I'm a trombone player primarily and I'm trying to get that bright, brassy sound in my recordings that you'd find in funk music and stuff like that. What am I doing wrong?? Simply on the way IN I just can't get any real brightness- even recording on-axis. I don't know what it is but are there any tips you guys could give to help me get the sound?
My dynamic range also tends to be just absurd. I don't want to compress the crap out of things but it's so much that I don't really have a choice. Maybe I mic too closely.
Maybe its just my playing technique? Do I need to overblow the instrument and turn my input way low? Use compression??
 
Directly ON axis? Get MORE room and LESS up-close?
It just doesn't sound "studio". I'm no pro, not even close, and in no way, but I can say for sure I'm doing SOMETHING wrong here.

I'm a bone player too, although my music tends to classical and jazz. If I were tryingto record that brassy strident sound, I'd stay right on the mike, play strong to get that edgy sound, and set the levels from that. Get the sound you want out of the horn first. Wide diaphragm mike might help,but I'm not sure. I use a wide diaphragm mike for my playing, but I'm trying for warm and open. If you want tohear some of my examples, I have a soundcloud page. Give me a shout.

Fred Wesley always seems right on the mic

What mic are you using?  Most dynamic mics will not cut it if you need brightness.  The strident, trashy sound comes from playing on axis with a mic than can capture those higher frequencies.  Of course, a little eq to compensate can help if you are stuck.  

I use ribbon microphones (whenever I can) to record brass solo or section. Something magical about that combination. Other tricks include getting the players to create the sound I'm after, and keeping them close to the microphone.
 
If I don't have enough ribbon microphones (and sometimes when I do) I will use a Shure KSM-32, which is brighter, but I like the overall sound I get with it. A friend of mine uses TLM-103s on trumpets and trombones (but oddly not on saxes). I love the sound he gets, but have never been able to reproduce it.

I gave another shot and a few things came to my realisation:
 
1) The equipment (instrument, mouthpiece) and playing style I use is HUGELY important in the final product. I switched my second part trombone to a smaller instrument with smaller mouthpiece, and achieved a much brighter sound there.
 
2) The recording equipment I use changes everything. Plus, the mic distance. I switched from my Co9 (sort of SM58 clone) to my MXL 990 condensor, and instantly got a much brighter sound. The only part I left alone was first trombone, which needed a little of EQ to make it more of a "lower trumpet" sound.
 
3) My arrangment didn't lend itself as well to bright sounds. I decided to re-track everything today, and I recorded trumpet parts first. It was last night that I discovered that the REAL brightness and sharp bite is in the trumpet parts.
 
4) I had placed a reverb in place BEFORE the instrumental reverb, so the brass sound was already pushed too far back in the mix. I got rid of that and instead ran all the brass through one bus with a little EQ to brighten, then added a send with a heavy compressor, a distortion plugin and a stereo widener to get a little more bite behind (and around) the core sound. Works great!
 
 
I'd have to say I learned a lot in the past 12 or 24 hours about recording brass. Thanks for the tips, guys... I probably won't be recording brass with the Co9 very much anymore. Guess I'll also have to re-work my arrangements so that they lean towards the sound I want.