Person on the street: Meet Stephen.
Self taught multi-instrumental musician and busker, delighting passers by in Washington DC.
Washington DC has a lot to offer the throngs of tourists, often from other countries, as they make their way through an array of museums, monuments, and other notable sites. Occasionally, some local music can be among the treats they might encounter.
I met Stephen while he was busking in Lafayette Square, along H street NW. While having trombone on hand, Stephen is a self taught multi-instrumentalist. As a teenager he first began experimenting with the trombone, and after getting the hang of it he branched out to other brass instruments, like Trumpet. He would later venture into woodwinds—first the clarinet, then the saxophone. But his favorite is still the trombone.
Being able to teach yourself how to play an instrument from scratch is no minor feat. The trombone is perhaps even more challenging, because there are no keys. You have only your own inexperienced ear, and the trial and error of adjusting your embouchure until it finally gets you where you need to be. Of course, once you have learned one instrument, the skills can generally transfer over to other members of the same instrumental family, giving you a strong base. But nothing about the slide trombone will teach you how to key a three valve trumpet.
For Stephen, the most difficult instrument to teach himself was the saxophone. I had guessed it would have been the clarinet. It’s a difficult instrument in the first place, due to very demanding embouchure. And the keys would have been entirely foreign at the time. By contrast, a saxophone is more forgiving on the mouth, and the keying would already have been very similar to what he learned with clarinet. But for Stephen, deciphering the nuanced differences between sax and clarinet keying to his satisfaction was apparently a big hurdle. That leaves me to believe he was diving deep into the instrument’s complexities.
While we spoke Stephen was being visited by a young man around 10 years old. Based on the striking resemblance, I assumed it was his son, without even asking. The young boy told Stephen that he was leaving, and they exchanged a hug as Stephen kissed his head. A woman with the boy also said her goodbyes. It appeared they had dropped off dinner for the street musician.
Stephen then told me that he’s been busking for years, and is often in the vicinity of the White House. But he’s usually along 15th St. NW. He migrated to the north side due to fencing that was in place this day, in preparation for the Army/Trump birthday parade.
After talking musical shop for a while Stephen played. He asked me if I had a particular request, but I told him I’m happy to let the artist choose the art. He didn’t tell me the song name, and I didn’t recognize it, but what could it matter? Stephen plays the trombone like a man who is one with the music.