DONALD HARRISON

Big Chief Donald Harrison is a master alto saxophonist who carries the musical spirit of his birthplace, New Orleans, wherever he goes – he’s a one man jazz festival. Donald, who was made an NEA Jazz Master in 2022, is known for his hard-swinging improvisational style and the creation of “Nouveau Swing,” a blend of jazz with R&B, hip-hop, rock, and soul. His performances travel through every era of jazz and he is a true champion of culture, well-known for mentoring the next generation of players.

Harrison honed his experience playing with Roy Haynes, Art Blakey, Eddie Palmieri, Dr. John, Lena Horne, McCoy Tyner, Dr. Eddie Henderson, Miles Davis, Ron Carter, Billy Cobham, Chuck Loeb, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Digable Planets, Guru’s Jazzmatazz, The Headhunters, The Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and The Notorious BIG. He has performed with over 200 jazz masters and created three influential styles of jazz. At the age of nineteen, Harrison created a modern jazz take on the New Orleans second-line tradition and introduced his composition New York Second-Line to the jazz world in 1979. By the mid-’80s, he created Nouveau Swing, a distinctive sound that blended the swing beat of modern jazz with hip-hop, funk, and soul music. In the ’90s, Harrison recorded hits in the smooth jazz genre. He began exploring music through the lens of quantum physics in 2000. With quantum jazz, Harrison heard how to move music from a two-dimensional state into a four-dimensional state. Harrison has been a mentor to artist as diverse as The Notorious Big, Jonathon Batiste, Christian Scott, Trombone Shorty, and Esperanza Spaulding.

Healdsburg Jazz Fest Presents a Cross-Generational, Gender-Diverse Cohort

A few hours later at Bacchus Landing, Healdsburg #27 ended with a New Orleans-centric double bill by Donald Harrison and Nicholas Payton, sponsored by Jason Patterson, proprietor of the Crescent City’s Snug Harbor Jazz Bistro. A day before his 65th birthday, Harrison led his tight quartet with pianist Dan Kaufman, bassist Nori Narakoa and drummer Brian Richburg through an autobiographical concert of the multiple genres that constitute his neoclassical conception. He uncorked a string of concise, full-toned alto saxophone improvs, first demonstrating his “nouveau swing” concept on “Jeannine,” then his assimilations, respectively, of Sidney Bechet (“Maple Leaf Rag”), Charlie Parker (“One For Bird”), Miles Davis (“Bye, Bye Blackbird”), John Coltrane (“Impressions”) and Eddie Palmieri (“Temporal”). There followed a soul medley, and then the soaring, self-descriptive “Big Chief Of Congo Square,” signifying the position with the Guardians of the Flame Mardi Gras Indian Tribe that Harrison inherited from his father almost 20 years ago. It was a master class from one of the finest of his generation.