Jazz Articles about Gene Harris

Gene Harris: Alley Cats

by Ed Kopp
December 1, 1999

If you like your jazz tinted with gospel, blues and soul, you gotta love Gene Harris' two-fisted piano work. Alley Cats is vintage Harris. Recorded live at Jazz Alley in Seattle, the album features the leader’s quartet (guitarist Frank Potenza, bassist Luther Hughes and drummer Paul Kreibich) along with veteran saxophonists Red Holloway and Ernie Watts. Harris and the saxmen establish the energy level here, and they don't hold anything back.Harris' goal for Alley Cats was ...

Gene Harris: Alley Cats

by C. Michael Bailey
December 1, 1999

Blues March. West Coast Pianist Gene Harris averages about one release per year. The bluesmeister chooses appropriately to close the century and millennium with a live recording, the venue where he dons his best face. Recorded at Seattle’s Jazz Alley (hence the disc title) in 1998, Harris continues his trend of using his daughter Niki as a guest vocalist and Brother Jack McDuff on the Hammond B-3. For earlier evidence of this trend, check out 1996’s In His Hands (Concord ...

Gene Harris: Down Home Blues & The Best Of The Three Sounds

by Ed Kopp
August 1, 1999

Gene Harris is one of my all-time favorite jazz pianists. A founding father of the early soul-jazz movement, Harris plays with the elegance of Oscar Peterson, the funkiness of Horace Silver, and the bluesy feel of an old boogie-woogie master. Critics haven't always taken to Harris, mainly because his music is so damn accessible. But to my mind he's one of those rare artists who makes complex music sound infectious.

Down Home Blues is an enjoyable release pairing Harris with ...

Gene Harris & The Philip Morris Superstars: Live

by Ed Kopp
April 1, 1999

If aliens landed in my front yard tomorrow and demanded to hear a quintessential jazz recording, I might offer them Live. This is the sort of smooth mainstream effort that originally turned me on to jazz. The music is hardly cutting-edge, but it's accessible, swinging, and thoroughly drenched in the blues. Live was recorded on April 22, 1995, and features seven distinguished jazz elders who gathered at San Diego's University Club for a performance that closed out a ...

Gene Harris and the Philip Morris All-Stars: Live

by C. Michael Bailey
January 1, 1999

Good News/Bad News. The editors of The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD, LP & Cassette sum up Gene Harris' craft by stating that, “Harris is always going to end up making the same record, but so far it still sounds pretty good". I agree. Gene Harris, Ray Bryant, Junior Mance, and Monty Alexander all play a brand of bluesy, churchy piano, steeped in the gospel and bebop traditions that I find very appealing. Gene Harris is a blues expert ...

Gene Harris: Live

by Jim Santella
December 1, 1998

Gene Harris and the Philip Morris All-Stars recorded a live session in 1995 at The University Club in San Diego. A finer group of jazz all-stars would be hard to find. With the pianist serving as the glue that holds it all together, Harris’ soulful piano catches fire on the first number and never lets up. George Mraz walks the bass lines confidently and delivers rooted riffs. Kenny Burrell adds some rhythmic color from time to time and stretches out ...

Gene Harris & the Philip Morris All-Stars: Live

by Jack Bowers
December 1, 1998

All–Stars? They don’t shine much brighter than this. Most of these gentlemen have been winning Jazz polls and receiving other well–deserved honors for many years. The exception is drummer Nash, a relative newcomer who isn’t winning many polls — yet — but should be, and who certainly isn’t out of place among these heavyweights. This concert, recorded in April 1995 at the University Club in San Diego, California, was part of a seminar whose focus was, appropriately enough, free speech, ...