Just a quick note if you haven’t been to “the brown site” for a while. Obviously, I’ve moved things over here. The old site was good, but frankly, it got too frickin’ difficult to keep up with all the spam. (I wish ‘consolidating’ the actually city was as easy.)

I have yet to find a way to have organised discussions that don’t get outta control and it frustrates me no end because I actually believe in dialogue. But as I’ve said before, I fear that’s gone with Web 1.0. If you take a look at Facebook or Twitter it’s all ‘140 characters’ and more ‘look at this video I just saw.’

Anyhow. I’m gonna post the best threads as soon as I have a minute. Some good history and ideas there which really helped me during the writing. Big Cheers!

The next news I expect to have is getting the score prepared for school orchestra. The idea has always been to be doable by less than pro level players. Given the current dreadful […]

The first time I heard this word; the first time I heard that sentence, was the last time I wanted to hear that word or that sentence. My understanding is that the word came into being in the 70’s and I believe it. It is not a word created as were so many by Shakespeare or Milton. It is not a word of mercantile necessity from the 18th century. It isn’t even a word of 19th century commerce and business. It is a word of pure marketing and thus purely post-modern. Blechh.

OK, so how can I incentivize you to buy an album before December 24th, 2012? 😀

On December 24th I will be switching the ‘processor’ that connects my music to the various e-commerce sites. This is not the same as a ‘credit card processor’. Rather, this is yet another machination of the music biz. To keep out the riff-raff (get it?) every artist not linked to a major label must go through one of these ‘brokers’ in order to be […]

Three years in the making and available now! A collection of songs from the opera Detroit, with all new arrangements and performed by JC Harris. Get the details here.

PS: I May Have Something In My Eye…

Or, maybe it’s just another infection. 😀 Seriously, I can’t thank you all (fans and music companies alike) enough for your support. In this day and age, I really had no right to expect anyone to stick with me after so long away from touring—especially to do something so insane-o as ‘grand opera.’ These past three years have been, in many ways, the toughest of my life. And as I’ve noted here, I had no idea when I began how writing Detroit would affect me personally. I used to scoff at journalists and authors who bitch about ‘getting too close to the story.’ But I get it now. Thankfully, my drinking days are over or I’d be in trouble, buddy. Again, thank you, thank you, thank you. It’s […]

To compensate for the aforementioned (and frankly inexplicable) lack operatic income, I’ve been playing with some local funk and blues groups which were quite well paid but I found myself repeatedly self-destructing. (More on that in a separate rant.) So I’ve been begging, borrowing, stealing work for various local pit bands—community theatre, dinner theatre, etc. Since my various maladies, I sure ain’t the picker I once was, but thank goodness there are still gigs where reading is a pre-requisite; and thank goodness all the jokes about guitarists and sheet music ring truer than ever. It’s a living.

And it’s given me a chance to watch all the low budget ways that you can stage various gags. I kept getting hung up on ‘impossibilities’. There are so many events in any staged production which defy believability if you think about it too much. But it seems that I have to constantly remind myself the very thing I love about the theatre: people want to suspend disbelief. I don’t have to worry so […]

The second official video from Positive (2010).

I noticed that a lot of people are using Youtube videos simply as a vehicle for listening to music. So this piece is not much more than that; a hopefully pleasant business card to get people to check out the site and perhaps (perchance to dream), shell out for a CD.

You can check out all the videos at the fantastic new JCHarrisMusic Video Channel!