Andersen earns honor for performance, teaching career

Tim Andersen (B.M.E. 1982) has combined a successful teaching and performing career in the Dallas/Fort Worth area over the past 38 years. His accomplishments earned him the Alumni Achievement Award in Music at this year’s Honors Day celebration.

“It was very emotional when I got the e-mail,” Andersen said. “I got pretty choked up. It was an unexpected honor. To be recognized by the school that you have such an affinity for is quite an honor for me.”

Andersen is a Yamaha Performing Artist and has performed with the five-time Grammy-nominated Dallas Winds for 33 years and has held the position of co-principal trumpet since 2007.

He performs, records and tours frequently with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and has performed numerous times at the Texas Music Educators Association Convention, Texas Bandmasters Association Convention and the Midwest Band and Orchestra Convention. Andersen began his 25-year public school teaching career in 1988.

While back on campus, Andersen met with brass students in the Glenn Korff School of Music.

“I start talking trumpet, and I geek out,” he said. “I love talking trumpet. It’s fun helping kids get better at something. They have fun doing it, and I love teaching it.”

While at UNL, Andersen studied with Professor Emeritus Dennis Schneider, who died in 2016.

“His legacy just lives on. It’s unbelievable,” Andersen said. “Taking lessons with Denny was my first exposure to what taking a private lesson was, and it felt like I was in heaven. I wish I could have recorded every lesson I had with Denny. He could get you to do things you didn’t think you could do.”

Andersen also appreciated the other opportunities he had at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.

“Playing in the Plymouth Brass, sitting next to Denny in the Lincoln Symphony, the competitions I was involved with—the International Trumpet Guild and the MTNA. Playing in the wonderful bands and orchestras here, going on tour and getting to play solos with the band,” he said. “And when you have the churches around Lincoln that had fantastic music programs combined with the opportunities in Omaha, I couldn’t have received a better education.”

Born and raised in Gering, Nebraska, Andersen also lived in Lincoln and Scottsbluff. It was here in Lincoln that he began playing the trumpet in fifth grade.

“Mr. Rogers was my fifth grade band director, and the band met before school twice a week. There was no band class during the school day,” he said. “When I moved to Scottsbluff, there was a marvelous band program led by two outstanding directors. Georgene Diers and Dean Maxwell. They made it fun while setting high expectations.”

Andersen loves performing.

“I’m not the most outgoing guy until I get a trumpet in my hand and get on that stage,” he said. “I love being on stage, and you never would have known that when I was in high school. I was so scared to even play my trumpet in public. I played with the choir one time in high school, and I couldn’t even get the tuning note out, I was shaking like a leaf. But now, if you put a trumpet in my hand and put me up in front of people, it’s like I get to play a different role, I guess. When there’s music and trumpet involved, it brings out something in me that otherwise is in the background. It makes me want to light up an audience as much as it lights me up.”

His advice for students is simple.

“Keep practicing,” he said. “And make connections. The cliche ‘it’s not what you know, it’s who you know’ is more applicable than you think. The reason I’m subbing with the Dallas Symphony for 32 years is because of David Bilger. Dave and I competed in the 1981 International Trumpet Guild Student Solo Competition at the University of Colorado. We tied for first place in that competition. Dave won a position in the Dallas Symphony Orchestra around 1986 and moved to co-principal trumpet shortly after that. He found out I was off the road with the Dallas Brass in 1988 and asked me to sub in the orchestra.”

Andersen is also inspired by friends like Ryan Anthony. Anthony, a former member of the Canadian Brass and the Dallas Symphony’s principal trumpet emeritus, died in 2020 of multiple myeloma at the age of 51. Anthony created the CancerBlows concert series to raise awareness and money to further research about Multiple Myeloma. The foundation has raised more than $3 million. Andersen played with Anthony in one of his final public performances. The documentary Song For Hope is the story of Anthony’s battle with cancer and has won numerous awards.

“He was an inspiration to so many people,” Andersen said. “He would play a concert with the Dallas Symphony in between chemo infusions. That was his life for probably the last five years of his life. He was an amazing person. Ryan continues to inspire me. CancerBlows is near and dear to my heart. Ryan was an important influence in my life and a wonderful friend.”

He is also grateful for his time at UNL.

“I can’t describe how much those five years did for my career,” Andersen said. “They were the foundation. Studying with Denny and being here at UNL was incredible. Wonderful, fond memories.”  ■

Tim Andersen gives a masterclass for trumpet students in the Glenn Korff School of Music.