Barry Harris


 * For the dance music performer and DJ, see Barry Harris (DJ).

Barry Doyle Harris (born Detroit, Michigan, December 15, 1929) is an American bebop jazz pianist and educator.

Biography
Harris left Detroit for New York City in 1960. Influenced also by Art Tatum, Coleman Hawkins, Charlie Parker, and Thelonious Monk, Harris's playing is noted for its similarity to Bud Powell.

Harris has played with Cannonball Adderley, Sonny Stitt, Illinois Jacquet, Coleman Hawkins, Dexter Gordon, Lee Morgan, Charles McPherson and Max Roach. He has recorded 19 albums as a lead artist, and is a recipient of the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

During the 1970s, Harris lived with Monk at the Weehawken, New Jersey home of the jazz patroness Baroness Pannonica de Koenigswarter, and so was in an excellent position to comment on the last years of his fellow pianist.

Harris appears in the 1989 documentary film Thelonious Monk: Straight, No Chaser (produced by Clint Eastwood), performing duets with Tommy Flanagan.

Since 1991, Barry Harris has collaborated with Toronto-based pianist and teacher Howard Rees in creating a series of videos and workbooks documenting his unique harmonic and improvisational systems and teaching process.

In 2000, he was profiled in the film Barry Harris - Spirit of Bebop.

Barry Harris continues to perform and teach worldwide. When he is not traveling, he holds weekly music workshop sessions in New York City for vocalists, students of piano and other instruments.

Jazz Cultural Theater
For five years, August 14, 1982, to August 14, 1987, Harris maintained a unique institution, the Jazz Cultural Theater (JCT), at 368 Eighth Avenue, a storefront between 28th and 29th streets in Manhattan. Primarily a performance venue, featuring "name" jazz artists on weekends, and a weekly jam session, it was known for Barry's music classes on other nights: vocalists and instrumentalists each taught in separate sessions. Several artists recorded at the club, including Barry's own album For the Moment. Some of the many musicians and notable jazz figures that appeared at the JCT were Jack Wilson (piano); Bill Hardman (trumpet); Junior Cook (tenor sax); Tommy Turrentine (trumpet); Charles McPherson (alto sax); Mickey Tucker (piano); Peter Leitch (guitar); Clifford Jordan (tenor sax); Mark Elf (guitar); Lou Donaldson (alto sax); Leroy Williams (drums); Vernel Fournier (drums); Hal Dotson (bass); Jamil Nassar (bass); Chris Anderson (piano); Lon Chaney (tap-dancer); Jimmy Slyde (tap-dancer); Francis Paudras (biographer of pianist Bud Powell); and jazz patroness Baroness Pannonica de Koenigswarter who would park her silver Bentley convertible sports car in front of the club.

Barry's approach to the teaching of jazz uses methods and techniques that pre-date the Berklee school and the Lydian Chromatic approach of George Russell. He relies upon the 6th chord and the 8-note, rather than the 7-note jazz scale, as a basis for melody and harmony. This is the material used by Bud Powell, Joseph Schillinger, George Gershwin, Glenn Miller, and even Frédéric Chopin. He emphasizes the concept of building a repertoire of one's own musical movements over common harmonic formulae.

The Jazz Cultural Theater (JCT) enjoyed a vibrant five-year run, and while its storefront existence ended in 1987 when its lease ran out and rent increased, Barry simply moved his jazz instrumental and vocal classes to other venues in New York City, and in Europe, supported by a devoted and ever growing international base of students, many of whom are now professionals, among them Israeli-born, now New York City-based jazz guitarist, Roni Ben Hur, and Italian-born brothers Luigi Grasso (alto sax) and Pasquale Grasso (guitar).

An advertisement appearing in the local Village Voice newspaper announced the last week of JCT performances:
 * Thursday, August 6, 1987: Haze Laser & Sextet featuring C-Sharpe
 * Friday-Saturday August 7 & 8, 1987: Charles McPherson with the Barry Harris Trio
 * Sunday, August 9, 1987: a vocal concert for Victor Lane
 * Wednesday, August 12, 1987: The Last Big Bash at the Jazz Cultural Theater

Theoretical Concepts
Barry Harris’ approach to jazz harmony relies heavily on the diminished chord and its relationship to the twelve keys. Utilizing the diminished chord, he has formulated scales which allow pianists and guitar players greater freedom in accompaniment, to play, in his own words “movement, not chords.”

His fundamental scale is the major “sixth-diminished” scale, but equally important are the minor sixth to diminished, the dominant seventh to diminished, and the dominant seven flat five to diminished scale. The major sixth-diminished scale is a major scale with an extra note between the 5th and 6th scale degrees. A typical exercise using this scale involves playing a C Major 6th chord, up the scale to a D diminished 7th chord, back to C Major 6th in first inversion, to F diminished 7th ( i.e. D diminished 7th first inversion ), to C Major 6th in second inversion, and so on, up the scale until it reaches the octave. Moving chords up and down the scale in this way gives more possibilities for “movement”, as opposed to playing a static chord when playing jazz standard songs. Extending this concept, Barry relates all chord alterations (flat and sharp 9’s, sharp 11’s, flat 13’s, etc.) to the tritones minor sixth-diminished scale (A Flat Minor Sixth-Diminished for G7), which provides options for “moving” the alterations through the scales.

As leader

 * Breakin' It Up (Argo 1958)
 * Barry Harris at the Jazz Workshop (Riverside 1960)
 * Preminado (Riverside 1961)
 * Listen to Barry Harris (Riverside 1961)
 * Newer Than New (Riverside 1961)
 * Chasin' the Bird (Riverside 1962)
 * Luminescence! (Prestige, 1967)
 * Bull's Eye! (Prestige, 1968)
 * Magnificent! (Prestige, 1969)
 * Vicissitudes (MPS, 1972)
 * Barry Harris Plays Tadd Dameron (Xanadu 1975)
 * Tokyo (1976)
 * Barry Harris Plays Barry Harris (Xanadu 1978)
 * Stay Right with It (Xanadu 1978)
 * For the Moment (Uptown 1984)
 * The Bird of Red and Gold (Xanadu 1989)
 * Live at Maybeck Recital Hall - Volume Twelve (Concord 1991)
 * First Time Ever (Ecidence 1997)
 * Live in New York (Reservoir 2002)
 * Live in Rennes (Plus Loin Music 2009)

As sideman
With Cannonball Adderley With Charlie Byrd With Donald Byrd With Al Cohn With Sonny Criss With Art Farmer and Donald Byrd With Terry Gibbs With Benny Golson With Dexter Gordon With Johnny Griffin With Coleman Hawkins With Illinois Jacquet With Carmell Jones With Thad Jones With Harold Land With Yusef Lateef With Earl May With Charles McPherson With Billy Mitchell With Hank Mobley With James Moody With Lee Morgan With Dave Pike With Sonny Red With Sonny Stitt With Don Wilkerson
 * Them Dirty Blues (Capitol, 1960)
 * Blues Sonata (Riverside, 1961)
 * Byrd Jazz (Transition, 1955) - also released as First Flight (Delmark)
 * Al Cohn's America (Xanadu, 1976)
 * Saturday Morning (Xanadu, 1975)
 * 2 Trumpets (Prestige, 1956)
 * Bopstacle Course (Xanadu, 1974)
 * The Other Side of Benny Golson (Riverside, 1958)
 * Clubhouse (Blue Note, 1965 - released 1979)
 * Gettin' Around (Blue Note, 1965)
 * The Tower of Power! (Prestige, 1969)
 * More Power! (Prestige, 1969)
 * Biting the Apple (SteepleChase, 1976)
 * True Blue - with Al Cohn (Xanadu, 1976)
 * Silver Blue with Al Cohn (Xanadu, 1976)
 * White Gardenia (Riverside, 1961)
 * The Kerry Dancers (Riverside, 1961-62)
 * Wrapped Tight (Impulse!, 1965)
 * Bottoms Up (Prestige, 1968)
 * Jay Hawk Talk (Prestige, 1965)
 * The Magnificent Thad Jones (Blue Note, 1956)
 * West Coast Blues! (Jazzland, 1960)
 * Eastern Sounds (Moodsville, 1960)
 * Into Something (New Jazz, 1961)
 * Suite 16 (Atlantic, 1970)
 * Swinging The Blues (Arbors, 2005)
 * Bebop Revisited! (Prestige, 1964)
 * Con Alma! (Prestige, 1965)
 * The Quintet/Live! (Prestige, 1966)
 * McPherson's Mood (Prestige, 1969)
 * The Colossus of Detroit (Xanadu, 1978)
 * The Turnaround (Blue Note, 1965)
 * Don't Look Away Now! (Prestige, 1969)
 * The Sidewinder (Blue Note, 1963)
 * It's Time for Dave Pike (Riverside, 1961)
 * Breezing (Jazzland, 1960)
 * The Mode (Jazzland (1961)
 * Images (Jazzland, 1961)
 * Sonny Stitt (Argo, 1958)
 * Burnin' (Argo, 1958)
 * Tune-Up! (Cobblestone, 1972)
 * Constellation (Cobblestone, 1972)
 * 12! (Muse, 1972)
 * The Texas Twister (Riverside, 1960)