Trumpeter Greg Glassman sits down with saxophonist Stacy Dillard for a conversation — along with the two of them improvising on their instruments — about what it means, and what it takes, to make it as a jazz musician in New York City.
“I just knew I had this what I had to spend my time on, with, the instrument. That was first thing, but I knew I wanted to do this, in like high school, and then throughout college, and then I needed something to, to give me a little little confidence boost,” Dillard recalls. “And that’s when I ran into like Myron Walden and Wynton [Marsalis] and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, all these guys, in Dayton, Ohio, because I went to school in Ohio. And, you know, it’s my first real contact with some New York cats, and I ended up sitting in. And that was the boost to say, ‘Okay, now the next step is New York,’ because they saying I could cut it. You know, now, now I’m starting to see it. Now. I’m starting to believe it. So no joke, two weeks after that I was here. Never visited, just came, and I’ve been grinding ever since.”
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