Thanks for the input so far folks, very informative and for myself I am a mere beginner perhaps in comparison to the very informed replies. It is around eleven years since when I first took up brass, and finding it still hard work to get better at it. I put that down to an age thing at now 62 I am finding you can teach old dogs new tricks, it just takes longer.
As for playing by ear or reading the dots, I know of a quite good keyboard, piano, organ etc player, he only needs to hear a piece once and can near as dammit play the whole thing. Considering he was born blind, Steve once said, "I would love to be able to read music." I reckon that puts the whole thing in perspective.