Mental approach

Agrell, Jeffrey

Zen and the Art of Horn playing

Beyond technique: Jeffrey Agrell explores how Zen challenges Western thinking—revealing a new path to awareness, focus, and deeper musical experience in horn playing.

Agrell, Jeffrey

Zen and the Art of Horn playing

Beyond technique: Jeffrey Agrell explores the clash between intellect and intuition—arguing that true musical expression begins where analysis ends.

Mathez, Jean-Pierre

Editorial

A warning from the machine: Jean-Pierre Mathez reflects on Kaufmann’s robot—questioning whether technology is shaping music… or slowly replacing the human artist.

Mathez, Jean-Pierre

Maurice André

Biography

Maurice André reflects on maturity—balancing performance, recordings and teaching, refining his approach to instruments and audience, and preparing for the limits of a virtuoso career.

Ree Wekre, Frøydis

Being a woman brass player... So what?

Frøydis Ree Wekre reflects on women in brass playing, examining physical assumptions, psychological factors, and practical realities across performance and professional life.

Agrell, Jeffrey

Zen and the Art of Horn playing

Between breath, reflex, and attention, Jeffrey Agrell links Zen practice with the physical and mental habits that shape brass playing.

Ricquier, Michel

The subconscious, a useful friend

From yogic practices to auto-hypnosis, mental conditioning and visualisation are linked to performance, self-control, and the body's hidden responses.

Stevens, Thomas

The Trumpet in the USA

The Confidence Pill

Stage fright meets medical research as performers, physicians and early beta-blocker studies reshape the debate over confidence, fairness and public performance.

Quinque, Rolf

ASA-Method, ASA-Technic

Virtuosity grows from disciplined work on scales, articulation and reading, arguing that consistent fundamentals matter more than chasing the upper register.

Agrell, Jeffrey

Listening

Musical listening begins where judgment ends, as Jeffrey Agrell questions habits of criticism, recordings and expectation that shape every performance.

Buck, Wilfried

A Miracle Pill for Stage Fright?

What happens when performance anxiety is treated like a medical condition rather than a musical one, and where does that boundary ultimately lead?

Baechler, Christian

Nerves, Pills and Doping

Behind a debate once confined to musicians lies a wider shift in how performance anxiety, medication and professional responsibility began to be separated instead of confused.

Mathez, Jean-Pierre

Editorial

When careers pause and certainty fades, real progress begins in private, where discipline, friendship and chamber music reshape what it means to be a musician.

Mathez, Jean-Pierre

Editorial

Music teaching depends on more than routine: in 1984, Jean-Pierre Mathez argues that living contact with artists keeps transmission open to new generations.

Mathez, Jean-Pierre

Editorial

Between disciplined practice and creative folly, musicianship emerges where scales and systems give way to imagination, instinct and the unsettling freedom to think.