Get a Hobby

The readers of this website all arrive with some interest in horn playing. However, if you make your living outside of music, music may be a hobby for you. This post is not so much directed to you, as you do have a real hobby and one that I applaud! Instead, this post is more directed to advanced students and pros.

While I know that several of my horn teachers had hobby interests (one was into sports cars, another organic gardening, another into computers, etc.) I recall when I was a student reading an interview with a well-known hornist in The Horn Call. This particular hornist was asked a question about if they had any hobbies. The answer? Their hobby was self-improvement! News flash: this is not a hobby. That hornist came off as being a bit one-dimensional in my book.

I obviously like writing and I like horn history—these are both hobbies in a sense, but somewhat work related. However, I do also have a “real” hobby, model railroading. I know of other brass players with a similar interest, the most notable today probably being tubist Gene Pokorny of the Chicago Symphony. He has right in his CSO bio that he is a member of the Union Pacific (Railroad) Historical Society and enjoys chasing trains. In my own case I am a member of the Train Collectors Association and focus on model trains in American OO gauge. This photo I took during a visit to the Colorado Railroad Museum.

I mention this because I have moderated an American OO discussion group for several years and I recently launched another blog related to American OO gauge, a little used but interesting model railroad scale. Check it out if you wish and above all don’t be one-dimensional, maintain some hobby interests.