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Interviewer: What are your thoughts on the Edmonton Folk Fest so far?
D.K. Harrell: I’ve done the Edmonton Blues Festival, which we played two years ago, and to me, there’s a very big difference. With blues festivals, it seems like you get an older audience and not as many young people. The youngest people you’ll see are usually the volunteers.
But when you play this folk fest, it really gives people who are younger than 50, or even younger than 40, an opportunity to experience it. I mean, the kids being here is a beautiful thing. We saw kids playing in the sand pile right across from the stage when we were at Stage One.
It’s just great to be at a festival where everyone is included. There isn’t really just one genre or one audience. That’s a beautiful thing.
Interviewer: You played yesterday. How did you feel about your set and the overall vibe?
D.K. Harrell: I think we did okay. The guy who was over at that stage, I didn’t get his name, came up to me after the set and said, “What do you expect me to do after you burned the stage up the way you did?”
Interviewer: You killed it. You shredded.
D.K. Harrell: I told him, “Well, we’ll do the best that we can.” But we had a good group of fans showing up afterward, new fans.
What I really love is that I think we’re the type of band that showcases everybody in the band. Everyone gets a solo. I love that because it creates an opportunity for audience members who play music themselves to spend time with musicians in the band who play the same instruments they do.
Interviewer: Tell me about the band members. Did you hand-pick them?
D.K. Harrell: Right now, Chuck and Max, the gentlemen in the baseball caps, are what I call extended family. They’re not permanent members of the group, but they are substitutes. So when permanent members either leave, get sick or whatever the case may be, we can call on Chuck, Max or someone else.
But we still treat them as equals with the permanent members. There’s no change in pay or anything like that.
Originally, we were all from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Two musicians had to leave the road because of family issues, which we understood. So right now, we’re in a transition period trying to find new members at home.
It’s also cost-effective. Flying someone out from Seattle, Washington, when the band is in Baton Rouge is a long way. It takes a lot of time and it’s an expensive ticket.
Of course, if we have to take those measures, we will. With Max, we had to bring him from Los Angeles, and Chuck came from North Carolina. We’ll do it.
We don’t complain because it’s about the music, the people and the fun. It’s pretty much about doing whatever it takes to keep the music and the band going.
Interviewer: So, coming from Louisiana, tell me about the blues scene there. How did you get involved in it?
D.K. Harrell: The blues scene in Louisiana is sometimes very overshadowed by Mississippi. People will talk about Mississippi and Chicago in a heartbeat, but they never really talk about Louisiana.
We’ve had Slim Harpo, Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown, Mike Brown and Fats Domino, of course. I understand Fats is considered more rock and roll, but if you listen to early Fats Domino, it’s very bluesy.
Then, of course, you have Dr. John, who actually started out as a guitar player and not a pianist. You also have the Neal family.
Kenny Neal’s father, Raful Neal, was the bluesman of the ’60s, ’70s, ’80s and ’90s for Baton Rouge. The Kenny Neal family gave Buddy Guy his first guitar-playing gig, and then Buddy went to Chicago.
Everybody calls Buddy a Chicago blues artist. I tell people, “No, Buddy is a Louisiana blues artist. He just moved to Chicago.”
Interviewer: You mentioned awards earlier. You won the B.B. King of the Blues Award for preserving traditional blues heritage from the Jus’ Blues Music Foundation. Tell me about that experience.
D.K. Harrell: The Jus’ Blues Music Foundation is an independent Black foundation. They’re very similar to the Blues Foundation in Memphis, but they’re more focused on Black artists.
That was the first award I ever received after the Blues Challenge. I got third place when I did the Blues Challenge, and then I ended up getting that award.
That was pretty cool because it was the first night I met Eric Gales. I was very nervous. You hear people say things about certain people and wonder, “I don’t know if they’re in a good mood. I don’t know if they’re happy.” But he was very nice. He got the Albert King Award.
When I got my award, I felt like I was really accomplishing something and doing something right. Being homeless during that time when I won it made me realize that this was all worth it. It was a very beautiful moment.
I still have that award sitting on my mother’s fireplace.
Interviewer: You’ve been in the music industry for a while now. Is there anybody you’ve crossed paths with who really inspired you?
D.K. Harrell: Tony Coleman. He was a drummer and B.B. King’s drummer. Tony and I have now had a friendship for about seven or eight years.
When we first performed together, it was just a jam session. But when we had to really put on a show, he chewed me out.
Interviewer: Why did he chew you out?
D.K. Harrell: I was singing a song by B.B. King called “I Like to Live to Love.” It’s a very nice song, and I was singing it kind of softly.
Here’s a guy who played with B.B. for 40 years. He goes, “You going to sing that song or anything?”
I said, “Well, I’m singing it.”
He said, “Why are you singing it so soft?”
I said, “Well, on the record…”
He said, “B.B. sang hard. He sang from the gut. I need some feeling behind it.”
So here I was with no microphone, singing this song. I’m singing so hard that the back of my throat is hurting, my head is hurting, and I’m crying. I get through it and everybody’s going crazy.
Interviewer: How many people were there?
D.K. Harrell: We were at a rehearsal, but we had to do a show the next night. Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks were there, along with Tom Wirth, the country singer, Keith Robinson, a guitarist from Vanessa Williams, Ella O’Keefe and Jesse Chown.
There were so many great artists there, and they witnessed this. They were like, “That’s how you do it.”
From that day forward, I could have been a young, sensitive musician and said, “Well, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.” But Tony is the reason why I sing the way I do and perform the way I do. He’s one of the many reasons why I sing the way I do.
He’s been proud of me ever since because nobody’s doing the blues the way that it should be done. It’s either a lot of guitar, and that’s it.
But we have a combination. We have enough guitar, enough singing, enough audience interaction, good, catchy songs and lyrics, and then, of course, the band gets showcased.
Tony has not only been a very big help musically, he’s been a damn good friend.
I cry when I think about the fact that he has to leave this Earth at some point. And that hurts.
I think people don’t realize that when you have idols, you enjoy all the time you can with them, but also keep in mind that their time has to come, too. When it does, you better be ready because you’ll never find another like them.
Interviewer: So, you talked about your lyrics. Tell me about your writing process. How do you come up with your lyrics?
D.K. Harrell: A lot of songs, I can’t lie, have been written while I was in bed. I was just bored. It actually happened last night. I started writing lyrics for a song.
I can hear music in my head very well, but I don’t play chords. I can rarely call them out — one, four, five, flat three, flat seven — but I can’t really play them. I hear them.
So, for me, the songwriting process is hearing something in my head and then trying to put a hook to it. Or I come up with my own hook first and then try to put music to it and think, “What would it sound like like this?”
Interviewer: So you come up with the hook first?
D.K. Harrell: I come up with the hook first because Quincy Jones gave some of the best advice: whether you’re a musician, songwriter or rapper, have a good hook. If you don’t have a good hook, the song doesn’t mean anything.
That’s what we try to do. That’s why we have songs like “Honey Ain’t So Sweet,” “You’re a Queen,” “Talking Heavy” and “Grown Now,” just to name a few.
I feel like when you have a good hook, that’s what makes people start requesting your songs at shows. They go, “Play this! Play this!” Because that hook got them.
Interviewer: Outside of music, what do you like to do?
D.K. Harrell: Honestly, I like watching movies. I’m a very big fan of James Bond. I watch a lot of James Bond.
I also spend a lot of time playing pool, shooting pool and billiards. I’m also a fan of bowling, and I like going to the movie theatre.
There’s something about doing activities that take you away from the world. For me, it’s kind of hard when I go back home because my world is music.
So I have to find things that keep me away. It’s not running from reality. It’s running away from the bullcrap that reality provides.
I try to surround myself with people and do things that keep that high on life for me, and that joy of life. It’s a challenge, but it gets the job done enough until I’m back on the road.
Interviewer: What are some of your favourite places you’ve played? Give me two or three places.
D.K. Harrell: One place that was one of my favourite places to play was Lugano, Switzerland, and it was for two reasons.
It wasn’t the same stage, but it was the same place where they had the stage. I think it’s called the Piazza. It’s like a city centre.
It was the same place where B.B. King had played. They had the stage set up right there in 1990, although it was a different festival that he played at in that same area.
That’s the number one reason it was my favourite.
The second reason is because I met a beautiful Italian young lady there, and we fell in love.
We’re not in a relationship today, but we talk three or four times a week, just checking on each other. So there might be something that rekindles down the line. I’ll leave that to the woman.
Another place I enjoyed playing was a Blues Festival in Spain. It’s right by the cities and the riverwalk, kind of.
Martha High from the James Brown Band was there, and she caught our set. She was in the wings watching, and I thought, “Man, I’ve got to bring her up for a song.”
She came up, and we’ve been friends ever since. I grew up watching her as a kid with James Brown, so that meant a lot.
Another show that’s one of my favourites was Lucerne, Switzerland. It was our very first European debut. We stepped out on a limb, took a chance, and got standing ovations. We even got more time added to our set in the middle of the show.
Another one was Grolo, the Holland International Blues Festival. It was the first time we played for maybe 10,000 or 20,000 people.
There’s a song we have called “While I’m Young” where I get the audience to clap to show that unity and togetherness is where it’s at.
It just sounded like thunder. We were all just like, “This is it.” It made me feel good.
We’ve played some amazing places. We even played the North Pole — Little Italy, Svalbard in Norway. It’s an island about four to eight hours away from the North Pole, but they count it as the North Pole.
They have a blues festival called Dark Seasons. Being out there in the cold, it was negative five and below zero, but it was cold and cool at the same time.
There have been so many places that I’m going to have to really sit down when I have a lot of time and think about them all.
Interviewer: I love it. So, what’s next for you? Where are you guys going?
D.K. Harrell: We have a few days off, and then we come back to Canada to do the Bear Creek Folk Festival.
Then we have a few days off again, and we’ll do a very short United States run through Mississippi and New Mexico. Then we’ll be doing the Listen In with the Blues Cruise later this year, and we’ll be recording our third record.
Interviewer: Nice. So, new music on the horizon. Where do you record?
D.K. Harrell: The first two records were done with Greaseland Studios.
For this third record, I can’t say. The reason I can’t say is because it’s a sequel.
We’re really trying to keep this under wraps as much as possible. I feel like when it comes out, people are going to be like, “What??”
Interviewer: When do you think it might be coming out?
D.K. Harrell: I would love for us to try to shoot for mid-spring or early summer of 2027.