Brent Williams

From Masterclass to Metadata: A Trumpeter’s Guide to Preserving Pedagogical Lineage

Brent Williams is a freelance trumpet player, applied-trumpet instructor, and instrumental music educator based in Bakersfield, California. As a first-call performer in California’s Central Valley, he performs with the Bakersfield Symphony, Tehachapi Symphony, Bakersfield Winds, Beale Park Band, Bakersfield Music Theatre, and Bakersfield City Ballet, and has recorded with Mento Buru and Soulajar. 

He serves as adjunct trumpet professor at California State University, Bakersfield, has maintained a private trumpet studio in Bakersfield since 2012, and teaches instrumental music in the Panama Buena Vista Union School District. He is a regular adjudicator and clinician for the California Band Directors Association, SCSBOA, CMEA, and KCMEA. 

Brent holds a Bachelor of Arts in Music from CSU Bakersfield and a Master of Music in Music Education from Boston University, where he is currently pursuing a Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study. His research focuses on brass pedagogy and on the digital preservation of trumpet teaching lineages, with particular attention to the Chicago and New York traditions descending from Adolph Herseth, Vincent Cichowicz, Arnold Jacobs, and William Vacchiano. His current work applies post-custodial archival theory and local AI tools to safeguard the ephemeral knowledge of applied trumpet instruction.