Sam First Wednesday Jazz Residency

Fifty-five seats, no bad ones, close enough that you hear the breath before the note. Musicians fly into LAX and play the same night because the room is five minutes from the airport, so the bill on any given evening might include the touring player who happened to have a day off. Sam First is that rare thing -- a jazz club built for the acoustic intimacy of a New York room, dropped a few minutes from the runway in Inglewood.

The booking philosophy is simple and unbending: working jazz musicians playing standards and originals at a level that the city's own working jazz musicians show up to watch. Two sets nightly, Tuesday through Saturday, at seven-thirty and nine-thirty. Wednesday is Hump Day -- reduced cover, same booking, same room. The crowd is the LA jazz community plus whatever visiting players are in town with the night free.

This is the show you drag the friend to who says they don't get jazz -- fifty-five seats will fix that. Twenty dollars Wednesday cover; drinks separately.