Reno: a forgotten city in the foothills

I arrive in Reno on a Thursday afternoon to the bells and whistles of slot machines, cheesy t-shirts, and snowboarders trying to ride the season as far into spring as possible. As I stroll through the airport to find a ride to the hotel the scene is of ecstatic gamblers riding high on their big win and others with a look of pure defeat. I exit the airport and catch a shuttle to the Sands Regency hotel in downtown Reno. Upon exiting the shuttle into the rows of speckled lights I wonder to myself why haven't they been replaced. The hotel reminds me of the most expensive suit you would find at a consignment store. I approach the understaffed and overly frustrated desk clerk whom greets me with a reluctant "Are you with the jazz festival or here for pleasure?" I respond "I'm here on a journey to find answers for the future." She smirks and thanks me for breaking up her mundane shift and hands the key to my room. I navigate the casino floor avoiding old ladies smoking long barrels, children running wild pressing buttons on random slot machines and an old man on a bender with an unbridled look in his eye. I head up to my room to relax from a long day of travel and rest up to hit the casino floor. As the clock ticks into the eight o'clock hour I decide to descend into the madness of the casino floor and find myself a drink and a bite to eat. As I wait to be seated a few participants of the jazz festival the desk clerk spoke of earlier come into the restaurant. As we converse they find out I am in Reno for the North American Professional Band Instrument Repair Technicians (NAPBIRT) conference and invite me to join them in celebration of a job well done on their parts. As we fill our time with drinks, food, and laughter a few of us decide to take advantage of the one dollar domestic beers offered in the casino. The night drifts off into the high desert of Nevada and the jazz crowd starts to thin out the ones left all agree we need to go find out what downtown Reno has to offer. We pour into the street and head for the more consistent night lights. Our first stop is the Golden Nugget where one of our crew hits for a hundred dollars and buys shots for everyone. Next we want to take a turn for the weird as stroll into Circus Circus. We play carnival games deep into the night surrounded by wild ecstatic laughter. I arise Friday morning feeling quite refreshed and head downstairs to meet up with last nights gang for a breakfast buffet spread for kings at a peasants price. The hangover has faded, now it's time for business as I say goodbye to my new friends, hop into a taxi and move to a classier resort. Upon arrival at the Atlantis I register at the conference and try to prepare myself for what I wasn't quite sure yet. I wander around the hotel for the next few hours waiting for my room to be prepared. I ran into an old friend that I whom I hadn't seen for about a year. As we play catch up she gives me the lowdown on what to expect over the next couple of days, but that conversation had not prepared me for what was to come. My roommates and I get settled and hit the hay early like children on Christmas Eve not knowing what to expect. Still being on central time I arise quite early and decide to go outside and enjoy the mountain air. After a few cigs and a fresh cup of coffee from the local bistro I head back to the convention center and walk into an in depth discussion about saxophones. "Hi my name is Jeff Smith and I will be presenting this course on Saxophone basics. The only problem is all of my supplies for this clinic are in a ditch in Iowa surrounded by circus animals." The saxophone can be the most rewarding and frustrating instrument to work on in the repair world. Few instruments vary from brand to brand even model to model except the saxophone. The same company can make a few models of saxophone and the mechanisms can be drastically different. As far as instruments go the saxophone has barely hit puberty compared to other traditional instruments in how long they have been around. First you have to make sure everything is aligned and in working order before you can tear it down to get to the guts of the instrument. If your saxophone has not been walking the straight and narrow just shock its system and more times than not it will straighten right up for you. Only on the real stubborn cases you may have to muscle it back into place. As you look into saxophone you can tell real quick if your working with a stubborn instrument or one that wants to be the best it can. Your best bet is to support the weakest point and beat the strong ones until everything aligns. There were times during this weekend I was questioning whether the clinicians were talking about repair or life in general. Align your posts, hinge tubes, and rods to make everything run at the top of its game. The spring in your instrument needs to be slightly bent up now isn't that sexy. The real quandary about saxophones is everything can be perfect and the damn thing still won't play. The low notes will warble even on the high end saxophones just because the instrument gets in the way of itself. As the air travels the length of the instrument and hits the bottom bow the sound waves will bounce off each other and make a vibrato sound whether you like it or not. To fix this problem you do something that sounds quite strange just drop anything small into the saxophone bell. I know this goes against everything your band director told you as a child but what do they know about sound waves. It works because it disrupts the pattern of the sound waves and keeps them from getting in the way of each other. We break for lunch and I see a spark in every techs eye as tips and tricks are being bounced off one another just like the sound waves in the sax. Some heated argument starts across the room while others are in a state of laughter. I over hear more than once during the lunch hour "That tip is so simple it will save me hours. Why in the hell did I not think of that." After consuming a wonderful lunch and four cups of coffee my brain and psyche is ready for a two hour session on percussion repair. "Surprisingly enough, drums rarely need any major repair. These things are meant to take a beating." states the clinician. The room giggles at the dry humor we are about to be drummed to death with over the next couple of hours. Since drums rarely need repair it is best to set up your snares with a blank slate so your customer can decide what kind of best suits their style. If both heads are tuned to the same pitch it gives the drum a traditional orchestra sound. When you tune the top head at a higher pitch then the bottom head it gives you a raw rock and roll sound and if you do just the opposite it sounds almost synthetic. As you twist and turn the nuts an bolts of a drum you have to do it with such timing and precision that it can be an art. Just as a percussionist needs to be "tight" their equipment has little margin for error otherwise you can wind up with dead spots and their instrument will not perform up to its potential. As the afternoon session ends I can tell the crowd is itching for a drink myself included. A few of the techs and I head downstairs to catch the scores of our favorite baseball teams and trade info from the morning clinics. Two or three beers deep I feel my stomach growling for food and as the crowd disperses I come across a few familiar faces. We all decide to grab a bite to eat and some more drinks considering the sessions do not start until one the next day. We sit down at the roulette table and proceed to lose our money in a timely fashion but not before we get a couple of drinks on the house. A group of techs from California are sitting at a table near us and invite us over. As the drinks and conversation flow I soon realize you learn just as much at the bar as you do at the clinics during the day. The night burns on and only a few of us left we head up stairs for a tech session and the group can tell there is a definite dynamic between two of the techs and we decide to let them be and hit the hay for another long enlightening day. I arise early Sunday morning still not having adjusted to pacific time. I head outside for the mountain air and other ascending techs from the previous night before we have a forum on the state of the industry. As budget short falls plague our schools art programs we discuss how to get the most out of each instrument for the least amount of money. There is also a discussion on which kind of tech is the best. The one with spots (apprentice) or the one with dots (tech school) You have to look very close to distinguish between the two for the spots are only slightly larger than the dots but from a distance it is impossible. Even up close you may have to measure the talent on a test that cannot be standardized. I feel, spots or dots, as long as the work is quality and our mission the same-to provide kids or starting musicians with properly working instruments so their experience is pure and will want to continue to play-are one in the same. A tech continually striving to be better will always build up a musical community around him/her. As tempers run high from varying degrees of disgust from the morning discussion I ran into my drinking buddy from the night before and she confides in me that she may be in love with Mr. man from the night before and has made plans to meet up with him again that night. My fellow classmates and an alumni go out to eat with our professor to let him blow off some steam from the morning forum before we head into our afternoon sessions. Full from a cheap Chinese lunch and refueled to absorb some for information we head back to the hotel to consume a wealth of knowledge on woodwinds in the afternoon sessions. I find tricks and tips to save myself at least an hour throughout the day. At this point in the conference my head feels like it is going to explode from all of the knowledge bestowed upon me and I still have a full day of clinics to attend. To combat all the buzz that is flowing around my head a few senior techs invite me to join them at an Irish Pub across the street that evening to talk anything but shop. If you have ever spent time with a room full of BIRTs it is impossible to avoid a conversation that leads back to tech talk. At least the jokes and true feelings shine through when the booze flows freely. Once again I realize the real learning happens at the bar with these people now that is a group I can support. Monday rolls around and the members of NAPBIRT are running on fumes from drinking and absorbing information and making new connections in the industry. After the Monday sessions we have a big formal dinner and it is time to say goodbye to new and old friends but not before one more big bash at the local pub. I am sure I was offered a first born at some point in the night like I said things get a little fuzzy especially since I have to be on a plane in two hours. Once I touch down in Omaha I reflect upon the weekend with a grin on my face and cannot wait until next years convention rolls around. Until then I will continue to hone my craft and support musicians in my area which will soon be Minneapolis. I look at the challenge ahead of me and say bring it on all you motherfuckers.