May 02, 2026
The Night the Power Went Out at Mezzrow
No amps, no lights, forty people and a room the size of a railroad apartment. We played acoustic in the dark for an hour. Best the band has sounded in years, and I have a theory about why.
Ray Petrov
Jazz Bassist / Brooklyn, NY
Brooklyn Bass Lines
Straight swing. Deep pockets.
Stories from the road.
Melody
— Ray Petrov
is a conversation.
The bass
keeps it honest.
Upcoming Shows
Latest Release
Midnight
at Greenpoint
Listen Now →
The Player
Forty years in the pocket.
Ray Petrov bought his first upright in 1981 from a pawn shop on Flatbush Avenue for eighty dollars and a transistor radio. The neck was warped, the action was criminal, and he played it six hours a day anyway. By the time he could afford a better instrument, he didn’t want one — the fight in that old bass had become his sound.
Four decades later, Petrov has held down the bottom for half the working bandstands in New York: sideman on more than sixty records, first-call anchor for singers who needed the time kept honest, and a fixture of the late sets where the real conversations happen. He never chased the spotlight. He built the floor everyone else stood on.
Midnight at Greenpoint, recorded live over two nights last winter, is his last album. Not a farewell tour, he insists — just the last record. “The gigs keep going,” he says. “I’m only done telling the tape machine about it.”
Notices
What the papers say.
Petrov doesn’t play the bass so much as hold the whole room to its word. The steadiest left hand in Brooklyn.
— The Bedford Ledger
A walking line from Ray Petrov is a short story with a beginning, a middle, and a punchline you never see coming.
— Night Set Quarterly
Sixty-three records as a sideman and not one wasted note. The quartet’s late sets are the best argument going for staying out past midnight.
— The Borough Sun
Discography
The records, as leader.
Journal
Stories from the road.
Apr 11, 2026
On Gut Strings, and Other Stubbornness
Every few years a well-meaning young player tells me steel would make my life easier. He’s right. That’s exactly the problem. Some notes are supposed to cost you something.
Mar 19, 2026
What I Learned Carrying a Bass Up Four Flights for 40 Years
People ask why I never switched to electric. They have never heard the sound a flatback makes in a stairwell at two in the morning. It is the most honest review you will ever get.
The Tip Jar
Keep the man in strings.
No label, no manager, no streaming arithmetic — just a bassist, a band, and the people in the room. If the music has done you a kindness, the jar is right here.
*A down payment on a set of gut strings. They know what they cost.
Bookings & Inquiries
The Mailing List
One letter a month, typed the old way: where the quartet is playing, what’s on the music stand, and the occasional story too long for the journal. No noise, ever. Unsubscribe by simply telling Ray to knock it off.