March 5, 2009 Issue
Pure Mountain Soul
Lenoir’s Harris Brothers Return to Canyons March 13
From swinging Chicago blues and traditional mountain music to classic rock and country, Lenoir natives The Harris Brothers know how to find the groove. The duo will return to the High Country for a show at Canyons on Friday, March 13. One need look no further than YouTube.com to witness the incredible musical range that has long made The Harris Brothers a musical act to be heard and seen. Whether shuffling through jazzy ragtime numbers with friend David Holt, belting out the rocking rhythms of Muddy Waters’ “I’m Ready” at one of Boone’s Mountainhome Music concerts or boogieing through J.J. Cale’s “Call Me The Breeze,” at the Hickory Tap Room, brothers Reggie and Ryan play and sing like only brothers can.
On Friday, March 13, The Harris Brothers will bring their unique blend of American roots music to Canyons in Blowing Rock. There is no cover charge and the show will start at 10:00 p.m.
For more than decade, The Harris Brothers have been burning up venues throughout western North Carolina. With Ryan on bass and lead vocals and Reggie on guitar and harmony vocals, the pair have been proving that it doesn’t take more than two people to create a big sound. The Harris Brothers’ musical evolution began when the boys were small children growing up in Caldwell County.
“I guess we’ve been playing all our lives really,” said multi-instrumentalist Reggie Harris. “We kind of derive our style from all those traditional forms of music.”
Reggie credits the boys’ musical family, particularly their father Charles, for providing the pair’s earliest influences, particularly the sounds of Lefty Frizzell and Hank Williams, whose early country sounds incorporated strong blues rhythms and feel.
“Something about the way [our dad] played had a real heavy blues influence,” said Reggie.
The Harris Brothers also soaked up the sounds and rhythms of Appalachia. From fiddle tunes and old-time to bluegrass, they heard and absorbed it all. According to Reggie, each new style that came through the house only fueled his desire to hear more styles of music. The dueling guitars and improvisation of the Allman Brothers Band led to the jazz artists of the 1950s and ‘60s. The modern stringband music of the Dave Grisman Quintet led to the discovery of gypsy jazz giant Django Reinhardt. And above all, the various styles of music pushed the brothers to improvise.
“That’s what we’ve always done; we’ve always jammed,” said Reggie.
While literally every musician is merely the sum of their influences, few have the ability to distill those roots to their core elements like The Harris Brothers. Reggie’s slide guitar would sound at home in any Chicago blues outfit and most any soul band would be thrilled to have Ryan on lead vocals.
The Harris Brothers weren’t always a streamlined two-piece band. During the late 1980s, both were members of a large rock band based in Boone called Black Market. The seven-piece outfit was one of the area’s hottest bands, sometimes including horns and backup singers. Unfortunately, like most bands, Black Market didn’t last forever.
“You know how bands are, they fizzle out for one reason or another,” said Reggie.
Out of the ashes of Black Market, Reggie and Ryan began performing with increasing frequency, gaining confidence as a two-piece and experimenting with things like using a suitcase for a bass drum. The pair also performed for a time with fiddle legend Vassar Clements.
“I kind of had my fill of going around and setting up all that junk,” said Reggie. “People sort of like [the suitcase] and it sounded real good. We kind of came on to a fairly unique style.”
That fairly unique style continues to make The Harris Brothers one of western North Carolina’s best sounding duos, regardless of genre.
To learn more about The Harris Brothers and link to several video clips, click to the band’s MySpace page at www.myspace.com/theharrisbrothers.
Want To Go?
Date: Friday, March 13
Time: 10:00 p.m.
Location: Canyons
Cost: Free
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