Despite selling less than 40 percent of the 10,200 tickets to the Second Annual Metropolitan International Jazz Festival in Prince George’s County, the event’s organizer deemed it a success.

“It takes a little time to get to the point where we are actually selling out,” said Emmett Roberts of Bowie-based Shortcake Entertainment Group, which created the festival. “I think that … we are leaps and bounds from the beginning point to now. I think that at this point next year, we will take another giant step.” Between 3,500 and 4,000 tickets were sold, organizers said.

This year’s event featured three nights of performances from Thursday through Saturday at Show Place Arena in Upper Marlboro. Performers ranged from keyboard player Ramsey Lewis and vocalist Jeffrey Osborne to guitarist Norman Brown and Isaac Hayes, a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

“The hopes for the future are very bright because, I’ll tell you, people are talking about this festival both at the patron level and on the artistic level,” Roberts said.

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In 2006, there were only two days of performances and about 2,500 attendees, but this year Roberts added a third day and five nights of jam sessions at the University of Maryland University Inn and Conference Center in Adelphi, from Tuesday through Saturday. During the jam sessions, musicians from the community and some of the hired acts performed. “It’s like a pickup [basketball] game,” Roberts said.

Michael Herman, County Executive Jack Johnson’s chief of staff, said he played the drums during Wednesday’s jam session.

According to Herman, “there is no reason why this [festival] can’t be on par with the Newport Jazz Festival, the Montreal Jazz Festival, the jazz festival in New Orleans.”

Roberts was not yet sure how many people attended the jam sessions.

Next year, Roberts said, he may hire a national act for each of the jam sessions. He will also begin marketing the event six to eight months in advance and to a wider audience. Marketing this year began about four months prior to the event and occurred only in the Washington area.

“We are going to keep on pushing this until we get exactly what we are looking for, which is a sellout audience months and months in advance,” Roberts said.

dfowler@dcexaminer.com