BOZEMAN - Jacob Hansen was once a nervous performer, whose suit became drenched in sweat as he faced his high school auditorium in Great Falls. In the trumpet player's first year of college at Montana State University, however, his audiences doubled in size. Then tripled.

Hansen marched in Bobcat Stadium with the Spirit of the West in front of thousands of cheering fans, performed in concert with Japanese university students in Kumamoto and Ibaraki, and, most recently, joined one of Greece's most prestigious bands in the 2026 Corfu International Trumpet Festival this summer.

By then, as he played "El Camino Real" before roughly 500 people in Corfu, his nerves had left the building.

"The audience is there for you. They're not rooting against you," said Hansen, a sophomore music major in the College of Arts and Architecture. "Musicians beat themselves up when they miss a note or they don't play something how they want to, but the audience isn't there to criticize you. They're there to cheer you on and to listen to some music."

Hansen was one of 20 American students attending the weeklong International Trumpet Festival, along with four of his peers at MSU. The student musicians included sophomore music education major Carson Boswell, spring 2026 graduate Sophia Hahner, senior music technology major Aiden Narayan and fourth-year student Benjamin Wilson, who is double majoring in liberal studies with a quaternity emphasis and environmental economics and policy.

They received one-on-one feedback from professors across the U.S. during master classes, and they joined professional musicians in a culminating performance on Greece's National Day of Music. Mantzaros Philharmonic, with whom the students performed, and the Ionian University organized the concert.

Students received funding from MSU's School of Music, Undergraduate Research department, Undergraduate Scholars Program, faculty excellence grant program and the Gallatin Trumpet Guild to attend the festival with Sarah Stoneback, an associate professor who performed as a guest soloist in the festival.

"Our research may look different than an archaeologist's. It looks different than being behind a microscope. But it still has impact as other research does," Stoneback said. "It expands our minds. It creates bridges with different worlds, different cultures, different ways of thought."

Stoneback taught master classes during the festival in the Ionian University's performance halls, using her pinwheel and ping pong ball she brought from MSU to demonstrate how certain tongue positions impact airflow.

MSU students learned new ways to analyze music and hone their individual sound in the master classes, Wilson said. He performed part of the first movement of "Sonata for Trumpet and Piano" by composer Eric Ewazen and afterward discussed with professors the art of storytelling and dynamic contrast, which is the variation in playing loudly and softly.

Students' connections with professors, other students and musicians around the world inspired them to overcome language barriers with music and form connections with people they could perform or study with in the future, Stoneback said. She also found opportunities for professional growth during the event, speaking with composers whose work her students play in concerts and performing with MSU students at a Corfu church as part of a community outreach effort.

In preparation for their performance with the Mantzaros Philharmonic, students rehearsed outdoors as the sun set and swallows swooped in circles overhead, with passersby stopping to listen and applaud, Wilson said. He had traveled abroad prior to visiting Greece - last fall, he studied motivation psychology and Scandinavian culture and history in Norway through MSU's Office of International Programs - but he said Corfu had its own kind of "magic." The experience was something his younger self, who grew up in Bozeman and often listened to bands like The Beach Boys and The Beatles while sitting in a rocking chair, never anticipated.

"These are lifelong experiences and core memories that really change you," said Wilson, who also performs in MSU's Symphony Orchestra and One O'clock Jazz Band. "You do it, and you're seeing things you didn't really think about or you're learning things you didn't even know to ask the question in the first place. The things I took away aren't just an 'Oh, I'll forget about it tomorrow' - they're lifelong memories."

Hansen formed some of his own core memories in Corfu as the only MSU student to perform as a substitute member of the Mantzaros Philharmonic during the festival. He said he was impressed by the musicians' well-balanced sound between the brass and woodwind sections, inspiring him to develop a more refined listening ear and better blend with his peers at MSU. Hansen is a part of many ensembles at MSU, including the School of Music's Symphony Orchestra, Wind Symphony and the One O'clock Jazz Band, which he plans to join in the fall.

"I remember right after we performed with Mantzaros, Jacob looked at me and said, 'I can't believe I'm doing this,'" Stoneback said. "I wanted to start crying because that's what these opportunities are about. It's that inspiration. It expands students' minds in a way that lets them think anything's possible."