Kim Moore’s riveting chronological account of practising the trumpet and becoming a trumpeter delves from her childhood into adulthood, exploring the emotional as well as the practical implications of starting to learn how to play an instrument at a young age and pursuing it throughout life. She practises every day for hours, takes part in concerts, becomes a conductor of brass bands and a brass teacher in primary schools. The short pieces in the collection entertain the reader with funny and serious anecdotes, surprising events, insightful comments and information about what it means to play the cornet and the trumpet. Personal reactions to the significance and impact of music in general and her close relationship with the cornet at first and then the trumpet are investigated too. In her writing Moore also shows a professional knowledge of the instruments which has been developed over many years of practising, reading books about them, playing in concerts, teaching in schools and eventually dropping them to concentrate on writing.
Her references to the ‘oldest trumpets in the world […] discovered in King Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922 by the British archaeologist Howard Carter’, one in silver and one in bronze, are a revelation that links Moore’s dedication to music to the ancient past. She imagines that the Egyptian trumpets are light, ‘like a hollow branch’; she would like to touch them, connect to them as if each of them were a talisman that might bring her luck. Other players will have the opportunity to play the ancient instruments, such as James Tappern and an Egyptian bandsman; the latter, unfortunately, shattered the silver one into pieces by pushing the mouthpiece of the delicate instrument. It is said that King Faruk, who was present, helped to pick up the shattered pieces.
Similar anecdotes enrich the collection with memories of the author’s music teachers, who were sometimes helpful and encouraging but at other times their remarks diminished her. Her A-level music teacher thought that she was not good enough for music college, but Moore proved her wrong. However, the teacher’s remarks haunted her for years as she felt that although she could make a living playing the trumpet, she would never excel as a solo trumpeter. The trumpet also opens her up to new experiences. Her first gig, a week’s performance of Singing in the Rain at the Haymarket Theatre in Leicester, gives her the fabulous sum of £150 to add to her savings for a Bach Stradivarius trumpet that she needs for music college. At the college she studies the Cornet Method by J.J-B. Arban and understands Paganini’s techniques, making clever connections with her experience and the achievements of the virtuoso musician.
Love stories and crushes mingle with her daily musical practice. The trumpet remains as present as ever, a friend or a guide that at times seems to lead her destiny. This happens during a tour to Germany with a dance band when she meets a man who will change her life and almost break her. The story is narrated in the sequence ‘How I Abandoned My Body To His Keeping’ in her first full collection, The Art of Falling, published by Seren Books in 2015. In the sequence she explores how he closely controlled and unravelled her, reducing her to nothing. The recovery is slow but the trumpet and her new job as a peripatetic brass teacher in Cumbria help her. It is a full-time teaching job that broadens her experience not only as a player but also as a human in relationships with students and colleagues. A sense of pride in her students’ achievements and sometimes frustration about missed lessons reveal moments of joy and sadness.
The recurring motif of the Last Post links to moving events such as the death of one of her best friends, a guitar teacher who suddenly dies while she is playing in a performance of Handel’s Messiah. The event is shocking and will echo for years every time Moore plays the Messiah:
I feel as if I can’t breathe, as if I’m going to have a panic attack. Then I have one of the strangest experiences of my life. My head is still resting on the wall of the church. The stone is cool against my skin. Suddenly, I feel a wave of calm washing through me, but it’s as if this calm is coming from the wall of the church.
Moore’s writing is effective and engaging. The reader is captivated by her neat descriptions that convey profound thoughts. Her stories are interesting and precious; they communicate the ordinary and link to a wider view that alludes to the world’s conflicts and social issues too. She investigates her vulnerabilities as well as her strengths, which have helped her navigate in a reality that has not always been easy. Her knowledge is accomplished and vital, not only in music but also in literature and art, as evoked in the poem ‘The Splendour Falls On Castle Walls’ by Alfred Lord Tennyson and in the suspended sculptures of flattened brass instruments by Cornelia Parker, which look ‘like pressed flowers in the open book of a room.’ Her responses are always clever and innovative, prompting the reader to have a diverse understanding.
Eventually Moore starts a new path, that is, writing. She joins a poetry group and attends poetry readings and workshops. Her attitude towards writing is as disciplined as her study of the trumpet. However, she practises the trumpet less and less and she reduces her teaching hours as well. When she is offered a Vice Chancellor’s Bursary at Manchester Metropolitan University for a PhD in 2016, she drops the trumpet and focuses on writing, expressing her talents in full and achieving considerable successes. Language becomes central, but the trumpet is still there; it survived a car crash and was reassembled. Although it is not perfect, it will survive and last and will always be ready for new adventures.
Carla Scarano D’Antonio 8th February 2023
Tears in the Fence 