Produce Row

Every Monday night from approximately 8:30-11:30pm there is a jazz jam at Produce Row. The quality of the music depends on the caliber of musicians who show up each night, but it is always worth the $3 cover.

Tonight was different though. I have never seen so many musicians and such a high caliber of musicians at a Monday night jam. Some of them had played with the likes of Etta James, the Stan Kenton Orchestra, and Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. Tonight's overall instrumentation included:

Four vocalists
Five drummers
Three pianists
Two tenor saxophonists
Three trumpeters
One flugelhornist (Not your flugelhornist, Jesse)
Three guitarists
Three bassists
And finally, one bad ass who did things on the bass so ridiculous that he has to be listed in his own category - Essiet Essiet (the last bassist to play with the late Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers).

And that's just the people who got the green light to play.

I'm exhausted. I should have been asleep hours ago, as I work at 5:15 this morning. But, the music I heard tonight will not let me sleep.

That is the power of jazz.