In the beginning...

My first introduction to Jazz came when I was about 8 years old. My father was an aficionado for playing the ponies and I would often take me with him to RiverDowns. There was traditionally 12 races and at the end of the 11th race, my father would place his bets for the 12th race, and then we would leave to beat the traffic out of the parking lot. In the car, he would turn on WNOP – 740AM. As we drove over the 275 bridge, jazz music filled the car until a certain time when the final race results came on. The biggest distinction I picked up from the sounds I heard was the absence of a vocalist – there was no singer! I was 8 and all the music I was used to hearing had a singer. As I was listening to it I anxiously waited for the vocalist to come in; and in this particular piece, there was no vocalist (I couldn’t even tell you what group or song was playing). When the song ended, despite my early age I discovered something: While waiting for the singer to appear, I actually listened to the whole song, and in the process became a fan of the music – particularly the horns. Two years later, I took up the Alto Saxophone and that opened up a whole new world…
- jh