Chris Harris

In his early career, he was a prolific songwriter and quickly came to the attention of a number of producers and record labels.  He set up his own studio where he recorded numerous musicians while working behind the scenes for years as a session player and songwriter. He worked extensively with top Australian record producer David Mackay who has worked with a number of established artists including Dusty Springfield, Bonnie Tyler and Eric Clapton.  They collaborated on a number of projects together the most unusual being playing acoustic guitar (alongside Procol Harum’s Geoff Whitehorn on lead) on an album by Dame Edna Everedge.
Chris was a latecomer to Country music  but after he saw a late night Garth Brooks concert on TV he began listening to a lot of different styles of Country music and quickly realised his future as a musician lay in that genre. In 1996 he collaborated with Sarah Jory. Sarah was originally going to record Chris’ song I Think I’m Falling In Love but instead, they worked on two other songs one of which, Something’s Changed, appeared on The Sarah Jory Band Live album.
In 1997 he won the international Songwriter of the Year Award at the American Country Music Association awards. At one time Garth Brooks’ manager had one of Chris’ songs in his hands but it was never recorded after Garth Brooks announced his retirement from recording and performing in October 2000.
Chris Harris first came to the public’s attention in 2002 when he joined the John Douglas Band as lead guitarist.  He stayed with the band for two years but left to form his own four-piece band Southern Union. The band worked mainly in northern clubs and festivals and the original line-up was Chris Harris (lead vocals and lead guitar), Davy Adams (pedal steel guitar), Clive Grant (bass) and Nigel Slater (drums).
In 2006 Chris won the Hot Disc Track Of The Year award at the UK Country Radio Awards, spending eleven week: at No. l in the British Independent Country Music chart.  Chris’ song I Think I’m Falling In Love was nominated for the Song of the Year category in the Southern Country awards show at Frimley in February 2007. Southern Union disbanded in 2007 due to pressure of touring and Chris teamed up with former Southern Union bass player Clive Grant to form the duo Harris ‘n’ Grant. Although working primarily as a duo they also worked as required as a trio with Bob Haskell on pedal steel guitar or as a 4-piece with Justin Ware on drums. Chris also later worked in a second duo Harrison County with Jim Martin. He had previously worked with Jim in the John Douglas band.
Following a break from the circuit between 2010 – 2013, Chris is now a solo artist although he still takes occasional duo bookings with Pedro (2013 – 2015), Jim Martin as Southern Union duo and with Tony Crooks and Steve Jay.  He also sometimes works as a trio with Jim Martin and Tony Crooks. Chris always has a good section of songs old and new to suit any audience.

Chris Harris.

Research by Nick Catford.

Chris Harris has been playing guitar since he was 11 but it wasn’t initially Country music, he played a mixture of folk, rock and blues with some country rock. He was in a number of school bands around Romford, Essex which gave him a good opportunity to hone his skills as a guitarist.

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