Jam session

A jam session is a relatively informal musical event, process, or activity where musicians, typically instrumentalists, play improvised solos and vamp over tunes, drones, songs, and chord progressions.

[3] Influenced by jazz, Cuban music saw the emergence of improvised jam sessions during the filin movement of the 1940s, where boleros, sones and other song types were performed in an extended form called descarga.

During the 1950s these descargas became the basis of a new genre of improvised jams based on the son montuno with notable jazz influences pioneered by the likes of Julio Gutiérrez and Cachao.

[4] As the instrumental proficiency of rock musicians improved in the 1960s and early 1970s, onstage jamming—free improvisation—also became a regular feature of rock music; bands such as Pink Floyd, Cream, The Rolling Stones, the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Deep Purple, The Who, the Grateful Dead, AC/DC, Led Zeppelin, Santana, King Crimson, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Steely Dan, and the Allman Brothers Band would feature live improvised performances that could last 10 to 20 minutes or longer.

Members of the Soulquarians, an alternative-minded black music collective active from the late 1990s to the early 2000s, held jam sessions while recording their respective albums at Electric Lady Studios.

"[5] According to music journalist Michael Gonzales, their sessions were marked by an experimentation with "dirty soul, muddy water blues, Black Ark dub science, mix-master madness, screeching guitars, old school hip-hop, gutbucket romanticism, inspired lyricism, African chats and aesthetics, pimpin' politics, strange Moogs, Kraftwerk synths and spacey noise."

[5] Bilal held improvisatory jam sessions while recording his second album, Love for Sale, at Electric Lady, although its experimental direction alienated his label from releasing it, and a subsequent leak led to its indefinite shelving.

[5] In 2018, leading up to the Grammy Awards, the Roots used their four-day residency at the Gramercy Theatre in New York to "revive a long tradition of jam-session concerts with unannounced special guests," including Common, Big K.R.I.T., Wyclef Jean, Roxanne Shanté, Gary Clark Jr., and Mtume.