Roy Hargrove

I had to come on here and put a post up about the jam hosted by Roy Hargrove.
The jam was in the jazz gallery, a non profit organization with no bar or food and is made purely for music. Roy was a very class act, he called most of the standards and taught them to the musicians within around two minutes and the standards that he did not call and that he didn't know, he picked up after one chorus.
The two great things about the jam was that it was a great opportunity to play and get to know some great young musicians in NYC, all of whom would be more than willing to play gigs with you and that there was no room for poor musicianship. Twice Roy threw musicians off the stand during a song, both drummers and once he threw one off straight after the song, saying that modern musicians seemed to be 'allergic to swing' and that they need to learn how to play their instrument. This was great as it meant the standard of musicians that did play was very high and they were very conscious that if they did not play well, they would be in trouble.

I will also quickly mention that I saw a saxophonist called James Carter playing with Junko Onishi at the Iridium jazz club. He stole the show and is probably the most accomplished musician I have seen in NYC, I urge you to check him out.

However I must now sign off as I've got two days left until I leave for Philadelphia and want to make the most of my time left, I'll post up a new blog on my thought on Phillie soon.