Last night I went to the Bierhaus Urban session with one thing in mind: try to participate in more of the tunes, as long as the number of musicians present at the moment allowed it and nothing extremely difficult was being played. As it turned out, it was a good night for that since I was one of just two horn players who showed up at the beginning, the other one being Werner, who plays alto sax and sings, both beautifully, and whom I had already met and played with at the club.
It turned out to be quite the trip for me. Werner picked a tune to sing called "When you are Smiling", which I did not know, but still decided on the spot to take an improvisation turn on since the harmony seemed quite logical and reasonably easy to follow. After that "Footprints" was suggested by the pianist, which I had already played and had decided to give a rest and do again in a few months, but before I knew it we were playing it and taking solos. After that, I suggested "Just Friends" just to play something I had been working on and get the first version out, always the most difficult one. It is a complicated tune to play, but I found that particular moment to be the best possible to try something like that, taking advantage of the power of momentum, already on stage, having just warmed up with other tunes, played music I did not know well and just feeling like it won't get any better anytime soon. At this point, some other musicians started to show up, so I decided to play one more tune while they got ready and yield the stage to them. For that last tune, I picked "Tenor Madness", which I had also done before and felt comfortable with.
While putting away our instruments, Werner asked me how I had felt and we talked to each other for a while. He took the time to give me some advice about practicing and was very encouraging about my process commenting on my musicality and determination. It takes a lot of insight to see some promise in somebody who is as early in the process as I am, and his words had a substantial impact on my motivation.
Let´s just keep the momentum going: preparing, daring to try out, reflecting afterward.