Corey Harris

   
Artist: Corey Harris

   Genre(s): 
Blues
   

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Discography:


   
 Mississippi to Mali

   Year: 2003   
Tracks: 15


   
 Downhome Sophisticate

   Year: 2002   
Tracks: 18


   
 Greens From the Garden

   Year:    
Tracks: 20

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Corey Harris has earned satisfying critical applaud as one of the few contemporaneous bluesmen able-bodied to channel the raw, direct emotion of acoustic Delta blue devils without approach off as an authenticity-obsessed historian. Although he is easily midazolam in the early history of vapours guitar, he's no well-bred preservationist, commixture a considerable change of influences -- from New Orleans to the Caribbean to Africa -- into his richly expressive music. In doing so, he's managed to appeal to a wide spectrum of blue devils fans, from staunch traditionalists to more contemporaneous sensibilities.


Zellig Harris was born in Denver, CO, on February 21, 1969, and began playing guitar at years 12, when he fell in love life with his mother's Lightnin' Hopkins records. He played in a rock & flap band in high school, as well as the marching band, and developed his tattle abilities in church. Through Bates College in Maine (where he majored in anthropology), Harris travelled to Cameroon to study African philology and returned there on a postgraduate fellowship; during his time in that location, he stiff up as much African music as possible, enthralled by its complex polyrhythms. After returning to the U.S., Harris taught English and French in Napoleonville, LA, and during his scanty time he played the clubs, coffeehouses, and street corners of nearby New Orleans. His local reputation finally earned him a deal with Alligator, one of the leading vapors labels in the South. In 1995, Alligator released Harris' debut album, Between Midnight and Day, a one-person, one-guitar intimacy that illustrated his mastery of legion variations on the Delta blues expressive style. The record south Korean won rabbit on reviews and level some mainstream media care, marking Harris as an exciting new presence on the megrims scene; it also earned him an opening slot on circuit with ex-10,000 Maniacs isaac M. Singer Natalie Merchant.


Bomber Harris followed it up with Fish Ain't Bitin' in 1997, a record that began to expand his style by adding a New Orleans-style brass section on several tracks, patch emphasizing his own original compositions to a much greater degree. The next yr, Harris was invited to participate in the Billy Bragg/Wilco collaboration Mermaid Avenue, which set a extract of unfinished Woody Guthrie songs to music; Harris played guitar and contributed bluesy backup vocals to several tunes. In 1999, Harris released what most critics called his strongest work to date, Leafy vegetable from the Garden; hailed as a landmark in some living quarters, the record delved deeper into New Orleans funk and R&B, while rephrasing its covers in surprising just effective newfangled contexts (even reggae and hip-hop). The result was a kaleidoscope of fatal musical styles that earned Harris even more far-flung attention than his debut. Veteran pianist Henry Butler appeared on the record, and for the follow-up, Harris recorded an total album in tandem with Butler; issued in 2000, Vu-Du Menz updated several different strains of early jazz and blue devils.


Harris afterwards left Alligator for Rounder, and debuted for his new label in 2002 with Downhome Sophisticate, a typically eclectic outing that explored his African influences and added Latin music to his ostensibly endless sonic palette. Two more albums followed on Rounder, the improbable Mississippi to Mali in 2003 and Daily Bread in 2005. Ever the musical explorer, Harris turned to Jamaica and roots reggae for the templet on his succeeding album, Utopia Crossroads, which was released in 2007 on Telarc Records.