“I’m not really in the entertainment business,” says the acclaimed singer/guitarist Corey Harris. Not that he can’t engage an audience, or draw crowds and acclaim around the world. But for Harris, the blues involves a deeper mission, and that includes weighing in when there is something timely that needs to be said.
A powerful singer and accomplished guitarist, Harris is one of blues’ most faithful contemporary griots. Tracing the music back to its African roots, he has trekked all over the world to share these stories in song and in 2007 was awarded the MacArthur Fellowship Genius grant for unearthing and sharing that rich, connected history.
Harris got his start as a street musician in New Orleans; he’s lived in Cameroon, West Africa, for a year and has toured extensively in North America, Europe, Brazil, the Caribbean, East and West Africa, Asia, Australia and New Zealand.