PODCAST: Inside Berklee—Jason Palmer

Jazz trumpeter, composer, and educator Jason Palmer discusses his music and more as he prepares to lead a Berklee septet at the Newport Jazz Festival.

June 30, 2017

Trumpeter, composer, and educator Jason Palmer, assistant professor of ensembles and brass at Berklee, will lead a Berklee septet in performances at two of this summer's top jazz festivals: the Newport Jazz Festival and the Toronto Jazz Festival. Noted as one of the "top 25 trumpeters of the Future" by DownBeat, which has awarded four stars to multiple Palmer albums, he has performed with Herbie Hancock, Roy Haynes, Common, Ravi Coltrane, Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, and many more. For more than a decade, Palmer has led the house band at Boston's historic Wally's Jazz Café. Palmer also costarred in Damien Chazelle's Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench, a critically acclaimed independent forefather to the Oscar-winning director's hit film, La La Land.

In this podcast, Palmer discusses his most recent release, Beauty 'n' Numbers: The Sudoku Suite, and shares a track from it while discussing his forthcoming new album, the upcoming festival shows, and more.

"Remain in the game long enough and you'll get to play," Palmer says, offering advice to his students. "You're going to hear 'no' a lot. For all the sessions I've had, I've had plenty of rejections. Just stay in it."

Producer: Mike Keefe-Feldman
Engineer: Brian Rajaratnam
Recorded at the BIRN Studios