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Celebrated trumpet soloist and teacher Jens Lindemann. |
A Musician of great depth and breath
He juggles teaching with travel
BY WENDY SODERBURG
UCLA Today Staff
Jens Lindemann doesn’t need to blow his own horn. At least
not figuratively.
The celebrated trumpet soloist is definitely in demand and has
played in practically every major concert venue in the world, from
New York and London to Berlin and Tokyo. He has appeared internationally
as an orchestral soloist, recorded with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir,
played lead trumpet with the renowned Canadian Brass and even served
as official trumpeter for the National Hockey League Stanley Cup
finals.
Yet despite his personal accomplishments, Lindemann, a UCLA music
professor, prefers to sing the praises of his talented trumpet students,
who won the top cash prizes at the prestigious 2004 National Trumpet
Competition in Virginia. UCLA competed against more than 20 other
schools, including Juilliard, and was the first ensemble in the
history of the competition to perform from memory. “I can’t
begin to tell you how proud I was of all of them,” Lindemann
said.
Juggling teaching with global travel is a challenge, but Lindemann
manages to be in Los Angeles on a fairly regular basis. He serves
as head of brass studies and teaches 11 trumpet students, in addition
to coordinating UCLA’s Brass Ensemble.
“I expect my students to be self-motivated, and their work
revolves around what they would like to accomplish,” he said.
“I do not believe in a set curriculum per se since their needs
are very individual. Every trumpeter in my studio is able to do
some particular thing better than anyone else, and it is important
for all of them to realize that they must learn from each other.”
Outside of class, Lindemann and his students make themselves available
to “Bugles Across America,” a Chicago-based organization
of 2,050 volunteer horn players who play “Taps” at military
funerals. Additionally, the trumpet professor participates in chambermusic@ucla,
a concert series that features UCLA music faculty. Recent guest
artists have included Lindemann’s friends, Doc Severinsen
and guitar virtuoso Sir Angel Romero.
If things had worked out differently, the Juilliard-trained Lindemann
might have been a drummer rather than a trumpet player. As an 8-year-old
growing up in Edmonton, Alberta, he began taking piano lessons and
switched to trumpet at age 12. “I wanted to be a drummer in
the band, and you had to choose trumpet or clarinet to play percussion,”
he recalled. “The best players after two weeks could become
drummers. I was dead last and wanted to quit, but my parents wouldn’t
let me transfer out of music for at least one year. Twelve months
later, I was hooked!”
Now Lindemann and his wife, Jennifer Snow, a music faculty member
who teaches collaborative piano, are happily settled at UCLA. “There
are some truly world-class people in our department who are fervently
committed to the ideals of creating a program that not only enriches
students, but ultimately society in general,” he said. “Without
the arts, we would have a very empty world indeed.”
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