The Hammond B3 does something to a trumpet that no other instrument can. It surrounds it. A piano leaves space — the notes fall and decay, and the horn floats in the silence between them. But an organ breathes continuously, fills the room with a living harmonic field that the trumpet has to push through, lean into, ride on top of like a ship on a swell. When Justin Ray steps in front of the Brian Felix Organ Trio, the physics of the room change. The Leslie speaker rotates. The drawbars shift. And a trumpet that has filled Madison Square Garden and the Sydney Opera House finds itself inside something more intimate and more demanding — a sound that asks not how loud you can play but how honestly.
Brian Felix came to the organ through the piano, studying with Kenny Barron at Rutgers before co-leading OM Trio, the San Francisco jazz-rock group that toured nationally from 1999 to 2004 and shared stages with Tower of Power and Umphrey's McGee. After earning his doctorate — his dissertation explored what happens when rock becomes jazz, a question his playing continues to answer nightly — he landed at UNC Asheville, where he now teaches everything from jazz theory to courses on the Beatles and the Grateful Dead. His double-LP Level Up, released on his own Slimtrim Records, captures the working trio in full flight across twelve original compositions that move from straight-ahead swing to New Orleans funk to folk-gospel without ever losing the thread. The album is a map of everywhere Felix has been, and every drawbar setting is a pin in it.
Tim Fischer and Evan Martin have been Felix's trio for long enough that the unit operates on something closer to intuition than arrangement. Fischer — the USC doctorate, the modular synthesis explorer, the guy who co-authored Jazz Guitar Duets and also builds sound from voltage-controlled oscillators — brings a harmonic vocabulary that meets Felix's organ voicings in unexpected places. Martin, who came to drums through years as a guitarist, listens like a melodic player and responds to phrases rather than patterns. Together, the three of them generate a sound that is simultaneously tight and open, controlled and combustible.
Adding Ray to this equation is like introducing a weather system. His trumpet — shaped by two decades in Michael Bublé's touring band, by the Los Angeles scene with Peter Erskine and Dave Weckl, by Clifford Brown and Lee Morgan and a patience that is entirely his own — enters the organ trio's atmosphere and changes the pressure. He knows how to use silence the way most players use volume. He knows when to lead and when to disappear into the harmony and let the organ carry the weight. This is a musician who chose Asheville over arenas, who composes extended works and sings and pushes the standard of what a Monday night can hold, now standing inside a sound built from drawbars and a rotating speaker and the accumulated trust of a working band.
Four musicians. One room on Broadway Street where the art doesn't quite make sense and the cocktails are worth the trip on their own. Free, because that's how Monday nights work at Little Jumbo.
Featuring
When Brian Felix sits behind a Hammond B3, gospel church pews start swaying in jazz clubs, and cocktail lounges suddenly feel like revival meetings where the only salvation comes through swing. As the beating heart of the Brian Felix Organ Trio, Felix doesn't just play organ—he channels the entire history of American soul through drawbars and Leslie speakers, creating sonic sanctuaries where Jimmy Smith's bebop athleticism meets Jimmy McGriff's bluesy gravitas. His left hand walks bass lines that make upright players jealous while his right hand preaches sermons in chords, and when his feet find those bass pedals, the floor becomes a congregation that can't help but move. This isn't just organ jazz—this is spiritual transportation disguised as entertainment, proving that sometimes the most authentic musical experiences happen when you stop trying to be cool and start trying to be truthful.
In Asheville's Monday night jazz ecosystem, Evan Martin represents the rare breed of drummer who understands that sensitivity and power aren't opposites—they're dance partners. As a cornerstone of the local scene, Martin has mastered the art of musical telepathy, reading room dynamics and bandmate intentions with the precision of a master craftsman who knows exactly when to whisper and when to roar. His kit becomes a conversation partner rather than a time machine, responding to melodic phrases with percussive punctuation that feels both inevitable and surprising. This is drumming as collaborative art form, where every snare accent and hi-hat whisper serves the greater musical narrative, making Martin not just a timekeeper but a storyteller whose vocabulary happens to be built from wood, metal, and perfect timing.
In a scene filled with talented musicians, Justin Ray has emerged as both a formidable trumpet voice and the kind of musical leader who makes everyone around him want to dig deeper into their craft. Leading the Justin Ray Quartet with the kind of understated authority that comes from deep listening and deeper respect for the tradition, Ray embodies the collaborative spirit that keeps Asheville's jazz scene thriving. His trumpet doesn't just play melodies—it starts conversations, poses questions, and creates spaces where other musicians can discover new aspects of their own voices. This is leadership through inspiration rather than domination, proving that the best bandleaders don't just direct the music, they elevate it by recognizing and nurturing the unique gifts that each musician brings to the collective sound.
Dr. Tim Fischer exists in that rarified space where USC doctoral precision meets street-level groove, where European touring experience fuses with American jazz DNA to create something entirely his own. This guitarist-composer-educator doesn't just play jazz fusion—he reimagines what happens when classical technique meets electronic experimentation, when rock energy collides with bebop sophistication. From Los Angeles studios to St. Louis classrooms to his current faculty position at Coastal Carolina University, Fischer has built a career on proving that the most interesting music happens at the intersection of seemingly incompatible styles. His collaboration with Brian Felix on 'Level Up' and his co-authorship of 'Jazz Guitar Duets' demonstrate a musician who understands that teaching and performing aren't separate activities—they're two sides of the same creative coin, each informing the other in an endless cycle of musical discovery.