Max Schlossberg (5 November 1873 – 23 September 1936) was a

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

Baltic Baltic may refer to: Peoples and languages * Baltic languages, a subfamily of Indo-European languages, including Lithuanian, Latvian and extinct Old Prussian *Balts (or Baltic peoples), ethnic groups speaking the Baltic languages and/or originati ...

trumpeter, conductor,

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and Defi ...

, and

teacher A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. whe ...

. His legacy is a large number of successful

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

students and the

method Method ( grc, μέθοδος, methodos) literally means a pursuit of knowledge, investigation, mode of prosecuting such inquiry, or system. In recent centuries it more often means a prescribed process for completing a task. It may refer to: *Scien ...

book, ''Daily Drills and Technical Studies''.

Life

Max Schlossberg was born in Libau,

Courland Courland (; lv, Kurzeme; liv, Kurāmō; German and Scandinavian languages: ''Kurland''; la, Curonia/; russian: Курляндия; Estonian: ''Kuramaa''; lt, Kuršas; pl, Kurlandia) is one of the Historical Latvian Lands in western Latvia. ...

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

, now Liepāja, Latvia in 1873 to Nathan Schlossberg and an unknown mother. He went to the

Moscow Conservatory The Moscow Conservatory, also officially Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory (russian: Московская государственная консерватория им. П. И. Чайковского, link=no) is a musical educational inst ...

at the age of nine. He emigrated first to the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

in 1894 as his father had done previously, but returned to

Riga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the Ba ...

shortly thereafter for compulsory military service which he never completed. There, Schlossberg married Jennie Lohak in 1902 before emigrating to the United States again that same year. In 1910, Max Schlossberg moved to

The Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

for his career. He spent the remainder of his career performing and teaching there. He had three children with Jennie: Charles, Katherine Benjamin, and another daughter who would marry Harry Freistadt. In 1936, Schlossberg suffered a

heart attack A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which may tr ...

which prompted him to visit

Bethlehem, New Hampshire Bethlehem is a hillside town in Grafton County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 2,484 at the 2020 census. It is home to Cushman and Strawberry Hill state forests. The eastern half of the town is within the White Mountain National ...

, where he would later die.

Career

Following his time at the Moscow Conservatory, Max Schlossberg played trumpet in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

. After moving to

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

, he studied under Julius Kosleck and toured with

Arthur Nikisch Arthur Nikisch (12 October 185523 January 1922) was a Hungarian conductor who performed internationally, holding posts in Boston, London, Leipzig and—most importantly—Berlin. He was considered an outstanding interpreter of the music of B ...

, Hans Richter, and

Felix Weingartner Paul Felix Weingartner, Edler von Münzberg (2 June 1863 – 7 May 1942) was an Austrian conductor, composer and pianist. Life and career Weingartner was born in Zara, Dalmatia, Austria-Hungary (now Zadar, Croatia), to Austrian parents. ...

. Following his return to

Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

in the 1890s, he supported himself by conducting. Once in New York City, he performed with the

New York Philharmonic The New York Philharmonic, officially the Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York, Inc., globally known as New York Philharmonic Orchestra (NYPO) or New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra, is a symphony orchestra based in New York City. It is ...

for the remainder of his life, first under

Gustav Mahler Gustav Mahler (; 7 July 1860 – 18 May 1911) was an Austro-Bohemian Romantic composer, and one of the leading conductors of his generation. As a composer he acted as a bridge between the 19th-century Austro-German tradition and the modernism ...

and finally under

Arturo Toscanini Arturo Toscanini (; ; March 25, 1867January 16, 1957) was an Italian conductor. He was one of the most acclaimed and influential musicians of the late 19th and early 20th century, renowned for his intensity, his perfectionism, his ear for orch ...

. He was part of the faculty of

Juilliard School The Juilliard School ( ) is a private performing arts conservatory in New York City. Established in 1905, the school trains about 850 undergraduate and graduate students in dance, drama, and music. It is widely regarded as one of the most el ...

. Some of his many trumpet students include

Louis Davidson Louis may refer to: * Louis (coin) * Louis (given name), origin and several individuals with this name * Louis (surname) * Louis (singer), Serbian singer * HMS ''Louis'', two ships of the Royal Navy See also Derived or associated terms * Lewis ( ...

, Harry Glantz,

Saul Caston Saul (; he, , ; , ; ) was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the first monarch of the United Kingdom of Israel. His reign, traditionally placed in the late 11th century BCE, supposedly marked the transition of Israel and Judah from a scattered tr ...

Renold Schilke Renold Otto Schilke (Green Bay, June 30, 1910 – September 5, 1982) was a professional orchestral trumpet player, instrument designer and manufacturer. He founded and ran Schilke Music Products Incorporated, a manufacturer of brass instrumen ...

William Vacchiano William Vacchiano (May 23, 1912 – September 19, 2005) was a trumpeter and trumpet instructor. Originally from Portland, Maine, Vacchiano studied trumpet at age 12. At 14 years old, he was playing in the Portland Symphony. For five years (19 ...

Mannie Klein Emmanuel Klein (February 4, 1908 – May 31, 1994) was an American jazz trumpeter most associated with swing. Career Born in New York City, New York, Klein began recording with The Ambassadors for Vocalion in 1924, worked with Paul Whiteman in 1 ...

Bernie Glow Bernie Glow (February 6, 1926 – May 8, 1982) was an American trumpet player who specialized in jazz and commercial lead trumpet from the 1940s to 1970s. Glow's early career was on the road with Artie Shaw, Woody Herman and others during the las ...

, and James Stamp.

''Daily Drills and Technical Studies''

Harry Freistadt compiled the manuscripts left behind by his teacher and father-in-law, Max Schlossberg, after his death. The resulting method book was ''Daily Drills and Technical Studies for Trumpet'', first published in 1937 by J. & F. Hill before the copyright passed along to M. Baron Company in 1938. Max Schlossberg's son, Charles, edited an arrangement of the method for

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the Brass instrument, brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the Standing wave, air column ...

titled ''Daily Drills and Technical Studies for Trombone''. The daily drills consist of 156 exercises divided into eight parts: long note drills (37 exercises), intervals (11 exercises), octave drills (10 exercises), lip drills (11 exercises), chord drills (19 exercises), scale drills (27 exercises), chromatic scale drills (13 exercises), and short études (28 exercises). The étude labeled as exercise 156, now attributed to Guillaume Balay, has been omitted from the book after the 1941 edition.

References

1873 births 1936 deaths 20th-century trumpeters American classical trumpeters American male trumpeters Juilliard School faculty Latvian conductors (music) Latvian people of Jewish descent Trumpeters New York Philharmonic Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States {{brass-musician-stub