JODY HARRIS
Genres: Jazz Related Improv, Composition • United States

Born in 1951 in Kansas, Jody Harris took a serious interest in guitar “around the time Hendrix was around.” Early influences included Scotty Moore, James Burton, Duane Eddy, Eddie Gray (of Tommy James & the Shondells), David Cremer (Miles Davis), Johnny Guitar Watson and Bobby Womack. In a 2001 interview, Harris claimed to be “entirely self-taught except for early Mickey Baker lessons from my cousin John English, a truly great unknown guitar player. I studied jazz harmony a bit in the early 80s with a series of jazz piano books by John Mehegan – modes, scale tone chords, inversions, axis of third and seventh, figured bass notation. It’s a sensible system (figured bass was a Baroque invention specifically for improvisation) but in fact jazzboes don’t use it; it’s the session notation system in Nashville. Except for that, I can’t read music for shit.” Jody Harris Harris played in a variety of Midwestern read more...