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By Laurie Heuston February 05. 2016 2:00AM Mark Hamersly and Dave Scoggin at The Wild Goose Mark Hamersly, left, and David Scoggin rehearse at Scoggin's studio at Briscoe ArtWing. Mail Tribune / Denise Baratta As first-call musicians, Mark Hamersly and Dave Scoggin say it's key to know lots of material. Hamersly made a living for 30 years playing upright bass and guitar around the Monterey Peninsula, and pianist Scoggin is a regular on Southern Oregon's music scene and teaches jazz history at Southern Oregon University. "I was based in Santa Cruz," says the 51-year-old Hamersly. "Monterey is a hotter spot for gigs, and I found myself driving there often, playing hotel lounges. In my dreams, I'm playing bossa novas on a nylon-stringed guitar while the audience eats their lobster and seafood." He'd ask to be booked at the high-end Hyatt Regency during Monterey Jazz Festivals so that he could jam with big-name musicians coming from the festival's performances. One of his fondest memories is jamming on the classic "I Can't Get Started with You" with trumpet player Wynton Marsalis. "We'd never met, but we looked right at each and played without looking at a chart," Hamersly says. Hamersly moved to Southern Oregon in 2014 to be with his girlfriend, who he met at a gig at Monterey Plaza Hotel. Hamersly and Scoggin will play at 6 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 6, at The Wild Goose Cafe, 2365 Highway 66, Ashland. "I get a lot of calls to play upright bass," he says. "It has more of an authentic jazz sound, especially in big bands. My first instrument, though, is guitar, and the styles I'm used to playing are jazz, standards, classical and bossa nova. I played four-string electric bass like Jaco Pastorius with a pan-Latin band called Tocara in Santa Cruz. We did everything from Peruvian beats, salsa, tango, merengue and Mexican folkloric." He also played a show or two with samba and salsa band SambaDa — when the band's regular bassist was out. "I'd love to be in a band that plays Brazilian-style bossa nova or choros. Those are my favorite styles. The sound places more emphasis on melody and less on percussion. I like the sound of a soft string and prefer nylon to steel. Even the strings on my bass are nylon-covered. "I like playing solo, in a duo, behind vocalists or in small situations," he says."So I know a lot of tunes." Since moving to Talent, Hamersly's jammed at The Hardware Cafe with local jazz musicians, worked as a bassist with the Southern Oregon Jazz Orchestra and as a guitarist with pianist Ben Gault's Bear Creek Jazztet, he says. He's also working on a project with trumpeter Randy Scherer and sax player Gordon Greenley. Email Hamersly at [email protected]. Scoggin is well-versed in jazz styles. He plays solo and freelances with various groups. He moved to the Rogue Valley after music careers in Minneapolis and San Francisco. He heads up jazz trio Opus 3. "The first time I heard Hamersly play was at a jam session at drummer Tom Stamper's house," Scoggin says. "I left there thinking he sounded pretty good. When we play The Wild Goose, we keep our music on the bluesy side of jazz since the venue is more of a working-man's bar or old-fashioned blues bar. We want to give listeners a chance to connect, and now and then we'll do jazzy versions of '70s pop. "I sing a little more than I would at other gigs. I play tons of Dr. John songs. I could do those all night. We often close the show with 'Goin' Back to New Orleans.' My song list is around 400 tunes. That's enough material to play 20 gigs without repeating a song. We pull out all kinds of stuff." Scoggin is a big Miles Davis fan and plays much of the late bandleader's neo-classic jazz style.  "I learned so much from Davis' albums," Scoggin says. "From '54 until '65, his piano players were Thelonius Monk, Horace Silver, Red Garland, Wynton Kelly and Herbie Hancock. You can get a full history of jazz piano by listening to those Miles Davis albums. There was always the very best pianist or the next up-and-coming pianist. Hancock still sets the standard. "From the '20s to the '60s, the evolution of jazz was to make it more complex, give it deeper harmonies and rhythms, then Davis stepped in with electric instruments and rock and funk beats to create fusion in the '70s, and jazz veered from its decades-long progression."     http://www.mailtribune.com/article/20160205/ENTERTAINMENT/160209883 © 2016 Copyright © 1995-2011 Crain Communications Inc. All Rights Reserved. Terms of Use Privacy Statement -->