THE RECORDINGS OF BILL HARRIS discography of a master guitar player featuring only dates under Harris' name compiled by Armin Büttner revised december 28, 2010
EmArcy MG 36097, titled Bill Harris was released in 1956. EmArcy MG 36113 titled The Harris Touch was released in 1957. It was rereleased later as Mercury MG-20552 (mono) and SR-60120 (stereo) both entitled Bill Harris - Jazz Guitar.
EmArcy MG 36113 titled The Harris Touch was released in 1957. It was rereleased later as Mercury MG-20552 (mono) and SR-60120 (stereo) both entitled Bill Harris - Jazz Guitar.
This Is A Perfect Jazz Solo!
V.S.O.P 66CD was released in 1988 or 1989. There also might be an LP issue. Other tracks on The Fabulous Bill Harris are from 1973, 1975, 1982 and 1986.
V.S.O.P 66CD was released in 1988 or 1989. There also might be an LP issue. Other tracks on The Fabulous Bill Harris are from 1957, 1975, 1982 and 1986.
According to the liner notes of this LP, Harris toured France in October 1973. Although the title of Jazz Guitar Presents BH 751 suggests that all of these tracks were recorded in Paris there is a different ambience on different tracks. In a short announcement to Hommage á Krupa that Harris apparently recorded at a later date in the US he says that this track comes from a life concert in Toulouse. Harris says he composed it while he was touring france.
Found! Great Guitar Sounds By Bill Harris. Plus: Cd And Lp Compared!
Bill's Bar is the same piece that appears on Black & Blue 33.042 as Billy Bar. Watergate Blues is the same piece that appeard on Jazz Guitar 100 as Intagglio Monk Parts 1&2. As Harris writes in the liner notes to Jazz Guitar Presents BH 751:
Watergate Blues was written for a watergate barge concert in 1962? Later to be retitled Intaglio Monk for its musical likeness to Monks approach. (My musical etching of Thelonious Monk) I was advised to give the original title back to it by Jarrell and there you have it with the gap in the tapes.
Note: There is a test pressing of this LP extant that bears the number Jazz Guitar 102. So was there a Jazz Guitar 101?
Bill Kirchen: Electric Guitar: Level 3
V.S.O.P 66CD was released in 1988 or 1989. There also might be an LP issue. Other tracks on The Fabulous Bill Harris are from 1957, 1973, 1982 and 1986. The liners to V.S.O.P 66CD do not mention the town in which these tracks were recorded.
V.S.O.P 66CD was released in 1988 or 1989. There also might be an LP issue. Other tracks on The Fabulous Bill Harris are from 1957, 1973, 1975 and 1986.
V.S.O.P 66CD was released in 1988 or 1989. There also might be an LP issue. Other tracks on The Fabulous Bill Harris are from 1957, 1973, 1975 and 1982.Quite a bit has been written lately (mainly in the liner notes of albums featuring jazz guitarists) about the “liberation of the jazz guitar”. The chief liberator was of course electric amplification, which came along towards the close of the ’Thirties and completely altered the role of the guitar in jazz, taking it from the anonymity of the rhythm section and giving it a strong voice of its own, one on equal footing with the horns. As a result, the guitar quite naturally adopted a single-line, many-noted, horn-like approach, an approach which finds its fullest expression in the work of Charlie Christian and, more recently, Barney Kessel, Tal Farlow, Jim Hall, Chuck Wayne, Jimmy Raney, Kenny Burrell, Mundell Lowe and Herb Ellis, among others.
Mary Jefferson With Andrew White On Electric Bass And Guitarist Bill Harris At Charlie's Georgetown Back Room
The continued usage of this horn-like approach has inevitably resulted in a corresponding de-emphasis of those characteristic instrumental techniques which are peculiar to the guitar, techniques best exemplified in classical and Flamenco guitar music. These two approaches rely for their effectiveness on a complete exploitation of the instrument’s potential, mixing melodic, contrapuntal and harmonic elements in an astonishing complexity, and utilizing to a greater degree the elements of dynamics, shading and tonal contrasts.
A few attempts have been made to fuse the classical and jazz approaches, but generally these experiments have been as unsuccessful as they have been provocative. Brazilian guitarist Laurindo Almeida’s work with jazzman Bud Shank was a positive step, but left much to be desired in the matter of jazz feeling. The most completely satisfying results so far have been provided by Washington’s Bill Harris (no relation to the ex-Hermanite trombonist of the same name), whose striking work in two Emarcy albums has wedded both approaches neatly.
Bill’s working background is surprisingly akin to that of many young jazzmen on the present day scene in that he served a long apprenticeship in the Rock ‘n Roll field – he was the featured accompanist of the celebrated R&R group, The Clovers, for over five years. Prior to joining The Clovers Bill had studied classical guitar with the famed Washington, D.C. guitarist and teacher Sophocles Papas (a former pupil and close friend of Andres Segovia) and it was on the long gruelling road tours with the R&R group that Bill brought to a fine polish the fusion of jazz and legitimate guitar techniques. New York guitarist Mickey Baker heard Bill practising one day and was so impressed that he recommended him to Bob Shad, then director of Emarcy Records, the jazz subsidiary of the Mercury Recording Corporation. Bill recorded one album for Emarcy,
Bill Frisell Interview: “i Hear A Song And Have To Ask Myself If It's Remembered Or New”
When he isn’t teaching guitar, both classical and jazz, at his Washington studio, Bill is often on the road, appearing as a featured solo attraction. He prefers concert work to night club engagements for the simple reason that he finds the atmosphere more congenial and the audiences more attentive and appreciative. He makes frequent concert appearances at a number of colleges and universities on America’s Atlantic coast and often appears in recital before the highly demanding audiences of several of the classical guitar societies in the larger cities. It was at a concert he gave at the Philadelphia Classic Guitar Society that I first met Bill.
He is a tall, well-built, muscular man with a shy, ingratiating, almost hesitating manner about him. Hunched over his guitar, in the classic guitarist’s pose, one foot propped up on the small wooden block, all hesitation disappears as the guitar comes alive in his large hands. He follows much the same format in all his concert appearances; at the Philadelphia recital, for example, he led off with a trio of short Bach pieces, a
, all flawlessly executed – to the obvious delight of the audience, most of them guitarists themselves – before he embarked on a program of his own arrangements of popular standards. These included highly pulsant and lyrical versions of
Baldwin Bred Professional Jazz Guitarist Stokes Flames Of Family's 'musical Royalty'
) which he had brought together into a short suite to be used as the musical setting for the recitation of a number of texts from James Weldon Johnson’s
Harris’s arrangements veer sharply away from the advanced harmonic writing of the modernists. Instead, he sticks within the traditional harmonic framework of swing music, an area in which he is comfortably at ease and in which he has accomplished some truly fine and sensitive jazz work. Actually, Bill has not been greatly impressed by the work of the modernists, one infers from his comments, though he immediately follows this up with the statement that he finds something good in any kind of music that’s played well and has something valid to say. Bill’s work has much the same beauty, lyricism, charm (and solid strength as well) as the playing of such stalwarts as Benny Carter, Johnny Hodges and Harry Carney. And his R&R backgrounds insure a solid and propulsive swing in all that he does.
Bill’s work has much the same beauty, lyricism, charm (and solid strength as well) as the playing of such stalwarts as Benny Carter, Johnny Hodges and Harry Carney. And his R&R backgrounds insure a solid and propulsive swing in all that he does
Amazon.com: The Blues Soul Of Bill Harris · Complete Mercury Recordings 1956 1959 + Bonus Tracks (4 Lps On 2 Cds): Cds & Vinyl
Anyone who has ever attempted to play classical guitar and is aware of the difficulty involved in merely executing a written score, can doubly appreciate the fact of Bill’s improvising within this discipline. I was pleased to hear at the Philadelphia concert that the numbers as Bill played them then differed markedly from the recorded versions of the same tunes – the difference being due to improvisation. Bill stated that he had begun extemporizing on the themes after discussing the matter with a close friend. Both concluded that only by experimenting, by continued spontaneous expression – in short, only through improvisation – could the approach he has pioneered remain fresh, alive and valid. Also, this was the only way it could advance.
Does Bill have any plans to form a group of his own? Yes, he says, he’d like to assemble a small group; the problem would be in finding the right instrumental combination. The other horn(s) should not intrude overly on the unamplified guitar sound. He has been impressed with the blending of flute and guitar. “One night we were playing an engagement at a Montreal hotel. This was when I was still with The Clovers. There was an Afro-Cuban band playing in another room and after
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