gonna go gear because he’s too pretty. He’s real. He really is too pretty to play trumpet. So Richard
ERIC BAKER: Ge. Yeah, I think the Rock likes music. He probably has some band in his background somewhere.
Although, I don’t know
KENNY RAMPTON: Mike. I remember Richard Gere playing Cornet in a movie. All right. Yeah, call that. Okay. I’m not sure some, that’s him stuck in my brain somehow. Clin Eastwood, you know his son is a jazz bass player. He’s, he’s a heavy jazz fan. Oh. Thought about
MIKE ZONSHINE: his love for jazz. He plays piano. He was really close with Jack Sheldon too.
Good God. I forgot about that. Oh,
JOHN SNELL: man. The hive mind. You guys are really impressive.
MIKE ZONSHINE: Oh, I forgot about that. Oh, I have to change my answer.
JOHN SNELL: Did
MIKE ZONSHINE: you say Clint,
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: are you using the Google machine?
MIKE ZONSHINE: No, I’m using the Kenny Rampton machine. He, uh, he, he reminded me that, uh, that, that, that he, that Clint Eastwood’s a big jazz buff.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Yeah. Yeah. Final answer. The rock or gear.
LIESL WHITAKER: [00:45:00] Guys, I gotta sign off. I’ve gotta go with, okay, Liesel. Happy holding holiday. Thank you for
JOHN SNELL: joining us. We’ll let Kenny know. He’ll give you the answer. I’ll let her know. Yeah, I’m going with gear. Kenny, are you sticking with the, the Rock? I’m, IM gonna sticking with the Rock.
Okay. I’m gonna go with the Rock as well. Vinny. I, I still think it’s gear. Okay. So we’re like 50 50. Uh, I think Liesel said the Rock, right. Yeah. So yeah, Dwayne The Rock, as far as we know, did not play the trumpet.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Wow.
JOHN SNELL: Uh, Richard Gere played, uh, when he was young. Uh, Clint Eastwood, and this is kind of a a, a trick, trick que question, uh, Clint Eastwood played Pfluger horn and band ’cause there was no trumpets left.
Um, and of course you guys mentioned he is a huge jazz fan. Mm-hmm. Um, in fact, I think he owns one of Dizzy Gillespie’s trumpets. Uh, they used to work on it next door, uh, 20 years ago. Remember it came in. Um, but yeah, he did technically play fugal horn a little bit when he was young. Uh, yeah, I think he’s a little bit more, uh, [00:46:00] known for playing jazz piano.
Um, so yeah, fun stuff. That was a
ERIC BAKER: good one.
KENNY RAMPTON: Yeah. And, and interesting little, um, another actor who plays trumpet is Peter Dinklage. Really, really ska band. Yeah. Wow. I actually heard him, I
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: heard him and he really wasn’t
KENNY RAMPTON: bad. Hamilton playing his, his brother, I think is a violinist and plays in Hamilton on Broadway.
Peter Dingles, his brother’s a concert master for Hamilton. Amazing. Awesome.
JOHN SNELL: How cool. Well, I, I have to, uh, yell at Google and chat GPT for, because that would’ve been a great one. Love, love him.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: I wish my video was working ’cause I, my wife bought me a pair of socks for my birthday that say, uh, on the very bottom.
I play trumpet and I know things, which is a throwback to, to Peter’s character in Game of Thrones.
KENNY RAMPTON: There you go. Yeah, and I drink too,
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: so, you know, I drink, play trumpet and know things, you know, but look at those right there. Trumpet [00:47:00] socks. Nice. Love it, Mike. Go to the birth store@mike.com.
JOHN SNELL: Well, what a pleasure it’s been having all of you on.
Um, if you could, let’s go around the room. If you could just leave our listeners with a, uh, holiday or New Year’s, uh, wish or greeting for everyone. You know, to end on a, on a high note here, so to speak. Uh, Eric, you wanna start first?
ERIC BAKER: Um. Inspired by some reading that I’m doing at the end of the year. I’ve just been kind of focusing on trying to be light and love to everyone.
And so if I can bring that, if I can bring some light, some joy, some levity, uh, if I can do a kind deed, I’m gonna try to do that. And uh, I think music is a great vehicle for doing that and so I’m happy to be in this world. But yeah, wishing everyone a lot of light and a lot of love this year, and hopefully we can all be that to others.
Great man. We gotta, we gotta
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: follow that.
ERIC BAKER: Yeah, that’s, so I started with Eric first. I knew he was ready. Kenny. Yeah. [00:48:00] Man, may your valves be never sticky and uh, you know, may your mutes never fall out of the bell. You know, that kind of a blessing would be good. I,
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: I feel like we just sat there and listened to Eric warm up and now we’re all skulking out of the room.
Gonna, the practice room, I mean, dude,
KENNY RAMPTON: I love it. Getting. It’s about enough. You got the outfit already, man. Start with that. Jeez. There you go. Keep up gentlemen. Yeah, I thought this
MIKE ZONSHINE: tie with the partridges and the pear tree was gonna work, but man, beautiful. Oh, it does. Amateur next to you.
VINNIE CIESIELSKI: Amateur. Um, am I next, John?
Sure, go ahead, Vinny. Um. A couple things and, and this is really to our, our community. I, I’ve, I’ve curated my, all of my social media to, to sort of filter out all the negativity. There’s no politics, there’s no religion, but there is trumpet playing. And what I’ve noticed in our community is, is uh, um, on [00:49:00] some places, uh, healthy and uh, vigorous, a discourse is.
It’s kind of awesome. There’s not a lot of name calling. There’s, uh, there’s no, nobody’s throwing any shade. They’re just agreeing to have a dialogue and sometimes disagree. And, um, so the guys that are online that are saying, um, there’s only one way to do. This, or there’s only one way to think about this.
I would like the spirit of, uh, of the new Year to come and just kind of con him on the head a little bit and, and, and just, uh, just be like, like Eric, man, just be kind and, and love one another. And if somebody says something really great, and this is a good piece of advice that I receive, if somebody says something that you wholeheartedly agree with online.
Go and find out who they are. Like look, look at who it may be curated, but look at who they are. And if that sort of [00:50:00] aligns with, with what you’re thinking in general, then get yourself up next to that person because, because of the positivity, um, equally if it’s negative, find out who they are, find out if they have credibility in your.
In your world, in your existence, um, and then deal with it that way. But I think rather than just shooting from the hip and being angry and, and kind of crappy, that, that you can learn a lot about a person. Um, and I think that’s, I guess that’s what it is in a nutshell. Learn about each other and then try and coexist because, um, I’m looking at everybody’s face.
On this podcast, and you can just see the infrastructure is different for everybody. Mm-hmm. So petal tones might work for somebody and long times might work for somebody else. And multiple times, I mean, just there’s so many different ways. Tongue position, diaphragm breathing, [00:51:00] yoga, breath equipment, all that stuff.
It’s. Man, if you guys picked up my horn because of my, you know, singular proclivities, you’d be like, what in the world are you thinking? And I would do likely the same thing with a bunch of you guys. We cross over genres. We, you know, it’s just like, just just be nice and, and try and learn something from somebody and then move on, uh, in a positive direction.
And, um. Scroll by.
JOHN SNELL: Scroll by. That’s yeah. Scroll by. Absolutely. Thank you, Vinny. Yeah, man. Great, great words. And speaking of bus buzzing and not buzzing, uh, Mike and I are gonna get into an hour discourse on whether we should buzz the mouthpiece or not. So the rest of you are free to go. I’m not gonna listen to a word Vinny just said, and it’s gonna be a death match.
And Mike’s gonna win ’cause he teaches my kids. So there we just, I just fast forwarded. So Mike, with that being said, with that introduction,
MIKE ZONSHINE: [00:52:00] I, uh, I’m gonna have a hard time following up those two gentlemen. Um, I guess I have two things. One is kind of inner. Um, if you find yourself fearing something, do it.
Do it because you fear it. And two is. Whenever there’s somebody and they’ve done something that you perceive as hurtful or harmful, uh, maybe try and recognize that they might be dealing with something that you can’t even fathom. And so acknowledge the pain, acknowledge the hurt, and then wish them as much love and mercy as you can.
That’s awesome. Absolutely. That’s beautiful
there, Michael.
KENNY RAMPTON: Absolutely. For the school. Kenny, he, that’s beautiful man. Well, this is a very wise, very small but very wise panel of brilliant thinkers. And I don’t know what I can really add to all that other than, you know, what’s coming to mind for me is the holidays can be a really difficult [00:53:00] time for some people.
Um, you know, we all wanna focus on family and love and good food and party and have a great time. But some people don’t have family, some people don’t have food. You know, so it can be very difficult and you know, I know when I go through difficult times, so anybody who’s dealing with that, you know, for me it’s very important to focus on gratitude and to find things that I have gratitude for and really focus on that.
And that brings to mind something that one time heard Winton say in front of a group of probably like 4,000 students in a, in a, in a theater. He was talking. About the importance of focusing on positivity. And he talked about, you know, every situation we’re in has a positive side and a negative side to it.
You know, everything. Mm-hmm. You know, and sometimes the most difficult thing is to find something positive in a really dark. Situation something really hard and not long [00:54:00] after. Went and talked about that. I saw him do it when his father passed away and he made a public statement about it, focusing on the positivity and the love there.
That’s something, you know, we, we all go through when we lose a loved one. And how difficult is that? It’s one of the hardest things we ever go, go through. But to find positive in that, find positivity to focus on. You know, all situations have positive and negative man. It’s so important to really focus on the positive.
Be aware of the negative. You gotta be aware of it, you gotta be informed. And there’s, things are so divisive these days, man. Somebody mentioned, you know, politics and religion being so divisive and they are, you know, but you gotta be aware of, of, of certain aspects of what we’re dealing with as, as a society man.
So. Be aware, but focus on the positivity. Focus on the humanity. Doesn’t matter what party you belong to, doesn’t matter who you voted for. We’re all human beings experiencing the same human condition. So [00:55:00] focus on humanity. Focus on love, focus on gratitude.
JOHN SNELL: Absolutely,
KENNY RAMPTON: absolutely amazing. Kenny, man, what a, you know, I got, I, I’ve got to run.
The other guys are knocking on my door. Love you all, man. Thank you for putting this together, man. Kenny. Happy holidays later.
JOHN SNELL: Way to drop the mic and. Yeah, go fix his gutter. That was good. Yeah. Well, you see, now, you know, my, my little secret to success is have absolutely wonderful, brilliant people on, and then I can just end the episode, end the episode, because nothing else needs to be said after that.
Um, I mean, Vinny, Mike, Eric, and also thank you to Kenny and Liesel who joined in, uh, thank you so much for what was supposed to be a five minute check-in. Ended up being a wonderful hour episode and more of a panel discussion. Uh. Absolutely amazing time. Um, we’ll do this again next year and I’ll plan it a more than three days in advance.
Uh, and, and we’ll do it now that Kenny’s not here. We can start the planning. We can have it at in Kenny and Liesel’s backyard with the green egg. With the snow. Will Vinny be
MIKE ZONSHINE: wearing like a hood so we could keep the, [00:56:00] uh, tradition of, of, uh.
JOHN SNELL: He’s gonna have, yeah, a black box around him. Uh, no political jokes about the black boxes. We’ll, we’ll leave that one. Um, but seriously, I mean, I think you guys all touched on it. Um, you know, you, you sit down and eat with someone, you drink with someone, you listen to music together. We’re all affected the same way.
Why? Because we’re all the same. Doesn’t matter where we came from. Uh, you know what we think, what we believe, we are all the same, and we’re doing a very powerful thing. Making music, um, as was instance with, you know, my dad hearing, uh, Mike’s quintet the other day. Uh, and I’m sure we all have experiences, um, playing for people, playing for audiences and seeing people light up or seeing people cry.
So, you know, what we do isn’t trivial and uh, it’s very cool that it’s also happens to be fun, uh, on our end. And, uh, even though a lot of us are, um, working long hours, not seeing our families. You know, long drives, long flights, um, you know, we’re still doing a very important thing for society. [00:57:00] Uh, so with that Merry Christmas, happy Hanukkah.
Happy Kwanza. Whatever you celebrate or don’t celebrate. Uh, to all of our listeners, thank you for a wonderful year, all of our guests, some wonderful episodes. And for 2026, we’re looking forward to making even more music, more trumpet stories, and of course, more arguments over valve oil and heavy valve caps.
Well then thank you for listening. And let’s go out and make some music.
