One of the most unmistakable instrumental sounds in jazz is the alto saxophone of Jackie McLean, this week's guest on Billy Taylor's Jazz at the Kennedy Center. McLean has a take-no-prisoners approach to his horn and swings hard with a touch of vinegar in his full-bodied and pleasing tone. Master teacher, composer, bandleader and Harlem native McLean shares numerous memories of his formative years with Dr. Taylor, who fondly remembers the scene in the early '50s when Jackie was coming up.

Growing up in Harlem in the famed Sugar Hill district, McLean credits his mother, a church piano player, for his early musical inspiration. He regales the audience with memories of growing up in a neighborhood full of current and rising jazz stars. "In my neighborhood were the greatest musicians in the world: Duke Ellington, Don Redman, Andy Kirk, Nat Cole, Benny Carter, Arnett Cobb -- there was just an endless list of great musicians walking around that neighborhood at that time." McLean's godfather, Norman Cobbs, played the soprano saxophone in church, and he helped young Jackie get started at age 14. The great pianist Bud Powell was an early mentor. "He allowed me to sit around in his house a lot, and he taught me some basic tunes, like 'Ornithology.' It gave me a lot of insights into the music," McLean reflects.

McLean joined the Miles Davis band at age 18, and he credits Miles with helping to accelerate his musical growth. On his own instrument, McLean acknowledges alto saxophonist Charlie "Bird" Parker as a huge influence. McLean had to work hard at not sounding like Bird, particularly after he joined the Charles Mingus band. While playing Mingus, the volatile bandleader urged him to find his own voice. McLean went on to record for both the Prestige and Blue Note labels before taking a teaching assignment at the Hartt School of Music of the University of Hartford in 1968. There, he established an Afro-American Studies curriculum and continues to turn out numerous fine young musicians. A pillar of the Hartford community, McLean and his wife, Dollie, have gone on to establish an exemplary community arts school and performance center, the Artists Collective.

Ever the teacher, in response to an audience query about the influence of tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon on him, McLean relates that he asks his students to learn Gordon's sax solo on "Dexter's Deck" note-for-note. "A lot of people don't realize that you have to go through somebody in order to develop your own style," he suggests. In response to a question from an aspiring artist on the relationship between jazz and classical music, Jackie draws laughter from the audience by recalling that when he grew up he and his peers considered cowboy and movie music to be classical music. Then he goes on to talk about his great respect for western classical music, to which Charlie Parker introduced him via Igor Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring."

Musical selections include a blistering "Lover," "Solar," a lovely "Never Let Me Go," and the bop classic "A Night In Tunisia," as Jackie and Dr. Taylor's trio get an opportunity to really stretch out.