JAY HOGGARD

 

Vibraphonist, Composer Jay Hoggard’s music has touched the hearts and souls of listeners around Planet Earth for  40 years. 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.  

Jay Hoggard has long ranked with the greatest vibraphone innovators. He has been one of the most enduring and innovative masters on his instrument since the 1970s.  A direct musical descendant of  Lionel Hampton, Milt Jackson, Lem Winchester, and Bobby Hutcherson, Hoggard’s omni-directional artistry encompasses the myriad musical dimensions of the African Diaspora and its spiritual resonances 

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 and his mother was an elementary school teacher with an MA in special education. Duke Ellington's music was a family affair that sparked his career as a musician. “My father was involved in presenting the premiere of the Second Sacred Concert in 1967 at  Mother AME Zion Church in Harlem. I was 12,” Hoggard says. “I got to meet Ellington, and that was a life-changing experience. That was before I started playing the vibraphone.” 

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Photos  : Artist Web Site