Meet The Under 30 Summit's House Band: The High And Mighty Brass Band

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Despite pursuing what he calls “not the most practical of degrees” in college, drummer Evan Howard and his High and Mighty Brass Band are steadily carving out a niche for themselves in the competitive New York City music scene.

Just as their name suggests, this group mixes R&B, hip hop, Afro-beat and New Orleans-style funk that is very loud and very proud. They kept the crowd energized as the house band for the Under 30 Summit – playing guests like Kelly

Osbourne and Shaun Whiteon and off the mainstage with cover songs from Drake’s ”Hotline Bling” to Jason Derulo’s “Wiggle,” and kicked off the entire Summit on Oct. 5 with a parade through the Pennsylvania Convention Center.

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Evan Howard (center) and other members of the High and Mighty Brass Band play in front of Under 30 Summit attendees on Oct. 5.

Howard, 35, started the band in 2009, a few years after he had moved to the city to study jazz performance at the Manhattan School of Music. Looking to form something that was “less academic” than his earlier years of training, he created that outlet in the brassy funk of HMBB.

“Being in New York there was extreme competition trying to find something,” Howard says. “That kind of narrowed my scope of performance, and that was doing things that not everybody was interested in doing or studying.” Howard, like the rest of the band members, is a full-time working musician and needed to find that perfect recipe to stand out.