Jay Hoggard Musician - All About Jazz

Updated: June 29, 2023

Born: September 31, 1954

Vibraphonist, Composer Jay Hoggard’s music has touched the hearts and souls of listeners around Planet Earth for 40 years. Jay Hoggard has long ranked with the greatest vibraphone innovators. Jay’s music is positive, spiritual, uplifting, and happy. He masterfully draws on traditional and contemporary musical vocabulary to develop new directions for the vibraphone. Jay seamlessly blends jazz and gospel roots with African marimba rhythms. His performance repertoire represents the three B’s of the jazz tradition (Blues, Bop, Ballads) with original innovations. Born in Washington, DC, Jay Hoggard was raised in Mt. Vernon, New York in a religious family.His father was a Bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Zion denomination. At age 15, Jay began playing the vibraphone. "One night I had a dream that I was playing the vibes. I asked my father to rent me a set and from the first moment, I knew that this was what I was supposed to do." Jay majored in the renown World Music program at Wesleyan University . He toured Europe and played at Carnegie Hall during his freshman year. In his junior year, he traveled to Tanzania to study East African marimba music. Jay graduated from Wesleyan in 1976 and returned to New York City in 1977 to be proclaimed a young lion of the vibraphone. Jay Hoggard has recorded 22 CD’s as a leader and over 50 as a collaborator. His newest CD, released in 2016 on the JHVM label, is HARLEM HIEROGLYPHS. This two disc recording features Gary Bartz saxophones, James Weidman piano,organ, Nat Adderley,Jr piano,organ, Belden Bullock bass, and Yoron Israel drums. Noted jazz writer Owen McNally recently declared in his Jazz Corridor column for WNPR.org : “ Hoggard has created a triumphant jazz album, a dramatic showcase for his diverse composing skills… While the standards get royal treatment, Hoggard’s originals are the album’s crown jewels. Among these are the celebratory rent party special, "Harlem Jazzbirds Swingin’ and Swayin’"; "Sonic Hieroglyphs," an ode to jazz’s sophisticated sonic semiotics, signs and symbols expressing the sweet and bittersweet mysteries of life, and Disposable Consumption, landscaped with brilliant corners and a mysterious motif of sharp consciousness morphing in and out of an edgy, subconscious dream state… Throughout, there’s the underlying theme of the hieroglyphs of jazz, the music’s uniquely creative, emblematic lexicon, alive with nuance and layers of symbolic meaning. Hoggard’s striking gallery of sonic portraits reflects many inspirations, both artistic and personal, that nourish his imagination…Harlem Hieroglyphs is alive with open-ended potential, perhaps even as the foreshadowing of a historical and culturally-oriented musical theater work graced with evocative narrative pieces resonating with cultural relevance.

Or the album could be the gateway to programmatic tonal suites as painterly as the works by such great African-American artists as Jacob Lawrence, a master chronicler of the African-American experience, including his celebrated Migration Series. … Part of what fuels Hoggard’s soaring, imaginative flights are his passion for jazz in all its historic and cultural breadth and depth, and his fascination with the legacy of Harlem’s Golden Age, its rich, vibrant social and cultural life from sacred churches to secular shrines for jazz…Along with a host of aesthetic, intellectual and psychological inspirations resides his deep-seated sense of family, pride in its roots and history. Moved by spirituality, scholarly intensity and uncompromising integrity, the composer/savant is on a mission to use his artistic gifts to spread the good word about the power and the glory of jazz’s hieroglyphs, those myriad, mysterious, sub rosa, miraculously redemptive messages that have left a profoundly expressive, ineffable yet indelible mark on America’s creative consciousness.” Jay Hoggard’s other recordings on the JHVM label, THE RIGHT PLACE, SONGS OF SPIRITUAL LOVE, SWING ‘EM GATES, SOULAR POWER, CHRISTMAS VIBES ALL THRU THE YEAR, and SOLO FROM TWO SIDES, give listeners an opportunity to experience the many sides of this significant and vital musician. About CHRISTMAS VIBES ALL THRU THE YEAR, Jay says "This recording is about the joy, peace, love, and happiness that should traverse the world during the holiday seasons and throughout the whole year. I am a Christian, and this recording is about the reason for the Christmas season: the observance and re-enactment of the circumstances of the birth of Jesus. But this music is also an offering to human beings of all faiths and non- faiths, of the beautiful sounds of which I am blessed to be one of many, many channeling spirits." This trio recording features James Weidman on organ and piano and Bruce Cox on the drums. SOLO FROM TWO SIDES is a beautiful program of 13 Jay Hoggard compositions performed by the composer on both vibraphone and marimba, by way of digital overdubbing. SOULAR POWER, released Fall 08, is an exquisite set of eleven Jay Hoggard compositions and one jazz standard. As Hoggard says, “this CD has the feel of a live performance with the benefit of studio quality sound. New tunes are combined with others that have evolved in performance over the years. I am about music that is both aesthetically pleasing for your mind and spirit, and physically healing for your body and soul. The power of soul is a mystical paradigm of consciousness transformation .” SOULAR POWER swings with great sonic balance among its instruments and artists. Pianist/ organist James Weidman, bassist Belden Bullock, and drummer Yoron Israel have performed and recorded as an ensemble with Jay for more than fifteen years. Their performances here are of a caliber that can only be delivered by long associated, empathetic collaborators. SWING 'EM GATES, is a tribute to the late vibraphone grand master Lionel Hampton. “Eight of the compositions on this recording are tunes that I played when Lionel Hampton sent me to sub for him with his band in the 1990’s…Once, when Hamp called me to play for him, I asked what tunes he wanted. He replied, ’Just swing ‘em,gates.’ ” That conversation was the inspiration for Jays’ composition of the same name as well as the direction of this musical tribute to Hampton in Hoggard’s musical voice The recording features stellar performances by top New York collaborators with a guest appearance by piano master, Dr. Billy Taylor on three tunes. Jay Hoggard has been honored and commissioned as a composer in various contexts. In 2016 he collaborated with choreographer Nicole Stanton and writer Lois Brown on STORIED PLACES, premiered at Wesleyan University. In 2009, he was commissioned by dance troupe Sankofa Kuumba and the Hartford Symphony Orchestra to write THE OTHER SIDE OF THE OCEAN and LET ME MAKE IT CLEAR. Previously, Jay collaborated with choreographer Cleo Parker Robinson by composing THE WISDOM OF THE BAOBAB TREE commissioned by Lincoln Center Out of Doors. He was commissioned by the Hartford Festival of Jazz to compose LA TIERRA HERMOSA, dedicated to Tito Puente. He was commissioned by Wesleyan University to compose JOYFUL SWAMP and CROSSING POINT for Max Roach and percussion ensemble, and VIBARIMBALA for symphonic and jazz orchestras. As a performer, Jay Hoggard has toured the globe to rave reviews. He has performed in many of the finest venues of music presentation throughout the United States , Africa Europe, South America, the Caribbean, and Asia. Jay has performed in major venues (Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, Schomberg Center) jazz festivals (St. Lucia. JVC, Montreux, Mt.Fuji, Pori, Hartford), colleges, universities, churches, galleries, libraries, and clubs around the globe. Jay has been featured on radio (NPR, Pacifica) and television (ABC Times Square, CBS Sunday Morning, BETJazz) nationally and internationally. He led a quintet on an extensive tour sponsored by the United States government to North Africa, the Middle East and India. Jay performed in special concert collaborations with vibraphone masters Lionel Hampton, Milt Jackson, Tito Puente and Bobby Hutcherson. He has recorded and toured with creative artists such as Kenny Burrell, Dr. Billy Taylor, Max Roach, James Newton, Hilton Ruiz, Oliver Lake, Bennie Maupin, Sam Rivers, Anthony Braxton, Jorge Dalto, Terumasa Hino, Dwight Andrews, Geri Allen, Anthony Davis, Henry Threadgill, Vishnu Wood, Chico Freeman, Muhal Richard Abrams , Sherry Winston, Ahmed Abdullah, and was a guest artist with the Dizzy Gillespie Big Band. Jay has accompanied singers, instrumentalists, and poets and has performed with gospel, theater, dance, percussion, and orchestral ensembles. Jay Hoggard is a tenured Professor of Music at his alma mater, Wesleyan University. For over 25 years, he has been the director of the Wesleyan Jazz Orchestra and has taught and mentored thousands of students.

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Album Review

The Right Place by Joel Roberts

JHVM LABEL RELEASES FIVE JAY HOGGARD RECORDINGS! by Scott Yanow A very significant vibraphonist for for over 30 years, Jay Hoggard has long ranked with the greatest innovators of his instrument including Lionel Hampton, Red Norvo, Milt Jackson, Terry Gibbs, Bobby Hutcherson, Gary Burton, Khan Jamal and Walt Dickerson, as well as his contemporaries Steve Nelson, Joe Locke, and Stefon Harris. The release of five of his CDs, including SOULAR POWER and SOLO FROM TWO SIDES, gives listeners an opportunity to experience some of the many sides of this vital musician, and they document the vibraphonist's musical language during the first ten years of the 21st century. This is a major event! Jay Hoggard, who was born in Washington D.C.,grew up in a religious family in Mt Vernon, New York. He began playing the vibraphone when he was 15. At Wesleyan University in Connecticut he studied in the World Music program including traveling to Tanzania to study firsthand East African xylophone music. Soon after he graduated in 1976, Jay was recognized as an increasingly important force on his instrument, able to display his own voice in settings ranging from the avant- garde to swing, from unaccompanied solo performances to work with a wide variety of all- star performers. While his work was well documented in the late 1970s, '80s and '90s, by 2003 Jay Hoggard came to the conclusion that it was time for him to own his own music and take charge of documenting his musical dreams. “By then it had become a lot less expensive to make one's own records,” says the vibraphonist. “With the collapse of the record industry, it made perfect sense to have my own label.” Adding to the logic was that Hoggard had stored up many fresh ideas and concepts that deserved to be recorded. Jay Hoggard's current working band is documented on SOULAR POWER (2008),an exciting release consisting of 11 of his original compositions plus “On A Clear Day.” With James Weidman, Belden Bullock and drummer Yoron Israel inspiring him, Hoggard stakes his claim as one of the major vibraphonists of today, performing music that is full of subtle surprises, covers a wide range of moods, and is never predictable. Among the many highlights are the forceful post bop of “Soular Power,” the touching ballad “You're In My Heart All The Time,” the soulful “Blues Bags,” a catchy boogaloo “Sweet Potato” and the driving “Mystic Winds/Tropic Breezes.” Jay really stretches himself during a set that has the feel of a live recording. The same can be said for the frequently-stunning SOLO FROM TWO SIDES (2009). Performing unaccompanied on vibraphone and marimba, Jay Hoggard creates music that is hypnotic, intriguing, melodic, thoughtful, surprising and thoroughly original. While a handful of vibraphonists have recorded solo sets in the past (including Gary Burton, Khan Jamal and Walt Dickerson), none have sounded like this. There are many rich melodies (“Kalila's Smile” and “Riverside Dance”are two strong examples), pieces that display the African heritage (“Ujamaa”,"The Golden Ashanti", and “Rain Forest”) and new spirituals such as “In The Spirit” and “Worship God In Spirit, Truth And Love.” Each of the 13 selections is memorable in its own way. But that is to be expected for Jay Hoggard has developed his own personal voice, both as an improviser and as a composer. SWING EM GATES (2007) is a tribute to Lionel Hampton which, although featuring some of the songs that Hampton made famous (including “Flying Home,” “Memories Of You” and “Air Mail Special”), finds Jay Hoggard sounding very much like himself. “I crossed paths with Lionel Hampton on a few occasions early in my career including sharing the stage during an all-star concert. He was always very encouraging and inspiring to me, telling me to always be myself in my playing.” So close was their relationship that, when Hampton was ailing later in his career, Hoggard often substituted for him. Swing 'Em Gates has Jay Hoggard swinging his way through standards with the assistance of a trio that on three songs includes the legendary pianist Dr. Billy Taylor. SONGS OF SPIRITUAL LOVE (2004) is a set of vibraphone-organ/piano duets by Hoggard and James Weidman in which they explore the African American sacred musical vocabulary. “Since I grew up in the Afican Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, I am hard wired for these melodies which are second nature for me.” The emotional versions of such songs as “Lift Every Voice And Sing,” John Coltrane's “Dear Lord,” “His Eye Is On The Sparrow,” and “The Lord's Prayer” are very respectful but also full of exciting melodic improvisations. Especially memorable is a rendition of Hoggard's best known melody, “God Will Guide.” The earliest of the JHVM releases is THE RIGHT PLACE (2003). Featured with his quintet (the late pianist Hilton Ruiz or James Weidman on piano and organ, bassist Belden Bullock, drummer Pheeroan akLaff and Dwight Andrews on reeds) plus both Kwaku Kwaakye Obeng and Asher DeLerme on percussion, Hoggard performs nine of his originals plus Ruiz' “Guataca.” Highlights include such gems as the upbeat “The Right Place,” the Mid-Eastern feel of “ Joyful Swamp ,” “Startin The Blues En Clave,” the mysterious “Crossing Point,” and the heartfelt “Lessons From My Dad.” Also of strong interest is SOMETHING "BOUT BELIEVING, a 1999 CD put out by the Twinz Records label and made available from JHVM that features Hoggard (along with Weidman, Bullock and akLaff) performing Duke Ellington's sacred music including “Come Sunday,” “The Shepherd” and “Heaven.” Back in 1967 the youngster accompanied his father to one of Ellington's sacred concerts and the performances changed his life, inspiring him to become a musician and ultimately a major vibraphonist. The release of these diverse but consistently rewarding CDs are a major event in 21st century jazz. Not only do they feature Jay Hoggard at the peak of his powers, but they add rich melodies and superb vibraphone solos to the legacy of jazz. For more information about the Jay Hoggard or his recordings, contact Carolyn McClair Public Relations at [email protected] or www.jayhoggard.com. By Scott Yanow 2-1-10 - JHVM LABEL RELEASES FIVE JAY HOGGARD RECORDINGS! (Feb 1, 2010)

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