Sugarcane Harris

One of the first gigs we played with Victor was at El Monte Legion Hall, opening for Johnny Otis, with whom Don and Paul played before. In fact, Paul is the drummer on the Monterrey Jazz Festival recordings of Johnny Otis. On that gig, the audience went nuts over Don's playing, singing and his stage antics, such as jumping into the crowd with his violin, creating at the same time a hugely amplified 60 hz hum when the cord snapped out of the violin.

From the first gig on, I saw the magic Don inspired in audiences and I thought he'd be another Jimi Hendrix, albeit not as creative in song writing. I think we could have gone there eventually if not for Don's total self-destructive habits. All I can say is that I never got chills in any other band like the ones I got when Don took off alone in a cadenza or when he and Paul did violin-drums duets. It was tribal, it was primitive and it was real music with all the faults that make us human. Don had a swing to his playing, a groove, a soulfulness that you don't hear anywhere else. No one plays with such gut-wrenching rawness, because musicians are trained to play "better". Little by little, I want to try to comment on the recordings I will post. I hope someone reads this and shares their own memories.

The last time I saw Paul was on a tour for my own CD in about 1995 in France and Switzerland. Ironically, Paul and I played in Geneva in 1974 with a band called the Curtis Brothers. That gig was the inspiration for my song "Woman In White" which was linked to by a nurses' site but in fact the woman in white wasn't a nurse but a powder. Oh, the irony of the Internetz...