Ross was a guest on the Paul deLay retrospective on episode 120
Ross lives near Los Angeles, which has helped him tap into the movie session work there
Originally moved to LA for college, but not to study music, and didn’t know would become a professional musician at that stage
Has lots of great recording credits to his name already, at the tender age of 39
Plays numerous types of harmonica, but first instrument was piano and composes and produces records
Harmonica was also around from a young age, which he first thought of as a toy
Really connected with harmonica from age 12
Played other instruments when young: violin, saxophone and trombone
How piano playing informed his harmonica playing
Ross is an analytical person and the piano can feed into that
Diatonic was first harmonica and enjoyed figuring out how to play it without the masses of material for piano
Had classical piano lessons
Knew two guys where he grew up, one who guided him on diatonic and another on chromatic, who played with the Sharp Harp group based in San Jose
Did Ross learn differently on harmonica coming from classical piano knowledge
Early on had heard Adam Gussow, Carlos del Junco and Howard Levy but overblowing was not well known at the time (in the 1990s)
Most of players Ross admired early on were the classic blues players and Stevie Wonder and Toots Thielemans
On chromatic loved the playing of Stevie Wonder, who plays melodically and not hugely complex
Moved away from playing harmonica for a few years when started playing more complex music
Started getting interested in jazz and fusion at this time and became frustrated with the difficulties of playing in different keys on a C chromatic
Got back into harmonica in early to mid-twenties used the knowledge gained to use the harmonica more effectively
Had some lessons with David Barrett on diatonic harmonica
David Barrett gave Ross the opportunity to start teaching harmonica at some of his workshops and providing transcriptions for some of his books
Went through David Barrett’s accreditation programme
Ross has created an overblow series on the BluesHarmonica.com website, for using overblows in traditional blues playing
Still uses overblows to enhance his blues playing, but isn’t an expert overblow player, preferring the chromatic at times for this purpose
Uses the Gamechanger harmonica, which is a diatonic with a slide, allowing chromaticism
Uses Brendan Power’s overblower booster, modified further by Kinya Pollard, allowing use of overblows without setting up diatonics specifically for overblows
Andre LaFosse description of Ross’s playing stylesl: "Ross Garren’s sound world is a meeting of vintage Americana, retro-futurism, classic songcraft and whimsical surrealism."
Ross got into session work ‘unintentionally’
Studied music composition and jazz piano at college, and when left college was teaching piano and doing gigs on piano
Was not playing harmonica at this time
Got a gig with an old friend, playing some harmonica at the Monterrey Blues festival
Used Seydel harmonicas for Monterrey gig
Playing harmonica brought some stress relief from music career in LA
Took some lessons with Winslow Yerxa and got exposure to bass harmonica and other types of harmonica
Video of Ross accompanying Alex Paclin with bass and chord harmonicas
When first started playing again it was on diatonic at first, with chromatic coming a few years later
Has done lots of great session work, including with Beyonce earlier in 2024
In the Beyonce session they wanted a Little Walter vibe. There was no tube amp, but they managed to find a retro speaker
Didn’t get to meet Beyonce but thinks she gave her seal of approval to the harmonica parts
Often harmonica used in pop tracks in quite minimal, and in some cases you almost wouldn’t recognise it as harmonica
What people want from different recording sessions varies between traditional harmonica playing to more of a layered approach
Ross was employed as a bass harmonica player as part of a woodwind section on the Bon Iver album
Has made some great chromatic recording sessions
Played chromatic on song Something That Matters, from an album which won an Emmy for best TV theme on Palm Royale
Has played on some big movies, including Logan, Flowers of the Moon, and the new Joker: Folie a Deux movie
Ross seems to be the man they call for session work around LA, taking on the mantle left by Tommy Morgan, and did some work with Tommy Morgan
Kim Wilson gets some of the more bluesy session work in that area whereas Ross gets more of the Tommy Morgan type sessions
Ross plays in an roots meets electronica duo The Sheriffs of Schroedingham
Ross has improved his music production skills
New release on Bandcamp: On Winds and Reeds and Very Old Trees, mainly produced and mixed by Ross
Has eclectic tastes and has enjoyed playing and creating varied types of music
Doesn’t play a lot of concerts under own name
Ross lists many of the great sessions he’s recorded on his website
Wrote a series of articles for the UK National Harmonica League magazine: Reeds for the Record, focused on recording approaches
Spent some time with Bill Barrett and his playing of the chromatic contrapuntally (counterpoint)
Has ‘informally’ been taking lessons from Joe Filisko, tone production and the harmonica train
Diatonic of choice: played Seydel for a long time and recently been using Kinya Pollard custom Hohner harmonicas
Chromatics: Suzuki Sirius 64
Uses Brendan Power’s Slider Bass Harp on a Suzuki bass harp
The Gamechanger harmonica, a diatonic with a slide, which Kinya Pollard is distributing
The Gamechanger could be similar to the Morbendz discussed episode 113
Embouchre: uses different ones at different times, including U bend occasionally
Mainly tongue blocks on 16 hole chromatic and puckers on 12 hole
Amps: favourite tone produced on an album was from a small 1940s Gibson amp
Not too picky with amps when playing live: playing through the PA or from his collection of small amps
Sometimes records cleanly and then adds effects in post-production
Played through Dave Barrett’s Masco PA head, which blew him away and bought something similar. This the type reputedly used by Little Walter
Likes the traditional Chicago Blues sound
Mics: used Ultimate 57 for a while, now uses the Lone Wolf Jason Ricci mic
Has a collection of bullet mics, mainly purchased via Simple Mics
Likes to take more robust mics on the road, which can be replaced like for like
Often uses a SM58 dynamic mic
Recently played a solo harmonica show, which he really enjoyed
Been playing with neighbour (Nathan James), the blues guitarist from James Harman band, and has played with Kim Wilson Southern Californian harp players
Will be recording harmonica on an upcoming Bob Dylan biopic, emulating Dylan’s style of harmonica
