I went to Infinity Hall in Norfolk, Connecticut, last fall to see two top veteran songwriters, Gretchen Peters and Mary Gauthier. I headed home after the show, though, knowing I had seen a great performance by three top songwriters. Peters and Gauthier had shared the stage equally with an unbilled, less-known talent, Jaimee Harris.
“I believe that Mary and Gretchen are two of the most important songwriters of our time,” Harris tells me. “They continue to capture our time with incredible narrative. To share my songs on the same stage with these songwriters is pretty mind-blowing. The opportunity to learn firsthand from their experience, musicality and craft is extremely precious. I feel honored to have the opportunity to study in their tradition. Each show has strengthened my confidence as a songwriter and background vocalist.”
That’s too modest, because Harris stands on her own as a singer, and she has already written some classic songs.
Peters, who just released an excellent new album, The Night You Wrote That Song: The Songs of Mickey Newbury, relates to me the time she first discovered Harris’s artistry.
“I met Jaimee when she attended a songwriting workshop I was co-teaching with Eliza Gilkyson and Mary Gauthier,” Peters says. “She knocked me out with her songs, particularly one she wrote during the workshop, ‘On The Surface.’ We’ve played numerous shows together since then, often with Mary Gauthier. She’s a truly original singer and songwriter. She’s quite open about her influences, but her songs and her sound are all her own.”
Harris, who lives in Nashville and is Gauthier’s girlfriend, learned about Peters’s music from her late mentor, Jimmy LaFave.
“I began playing Revival (Peters’s 2010 album) at a weekly gospel brunch I’d attend every week at Strange Brew (an Austin coffee shop and live music venue),” Harris says. “It wasn’t until later that I realized so many of Gretchen’s songs, including ‘Independence Day’ and ‘You Don’t Even Know Who I Am,’ were some of the first songs I learned when I was just beginning to play. Without my awareness, Gretchen’s songs informed so many of my sensibilities as a songwriter.”
Harris later became familiar with Gauthier’s music through a Ray Wylie Hubbard song called “Name Droppin’.” The song’s fourth verse contains the lyrics: “Mary Gauthier, Mary Gauthier / She write all night, sleep all day / Damndest thing I ever seen / Was that woman in a limousineI”
Like Gauthier and Peters, Harris has worked hard at her songwriting craft. It took her 12 years to make her first album, Red Rescue, and it’s packed with top-notch songs, including “Catch It Now” and the title cut. LaFave sings on the title cut, and two other songs on the album, “Forever” and “Where Are You Now,” appear to have LaFave and bassist George Reiff in mind. Reiff was a friend of Craig Ross, the album’s producer, and he and LaFave died on the same day.
Harris befriended LaFave while singing backup vocals on his album, The Night Tribe, five years ago. But she knew LaFave’s music long before.
“My dad turned me onto ‘Never is a Moment’ (a song on LaFave’s 2001 Texoma album), and I learned how to play it on guitar in my childhood bedroom,” Harris says. “I fell in love with all of Jimmy’s records shortly after that time. Jimmy’s voice — the emotion wrapped up in it — and his phrasing just floored me. I also loved how he played guitar. So much of his vocal and guitar sensibilities have found their way into my writing for years.”
Harris says she saw LaFave perform several times over the years, and she joined him at his final show in Austin in 2017.
“I was just a fan,” she admits. “I actually had tickets to see him on a Friday night at Strange Brew, and, the Sunday before, my friend Noelle Hampton recommended me as a third background singer for The Night Tribe.”
LaFave trusted the recommendations of Hampton and BettySoo, and Harris met him in a recording studio.
“It’s not every day you get called to sing harmonies on one of your hero’s records, so I was obviously a little nervous —especially because Jimmy had never heard me sing,” Harris says. “At some point in the session, it was revealed that I was also a songwriter. Jimmy told me he’d come check out my band — and he did! He taught me quite a bit about Woody Guthrie and all sorts of Oklahoma songwriters I was unaware of at the time.”
Harris, who was born in Nacogdoches, Texas, and grew up in Waco, says LaFave connected her to Peters, Eliza Gilkyson and Gauthier. “All three women offered to step in after Jimmy’s passing to answer questions, guide and support me,” she says. “I’m so grateful.”
Harris says she misses LaFave every day.
“I really hope I’m making him proud,” she says. “I’d give anything to talk to him one more time — to hear his laugh or one of his questionable jokes. There are still times in my life when I reach for the phone, because I need his wisdom.”
Another major influence seems to radiate throughout Red Rescue. I mention to Harris that the sound and vibe often bring Stevie Nicks and Fleetwood Mac to mind.
“Craig, my band members and I share a serious love for Fleetwood Mac,” she responds. “I saw Fleetwood Mac’s The Dance (the group’s 1997 concert recorded for MTV) when I was 7 and had been playing guitar for two years. The Dance pretty much sealed the deal with this whole music career thing. I didn’t care if I was Lindsey (Buckingham) or Stevie, but I knew I had to dedicate my life to playing music.”
Harris says it’s “so compelling” to hear the many voices in Fleetwood Mac “harmonizing or weaving in and out of each other.
“I loved the songs, the energy of the band, Lindsey’s simple but effective guitar parts,” she says. “Also, as a singer who mainly likes to operate in my lower range, I find so much inspiration in Stevie’s voice. Live, three-part harmony is a huge part of our show — much more than you hear on Red Rescue. Craig pulled the less obvious Fleetwood Mac influences on the record. Instead of lots of harmony, he played beautiful 12-string guitar. I think that’s one of the genius moves of his production. When you listen to Red Rescue, there’s a familiar experience of listening to (Fleetwood Mac’s) Rumors without being too derivative.”
I ask Harris which three to five albums standout as the best ones she has listened to.
“I don’t believe there is such a thing as a best album,” she responds. “I love various albums at different times for a variety of reasons. I learned every song on Tracy Chapman’s debut record when I was 8. Hal Ketchum’s Greatest Hits remains one of my favorites. I just love all of those songs and the production.”
Then Harris lists a string of favorite albums: LaFave’s Blue Nightfall, Cimarron Manifesto and Depending on the Distance, and Emmylou Harris’s “masterpiece,”Wrecking Ball.
“Eliza Gilkyson’s Hard Times in Babylon,” Harris adds, “has received the most play in my car over the past four or five years. Patty Griffin’s 1000 Kisses and Living with Ghosts are masterpieces, and I have learned every song on every Dixie Chicks album. Mary Gauthier’s Trouble and Love was on constant repeat for me for a while. I also believe her Rifles & Rosary Beads is one the most important albums of all time. I could go on and on.”
Website: https://www.jaimeeharris.com/