<p>ASU’s brass program has a good reputation: [Brass</a> | School of Music | ASU Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts](<a href=“http://music.asu.edu/brass/]Brass”>http://music.asu.edu/brass/)</p>
<p>TickGrey, There are plenty of colleges to play trombone at, just not all of them will be small colleges. Lot depends on what part of the country you want to study in? ASU is one in the south. In the North East, Penn State, Temple, Purchase, DePaul, Rutgers, Ithica, Duquense all have great faculty but Purchase is probably the smaller college in that list. Conservatory wise, Manhattan School of Music and Mannes both have strong trombone professors and would be smaller. Key is to find a teacher you are comfortable with and a college that has the groups you would like to play in which smaller colleges may not. For example, Webster University in St Louis has a great trombone professor but there may not be a lot of other trombone students there. The Trombone Forum is also a good place to research other schools and they have a section on colleges with lots of interesting info.</p>
<p>Check out Suny Potsdam Crane School of Music: the trombone prof has a good track record.</p>
<p>You should definitely look at CIM- top trombone faculty including Massimo LaRosa and Richard Stout. The department has about 12 students, total, including undergrad/grad/Artist Diploma and there are usually 2-3 openings per year.</p>
<p>TickGrey,
You may want to consider Western Michigan University. The classical trombone professor there is very nice and two of his recent students have won ITA awards, I believe. One is going on to the Yale graduate trombone program on a full scholarship. Another plus is there is no graduate program there so you will be taught personally by the professor and have a better chance at being in the top tier music ensembles. What I also like about this professor is the way he treated my son at his junior year visit and at audition time. My son’s interest is more in jazz but he gamely prepared his required classical piece albeit not to the excellence level that would be expected of an aspiring trombone performance major.
Professor Wolfinbarger was the only classical trombone professor who listened to my son’s entire audition piece and didn’t cut him off after two or three bars…I interpret this as a teacher who is looking for potential that he can work with and develop.</p>
<p>Thanks for the suggestions!
Anyone have any somewhat close to Atlanta, GA?</p>
<p>to the OP, Northwestern, without a doubt.
Chicago is also perfect location/base for musicians.</p>
<p>I’ll second WMU for trombone. Not enough good things can be said about Dr. Wolfinbarger’s studio. One of his recent grads just one the Louisiana Philharmonic bass trombone audition (after attending Juilliard for grad school), another, as mentioned, is at Yale, and another has had a position in the Chicago Civic Orchestra. His students have won numerous recent ITA and ETW competitions, as well as a few DownBeat awards. There is a master’s program, but there’s absolutely still room for the undergraduate studio.</p>
<p>Time to update this material - check out Brad Edwards at University of South Carolina. “Doc” has published about 5 books now on practicing and playing trombone and has earned quite a reputation. He is an outstanding teacher as well, and SC offers decent scholarships for talented OOS students.</p>
<p>This thread should probably be closed and a new one started. Teachers move around and I know that some listed here have moved on in the last 3 years!</p>