Howard Levy LIVE with Miles Levy and Larry Gray

Wed, 09/02/2015 - 9:33am
Written by howard
Topics: bass, harmonica, Howard Levy, improvisation, jazz, Piano

This is video from our one and only live gig, June 11 in Evanston, IL. 

The first tune, a free improvisation, starts at 8:18. I hope you all enjoy this. We made a CD of free improvs a few years ago. You can check it out here: http://balkansamba.com/recordings/first-takes/

When you play like this with the right people, some really good things can happen. I hope some of you check this out and enjoy it.

Howard Levy Playing Blues in 12 Keys on Harmonica

Thu, 07/30/2015 - 2:20pm
Written by ArtistWorks
Topics: harmonica, Howard Levy

ArtistWorks instructor Howard Levy was recently interviewed on WBUR.org's "On Point with Tom Ashbrook" by guest host Jane Clayson. Check out this great clip of Howard playing blues in all 12 keys on harmonica, and listen below to the full interview from WBUR.org:

Howard's F# Blues

Tue, 06/09/2015 - 7:14pm
Written by howard
Topics: harmonica, Howard Levy

Here's a track from "Tonight and Tomorrow", a CD I recorded just before I started this harmonica school. I was listening to the final mixes as I filmed the core lessons for the school out in Napa. This was named one of the top 100 CD's of 2010 by Downbeat Magazine. I played piano and overdubbed harmonica. I am playing a B harp in Cross (2nd position). The bassist is Larry Gray and the drummer is Ernie Adams. I recommend that you buy the CD, but as we all know, you can hear/see everything on YouTube these days. We recorded the whole thing in 2 6 hour sessions, the way they did Jazz albums way back when.

The Stranger's Hand

Sun, 05/31/2015 - 10:21pm
Written by howard
Topics: harmonica, Howard Levy

I usually encourage everyone to buy CDs, but I just found a link to this CD on youtube. It's a one-time-only recording I made in 1999 with 3 great musicians. We had never played together before, spent 9 days recording this CD at Steve Smith's home studio in the Bay Area. It's one of my favorite things that I've ever recorded. All the music is original, including a few free improvs. Steve, violinist Jerry Goodman and I played together a few times after this, but not with bassist Oteil Burbridge, I'm sorry to say. So give it a listen if you have some time on your hands. If you make it all the way to the end, you will hear the fastest harmonica solo that I've ever recorded starting around 4 minutes into the last tune. On this link this part of the tune starts around 48:20.