Jay Hoggard

Born in Washington, DC and raised in Mt. Vernon, New York, vibraphonist JAY HOGGARD took piano lessons from his mother and studied alto saxophone at Duke Ellington’s Second Sacred Concert at Mother AME Zion Church in Harlem. After meeting Ellington, Hoggard knew that he “wanted to play music,” and at 16 he began playing the vibraphone. Hoggard majored in the music program at Wesleyan University and later toured Europe, played Carnegie Hall with Wesleyan teacher Clifford Thornton, and traveled to Tanzania on a Wesleyan grant to study East African xylophone music. After graduation, he returned to New York City, where the New York Times soon proclaimed him “the most dazzling new vibraphonist in jazz”.