When Harris demonstrated an idea, the cellphones came out to capture the moment on video. The tune was Bud PowellвЂ™s вЂњDance of the Infidels.вЂќ вЂњAs Coleman Hawkins told me,вЂќ Harris said, вЂњyou donвЂ™t play chords вЂup thereвЂ™, you play вЂdown there.вЂ™ Little chords,вЂќ he emphasized. The class began almost imperceptibly with one student picking out chords and Harris softly commenting by his side, the other students hanging on his every word. Where else can you study with someone who can say, вЂWhen I played with Coleman Hawkins, he said such and such?вЂ™вЂќ Then when I came to BarryвЂ™s workshop, I realized this is it: the secret. But I always knew there was some underlying logic that I was not able to get. вЂњI went to Berklee,вЂќ he said, вЂњand learned a lot there. Isaac Raz, 50, the stranger who had advised me to lose my ego, told me heвЂ™d been coming to the workshop almost every Tuesday night since 2012. In January, he was named a вЂњLegend of Jazz EducationвЂќ at the annual Jazz Education Network (JEN) conference in Reno, Nev. HeвЂ™s teaching all levels at once, from a 12-year-old kid to Chuck Israels, who comes by whenever heвЂ™s in town.вЂќ Among his other students over the years: John Coltrane and Paul Chambers.ДЄlthough HarrisвЂ™ teaching style is famously unorthodox, over the years jazz studies programs like that of the New School have begun to adopt his approach to building technique, especially his unique harmonic theory. IвЂ™ve never seen anything remotely close to what he does. вЂњThe workshop is an immersive experience. вЂњHe and Monk would sit for hours and play one song, and find all the different ways to play it,вЂќ jazz pianist, educator, and Harris acolyte Eli Yamin told me in a phone call a few days earlier. In the 1970s, he famously lived with Thelonious Monk in the Weehawken, N.J., house owned by the Baroness Pannonica de Koenigswarter, where he still lives. Named an NEA Jazz Master in 1989, he was a key player in bebopвЂ™s early years, sitting in with his idol Charlie Parker вЂњthree or four times,вЂќ he told me in a pre-workshop interview, as well as with Lester Young, Max Roach, Coleman Hawkins, and Dexter Gordon. By the time the singing started, there were upwards of 50 people in the room, and it got more crowded still when the improv class began.ДЄt 89, Harris is still intellectually agile even as his stride has slowed, the result of a fall two years ago in Bologna, Italy, in which he fractured two ribs.

vocals from 8 to 10 and improvisation for all instruments from 10 to midnight. The workshop is actually three workshops: piano from 6 to 8 p.m. I was among a diverse group of 20 pianists of various ages and skill levels, all crowded around Harris as he sat at the grand piano. The location was a large rehearsal studio on the 10th floor of a building just off Broadway, around the corner from the Ed Sullivan Theater. I decided to attend anyway and defer my decision about whether to play until I got there. There was, however, one thing holding me back: I was nervous about playing before the master. After seeing Harris play two exhilarating sets at LondonвЂ™s Pizza Express Jazz Club last August before an adoring crowd, many of whom had attended his master class earlier that day, I realized that I, a New Yorker and jazz pianist, needed to visit the workshop and report on the experience. Barry HarrisвЂ™ weekly New York City jazz workshops was getting under way on a Tuesday night in December, a friendly stranger gave me some advice: вЂњLeave your ego behind.вЂќДЇor years I had heard about these public sessions where anyone with $15, regardless of ability or previous experience, could spend six hours with the bebop piano legend.

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