PODCAST: Inside Berklee—Donald Harrison Jr.
Donald Harrison, Jr.
Photo by Mike Spencer
Alto saxophonist Donald Harrison Jr. '81 says his mother used to joke that, as a baby, he played on his crib the rhythms he heard Creole Wild West musicians practice at his parents’ house in New Orleans.
“I was immediately taken by it, even before I could walk,” Harrison says. It was growing up in New Orleans that gave Harrison what he calls the “full spectrum of American music, from maybe an African-American perspective.” His personal story is so resonant of the city that pieces of it were built into the HBO show Treme.
In this episode of Inside Berklee, Harrison talks about how his hometown shaped him, Hurricane Katrina and its 10th anniversary, and what Berklee gave him when he left the Big Easy.