By Lisa Provence

It was a classic case of the hook: Robert Jospe came to town in 1981 with pals John D'earth and Dawn Thompson, intending to spend the summer. He never left.

Jospe is a jazz drummer, and a cruel fact is that even the biggest jazz musicians don't sell that many CDs. Since he lives in Charlottesville instead of jazz towns like New York it's all the more amazing that Down Beat Magazine rated Jospe's latest CD, Blue Blazes, one of the best CDs of 2001.

The reviews of Blue Blazes and the Jospe-led group, Inner Rhythms, positively glowed: "...Jospe directs a wild music ride... He makes big noise on the traps..." (Down Beat); "...uncommonly fresh and expansive" (Washington Post); and "what makes Inner Rhythm exhilarating is how monster drummer Jospe... showcases rhythmic elements" (64 Magazine).

That Blue Blazes was reviewed at all, Jospe acknowledges, is thanks to the name-recognition factor of his old friend and seven-time Grammy winner Michael Brecker. "His name is what interested some of the reviewers right off the bat. I'm relatively unknown on that CD," says Jospe.

Jospe calls his music "modern contemporary jazz with a world beat direction," or to lift from his publicity package, "world beat meets Blue Note."

"We're slanted to dance-oriented grooves rather than the usual sit-down jazz situations," he explains, and he mentions Afro-Cuban and Brazilian influences as big contributors to his world beat style.

As for the Blue Note factor, Jospe attended NYU during the late '60s and early '70s, the heyday of Blue Note Records, the label on which anyone who was anybody in jazz recorded.

And what young, aspiring jazz musician wasn't influenced by legends Miles Davis and John Coltrane? Their drummers particularly intrigued Jospe: he studied with Tony Williams at NYU and became friends with Elvin Jones.

Blue Blazes includes other mainstays of the Charlottesville and Richmond jazz scene: D'earth, Royce Campbell, Jeff Decker, Pete Spaar, Kevin Davis, and Bob Hallahan. The latter four will be joining Jospe for an Inner Rhythm performance Sunday, February 17, at the Carysbrook Pavilion in Fluvanna.

Jospe has performed with Pat Metheny, Joe Henderson, Dave Matthews, Tim Reynolds, Carter Beauford, and John McCutcheon. And he's played with D'earth since high school. For years he was a regular at D'earth's Thursday night gigs at Miller's, and he was a founding member of the Free Bridge Quintet.

Inner Rhythms' sophomore CD is well under way and should be released by late spring. "I think the next CD will be easier to get reviewed and played," Jospe says. Because even having a well-regarded CD doesn't free a well-regarded jazz musician from having to act as his own business manager. "It all comes down to getting gigs," he says.

It's not a bad life for a jazz musician to be on the performing faculty at UVA and to play throughout the mid-Atlantic, but Jospe's goal is to have enough exposure to be invited to the larger jazz festivals. And his dream, like that of every other musician not on the Dave Matthews level, is basic: "To have an agent booking me so I can focus on the my music.

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