Every job has a down side. For Mike Jacobsen it is pulling gross stuff — such as a mummified rat — out of musical instruments.
‘‘Oh my God, sometimes you have to have a strong stomach. You wonder how on Earth they played it with that in there. Pens are good one.’’
Brass instruments are the worst — a double French horn can have 5.4m of tubing, which acts like a hothouse for whatever is blown in there.
While brass musicians are not supposed to eat or drink for an hour before playing, they often ignore that rule, he says.
‘‘Whatever they have eaten or drunk gets blown right through. It gets put straight back in the case, then pulled out again. Over time it builds up — stuff grows.
‘‘It’s lucky I love my job.’’
Jacobsen is an instrument repairer who specialises in brass and woodwind repair.
He got into the lesser-known occupation thanks to a love of music and a dedicated teacher.
Jacobsen ‘‘hated’’ school growing up in Hamilton and was known as a ‘‘naughty’’child but a music teacher recognised his love of music — his mother made him learn piano from 6 years old — and took him under his wing.
‘‘Music was the only thing that saved me.’’
The teacher helped him get an apprenticeship at Brass and Woodwind Repair in Auckland.
‘‘I was 16 and bolted for Auckland and did my apprenticeship.’’
Back then he played the saxophone in bands of all types and was in the National Youth Symphonic Band.
‘‘Music was huge in my teens.’’
After completing his apprenticeship, and getting some experience, he travelled the world, living in the United Kingdom for a ‘‘long time’’ before settling in Australia.
He stopped playing music because he felt ‘‘burned out’,’ and instead concentrated on his work.
‘‘The music industry is brutal — I’d hate to be a player. I like this side of things quite good.’’
There he worked for New South Wales’ largest brass and woodwind repair shop, Sax & Woodwind, which he ran for five years.
He got an invitation to study with senior technicians at Yamaha’s Toyooka Factory in Hamamatsu, Japan. He is one of possibly three people in his field in the southern hemisphere with Yamaha qualifications.
‘‘It was fascinating.’’
Many of its instruments are made in China rather than Japan but its high-end instruments are still made there.
Over the years he has worked on instruments from a variety of ‘‘big names’’ including the saxophone of Jim Horn, a well-known American session musician for top musicians such as Sting and Elton John.
‘‘You meet some interesting characters.’’
Another notable job was the nearly solid gold trumpet of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra’s first trumpet.
‘‘I once had someone come in with an old helmet from a diving bell and wanted me to fix that.
‘‘One lady in Australia came in with an old French horn she wanted rebuilt — it had a Nazi eagle on it. It was her great-grandfather’s. She wasn’t aware of it.
‘‘Every now and again you see stuff like that. Things like that can be a bit confronting.’’
Many people were reluctant to get their often very expensive instruments maintained regularly, so he also saw his role as educating people on how to look after their pieces.
‘‘You’re blowing things through it all the time.’’
If he cannot fix something, he passes it on to someone who can. Thanks to the internet he has a network of ‘‘repair mates’’ around the world he can call on for help or advice.
A client recently came in with a 1978 Clippertone Cornet, which is relatively rare, so he rang a friend in Seattle who is one of the best brass repairers for advice.
‘‘The repair world is relatively small.’’
When his marriage broke up he looked to make a new start. Assessing his options for relocating his business he came upon Dunedin.
‘‘I’ve never been a big city boy. I love Sydney and Australia — it’s my second home ... but I needed somewhere new.’’
While he hadn’t spent any time in Dunedin before moving to the city, his grandparents grew up here. He found a picture of his great-great-grandparents in Toitu Otago Settlers Museum.
‘‘We think he [his grandfather] used to play for St Kilda Brass and lived around here somewhere.
‘‘I don’t know why I chose Dunedin — it just seemed to fit. Dunedin is a special place. It’s got everything you want from a bigger town in a pocket size.’’
He has set up his workshop in a spare bedroom of his Dunedin home, with tools organised neatly on a pin board above his desk.
‘‘I don’t have any big tools, so I have to figure it out without those and I can do just as good a job.’’
One of the things he likes about the job is the problem-solving.
‘‘There is a lot of ‘how the hell do I do that?’ It’s very lateral thinking — I’m good at thinking outside the box.’’
The beauty of the job is that there are so many different reasons an instrument may not be playing right.
‘‘It’s very rarely the same any day. There’s a million things you have to think about to solve a problem.’’
While he was the only apprentice in the country when he started, there were a lot more repairers out there now, especially in the North Island.
His enthusiasm for the trade dimmed for a while, so he gave it up and did an electrical apprenticeship. He soon discovered that was not for him but got his ticket before returning to instruments.
‘‘It was noisy and busy. I found I liked to work quietly on my own, being able to take the dog for a walk when I wanted.’’
He most enjoys working on oboes as they are very challenging to fix.
‘‘They’re mind-numbingly difficult and complex. I like doing saxophones too — I’m good at them.’’
It is important to pay close attention to detail to ensure instruments leave his workshop in top condition.
‘‘I’m fairly dogmatic about it. It takes a long time to build up a reputation.’’
The hardest aspect of the job is telling someone their ‘‘pride and joy’’ or family heirloom is beyond repair or that it is uneconomic to fix, he says.
Also challenging is when people come to him with cheap instruments made of poor-quality materials. He knows better than anyone how important it is for children to be exposed to music, so cheaper instruments have a role, but they are just not able to be fixed, he says.
‘‘The market is flooded with them. You can’t get parts for them. I just can’t touch them.’’
He believes it would be better for parents to buy decent second-hand ones if possible.
