Playing with improv groups

[BrassSection]

Just curious what instruments others have found to play off of in basically an improv settings that work well. (All of us in the group have a chord sheet to work off of…still haven’t figured out how to play a chord on my trombone…) Our old group consisted of 2 electric guitars, always one and often two keyboards, bass guitar, and drums. With that background sound, trumpet was rarely used, trombone got about 95% of play time. Had an outstanding bass player that we could almost read each other’s thoughts and really gelled when playing. First time he joined us he heard my trombone and said “I can work with that!” He moved on and the drummer started listening more to the trombone…we wound up working well together, adding triplets, syncopation, etc at times. Had a pro sax player join us for a few years, we worked well together, again primarily trombone with a little more trumpet than before, but not a lot. He moved on, lost main keyboard player so now we have generally 2 electric guitars, an acoustic guitar, bass guitar and drums. Maybe a keyboard once a month, but without a regular keyboard the brass had to pick things up. Trumpet used a lot more now, euph and French horn in the rotation too now. I’d have to say playing with a great bass player was my favorite to play with, followed by the sax. Pro trumpet player joins us occasionally, I primarily go with trombone then, occasional euph, but frequently 2 trumpets work well together.

Oh yeah, forgot to add 2 to 4 vocalists. Not unusual to play instrumental only at times.

[Richard3rd]

What kind of music and in what type of venue are you playing?

[BrassSection]

Church setting, contemporary Christian music.