It started with Jackie Craighead, who, on a sun-soaked Memorial Day Sunday, said four portentously innocuous words: “You should stick around.”

The place was the Hyatt Regency Hotel’s Fireside Lounge. Former Monterey resident, Brazilian-born pianist Weber Iago, was back in town to play a free-flowing, effortlessly elegant set at the musically receptive spot. Soon a lazy Sunday afternoon, saturated by the clinking and tinkling of brunch and murmurs of conversation, segued into an all-star musical reverie scored by some of the best – and unannounced – musicians from local, regional, national and international stages that music-steeped Monterey County can consistently see outside of the jazz and blues festivals.

Longtime local jazz singer and emcee Lee Durley held the reins to an afternoon of which some derivation has gone down the last Sunday of every month for 15 or so years.

“It started at the Ramada Inn,” said Durley, in a gravelly voice, “as a memorial for [former local jazz] writer John Detro.”

And it kept going, with a life of its own, to its present incarnation, which last month drew in saxophone maestro George Young (“Tony Bennett’s first call,” Durley says); former Stevie Wonder flutist Kenny Stahl; Great American Songbook singer John Lawrence, who’s been coming for as long as the jam sessions have been going; drummer extraordinaire Kim Edmundson; and saxophonist Roger Eddy, whom Edmundson calls the “father of Monterey jazz.” (Eddy was only listening; he didn’t bring his horn.)

Andy Weiss sat in on percussion, trading the sticks with KSBW weatherman Jim Vanderzwaan, who’s surprisingly nimble on the skins.

“This is Dr. David Morwood’s gig,” said drummer Billy Jones, though the maestro was absent this day. “It’s really just a place for local musicians to gather, jam, and have some jazz fun.”

It was Durley’s birthday, and that of former big band singer Ree Brunell, 82, who was just having brunch with Craighead and friends, but was goaded into performing a lively “The Lady is a Tramp.” Afterwards, the racy songstress implored the crowd, “Can I go home and feed my cat now?”

Jan Deneau kept a low profile, choosing to listen instead of sit in on the piano. Trumpeter Stan Soroken also chose a discreet spot in the audience.

And so it went, for several supple and strong hours – a turntable of incredible and convivial musicians including drummer Billy Jones, who’s gigged with Sammy Davis Jr. and Stanley Clarke, and CSUMB’s first Jazz Studies graduate, bassist Steve Uccello, who can play rhythm and lead at the same damned time. They rotated and shared songs like “On the Street Where You Live,” “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and “Someone to Watch Over Me.”

Kenny Stahl’s wife, Mary Anna, said that bassists Pete Lipps and Dan Robbins, pianists Marshall Otwell and Eddie Mendenhall and sax man Gary Meek often come. Billy Jones added that one never knows who’s going to show up, but that when big deals like the Jazz Festival, or this weekend’s Blues Festival arrive, the high-caliber musical visitors know about Fireside Lounge – and they come to jam.

THE DAVID MORWOOD/LEE DURLEY SUNDAY JAZZ JAM takes place the last Sunday of the month, 2-7pm, including this Sunday; the Blues Festival jams take place 7-11pm Thursday and 9pm-1am Friday through Saturday, at Hyatt Regency Hotel’s Fireside Lounge, 1 Old Golf Course Road, Monterey. Free. 372-1234.