Flint jazz legend Sherm Mitchell ....

By Scott Atkinson, on May 06, 2013 at 7:00 PM, updated May 07, 2013 at 3:22 PM

FLINT, MI -- It's been about 20 years since Eric Hoffman stood in Sherm Mitchell's musical instrument repair shop, listening to Mitchell dish out his musical wisdom – whether it was asked for or not – but there's one thing the late local jazz legend told him that he'll never forget.

"He said to me one time, music does not care how old you are. The only thing it cares about is how much time you give to it," Hoffman said.

Over the course of his life, Mitchell opened and owned Sherm's Musical Instrument repair and helped young musicians on to to promising futures. He played with and knew practically every musician in the area and traveled the world playing jazz. He wrote music for PBS and was recognized by former President Bill Clinton. He was a man who took his own advice, who gave every bit of time he could to his music before he died May 4 at age 83 following a long bout with cancer.

Sherman, "Sherm" Mitchell performs at "Sherm's Day," a 2011 concert at the Flint Art Fair where local musicians held a concert in his honor. Mitchell played on every set.

Hoffman now makes his living as a singer and trombone player in New York. Growing up in Flint, he said there weren't a lot of places to take his interest in music until he met Mitchell at his shop, still in operation at the corner of Lapeer Road and Dort Highway.

"As I grew to be more of a jazz fan and aspiring jazz musician, I would go over there  and he would share knowledge. It was a beautiful thing," he said. "We would talk about music, we would talk about improvising. It wasn't so much formal lessons, per se. There was a time when people didn't go to school to be a jazz musician. It was one on one. It was an oral experience. It was more like that. ... He was very generous with his music, our music. He was a special guy."

Anthony Wynn started working for Mitchell in the shop in 1982, two years after it opened. Like Hoffman, he learned a lot from hearing Mitchell talk about music, though he jokes that over the years, it became something you just got used to – one of Mitchell's many quirks.

"I wouldn't say he was a philosopher, but he would get going," Wynn said, breaking into a deeper, raspier voice he uses to impersonate Mitchell, "'You know if you think about this...' Oh, he would go on."

Read more: http://www.mlive.com/entertainment/flint/index.ssf/2013/05/local_jazz_legend_sherm_mitche.html