Thai Food and Michael Davis

For those of you that don't know there is Thai Food, and then there is Thai Food. As an ex-San Jose resident, I came to love a Thai restaurant called House of Siam. All that oil and spice, it's hard to forget. Anyway, my husband and I have noticed a Thai restaurant in the University District, on "the Ave" as it's called, that always seems to have a line out the door. It's called Thai Tom and is about the size of a moderately sized studio apartment. There are only 4 tables and 8-10 bar seats. 4 of the bar seats are within inches of the flames of the cooking and there is no air conditioning in the building...
We caught the end of the lunch rush and found ourselves sitting on 2 of the 4 bar seats near the fire. It was amazing to watch the chef cook. He was dripping sweat onto his already soaked T-shirt as more and more orders came in.
We ordered our food (Shrimp Fried Rice and Poor Man's Noodles) and watched as he cooked it in a flash of movements: oil in the pot, add onions, rice, thai basil, soy sauce, fish sauce, shrimp paste, spice and serve! For the poor man's noodles he doused the rice noodles in oil, soy sauce, and fish sauce then added American vegetables (we'll let that slide b/c the flavor was so wonderful!), fried tofu, spices, and topped it was a Kaffir lime (at least I hope it was a Kaffir lime). It was spicy, sour, tangy and delicious! It was worth sitting near a fire for. :)

After such a wonderful meal, we ventured home to enjoy the rest of the day. Part of enjoying the rest of the day meant practicing, and what a joy it was!

Michael Davis, trombonist-composer and a fellow San Jose native, has written a great collection of warm-up books, etudes, and pieces for brass instruments. I've purchased and used his warm-up books for trumpet, his etude book Total Trumpet, and the composition We Four Kings for trumpet quartet. All of his music is challenging, and it's fun to learn with the CD that comes with each warm-up and etude book. Warming up with a CD helps me with my pitch, my time, and my sound. Using the CD is especially helpful because Davis commissioned Phil Smith, principal trumpet of the New York Philharmonic, to record the music on the trumpet CD. Who wouldn't want to warm up with Phil Smith everyday???
Today was a bit of a guilty pleasure. I found myself listening to Phil Smith on the recordings more than I was playing along. But, that's one of the benefits of purchasing Davis' warm-up and etude books: you get to listen to professionals play what is on the page in front of you. I can hear the music in my head and I know what note comes next, but being able to model my playing after such a talented instrumentalist is a rare opportunity! Davis has not only written warm-up and etude books that build fundamentals of instrument playing, he's offered a whole other dynamic by including recordings of the pieces done by masters of their craft. I greatly enjoy my practice time with Phil Smith through Davis' music. I know I'm not the only one either. If you're a brass player looking for a different warm-up book/routine, give Davis' stuff a try. I think you'll find it to be very helpful.