Jazz bassist Bill Crow plays Madison

“I’m still finding my way around the bass,” says jazz musician Bill Crow. “Every job I’ve taken has been a different lesson.”

That attitude may explain, in part, why Crow continues to enjoy performing – even though he will turn 88 next month.

A veteran musician whose resume includes jobs with such figures as Gerry Mulligan, Dizzy Gillespie, and Marian McPartland, Crow’s next gig will be at Shanghai Jazz in Madison this Sunday, Nov. 15.

Crow will be joined by guitarist Flip Peters at Shanghai Jazz. “We’ll sing a little, play a little, tell a few stories,” says Crow. “We’ll feel our way through it.”

The performance is the latest in the series of monthly Sunday afternoon socials sponsored by the New Jersey Jazz Society.

Crow says that his and Peters’ set is likely to be informed by the Great American Songbook. “The era of jazz players I grew up with was based on popular songs,” he says. “Jerome Kern, Irving Berlin, Cole porter – you had some really wonderful writers.”

“I still remember songs I heard in the 1930s with my ear glued to the radio,” he adds. “I play with musicians who are one-third of my age, and I’ll mention songs they’ve never heard of.”

That early exposure to music took place in Washington State, where Crow was born on Dec. 27, 1927. His mother played piano, and she taught him to sing and to pick notes on a keyboard.

Crow started playing trumpet and baritone horn in school bands. In high school he branched out to alto saxophone and the drums. He also fell in love with jazz, using money earned from paper routes to buy jazz records.

During his military service after World War II, Crow played in Army bands in Washington State and Maryland. Following his discharge, he attended University of Washington for a time before moving to New York City in 1950.

Around that time, at the suggestion of musician friends, Crow picked up the bass. Crow says he worked hard at the instrument. “I could hear in my head what I wanted it to sound like, but I couldn’t figure out how to do it,” he says.

His apprenticeship included gigs at Charlie’s Tavern, a popular spot for musicians at Seventh Avenue and 51st Street. He began meeting an expanding circle of performers, including Dave Lambert, Marian McPartland, Gerry Mulligan, and Stan Getz.

Since the 1950s, Crow has also played numerous one- or two-night gigs with a host of artists, such as Zoot Sims and Clark Terry. He has especially fond memories of the July night in 1958 when he sat in with the Duke Ellington Orchestra.

For Crow, the essence of jazz is the rhythm, which takes on a life of its own. “Once you get the ball rolling down a hill, you don’t have to push it,” he says. “You just keep it going in the right direction. When you’re doing it right, it goes on its own.”

“With jazz, you do your own dance,” Crow says. “You keep to the chords and pick the notes that are still surprising. Some nights you do it better than on other nights.”

From the mid-1970s to the late 1980s, Crow also supplemented his jazz work by playing in the brass sections of the orchestras of several Broadway musicals, such as “42nd Street” and a revival of “The King and I.”

Crow still plays regularly in clubs and eateries in the greater New York City area. “Playing is my method of meditating,” he says. “That’s the state I get in. I like the resonance of the bass.”

As for the future, Crow feels that jazz is capable of surviving well into the future. “It’ll probably never be as close to popular music as it was in the 1940s,” he says. “There’s a whole generation of younger players that I meet who are very good.”

“The pleasuring of improvising jazz is a gift that people will discover and delight in,” Crown concludes. “I’m very lucky to still be able to do it.”

BILL CROW & FLIP PETERS

WHEN: 3:30 p.m. Sunday

(Doors open at 3 p.m.)

WHERE: Shanghai Jazz, 24 Main St., Madison

ADMISSION: Free for New Jersey Jazz Society members, $10 for others (which may be applied toward membership in the society). Additional $10 food-beverage minimum.

INFORMATION: 973-822-2899 or www.shanghaijazz.com or www.njjs.org