AND IT ALL STARTED WITH POTS AND PANS.

Byline: DENNIS McCARTHY 

``Music is what wakes me up in the morning.''

- Jeremy Jeffers

The way the kid remembers it, the first instrument he played was the drums in elementary school, but his parents have a different memory.

``Pots and pans in preschool,'' Kimberly Jeffers says, laughing. ``It was pretty amazing to hear. This little 4-year-old boy keeping perfect rhythm on my pots and pans.''

It should have been the tip-off that Walter and Kim Jeffers' son, Jeremy, had something special going inside his active mind, but musical talent wasn't on their radar screen.

They were too concerned with finding a good elementary school with programs for the blind. And making sure Jeremy learned to walk with his new prothesis.

Born three months premature and weighing only 2 pounds, Jeremy could not see with his left eye because of a detached retina, and had only limited vision in his right eye. Legally, the kid was blind.

He developed a blood clot in his right leg when he was just 3 weeks old. By the time it was detected, it was too late to save the leg. He was fitted for his first prosthesis at 2.

So the possibility that their little boy playing pots and pans in perfect rhythm on the kitchen floor was perhaps a harbinger of great musical accomplishments never entered their minds.

That would come later - when Jeremy had mastered the drums, piano and trumpet by the time he was 15. Later - when people in the music business who know a thing or two about serious talent started knocking on their door.

Gary Pratt heard the kid before he ever saw him. The co-director of jazz studies at California State University, Northridge, was at the Roxy last May with a couple of his students waiting for piano/composer jazz great Herbie Hancock to take the stage.

The jazz band from George Washington Prep High School in Los Angeles was warming up the crowd, and Pratt was focused on the sounds being put out by the lead trumpet player.

``I kept thinking, `Who is this kid? He's incredible,''' Pratt said.

Pratt checked with the band director at Washington, and found out that Jeremy had wanted to go to Long Beach State, but had been turned down for a scholarship. He was hoping maybe the University of California, Los Angeles, would accept him.

Pratt contacted Jeremy and told him that if things didn't work out, the CSUN jazz studies program would love to have him.

So this semester Jeremy entered CSUN on scholarship. And although he's only a freshman, he's quickly made a name for himself by earning a spot in the school's top Jazz ``A'' Band.

Pratt pointed him out to Bobby Shew, one of the top jazz trumpet players in the industry. Shew, who is serving as CSUN's jazz trumpet teacher this year, was lead trumpet with the Louie Belson band, and also played with the Woody Herman and Buddy Rich bands.

``The first day the kid walked in I didn't know what to expect,'' Shew said. ``He had this cheap student horn that was broken. I didn't expect much.

``When he started playing, though, I had tears running down my cheeks. He had perfect pitch. You find people with sight problems hear things we can't because they have to. They develop a tremendous musical ear.

``Ray Charles and George Shearing had it. This kid has it.''

When Jeremy came back for his second lesson, Shew handed him a new trumpet and told him to try it out.

``He asked me whose trumpet it was.'' Shew said. ``I told him, it's yours. He almost fell out of his chair.''

Music wakes him up in the morning, the kid says. It's what makes him tick, makes him almost forget that he can't see.

``I honestly believe if it wasn't for Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder, I wouldn't be playing,'' Jeremy says. ``Their music inspired me, made me believe there wasn't anything I couldn't accomplish if I worked hard enough.''

He laughs when I tell him his mother says his first instrument was not the drums, but rather her pots and pans.

``You know, my mother is the love of my life,'' Jeremy says. ``My dad is my role model. My brother and sisters constantly keep me laughing and centered.

``The support of my family has sustained me. I realize how blessed I am.''

With that, the kid picks up his trumpet and starts playing. Close your eyes and you could hear why Bobby Shew had those tears running down his cheeks.

Dennis McCarthy, [phone]

dennis.mccarthy(at)dailynews.com

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Photo:

CSUN jazz trumpet teacher Bobby Shew, left, and Gary Pratt, right, co-director of jazz studies at the university, have seen something special in Jeremy Jeffers, center. Pratt invited the young musician to study at CSUN.

Gene Blevins/Special to the Daily News