He's got the hottest blues harmonica around

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He's got the hottest blues harmonica around
June 19, 2010
Dave Howell
The Morning Call

You can argue about who is the world's greatest harmonica player, but the hottest up-and-coming contender is Jason Ricci. In May, the 36-year-old was chosen as Best Harmonica Player at the Blues Music Awards, the Oscars of the blues world. Ricci is bringing new life to the instrument, which has suffered from too many players with too few original ideas.

Ricci can play Little Walter or Sonny Boy Williamson-inspired riffs with the best of them, but he also shows a heavy jazz influence and does music with meaningful and original lyrics. Titles like "I Turned into a Martian" and "Ptryptophan Pterodactyl" indicate his unusual outlook; both are his songs from the 2009 release "Done with the Devil" (Eclecto Groove Records), a collection that sounds like blues from another planet. The band's MySpace site places Jason Ricci and New Blood in a "jam/blues/rock/jazz/ funk/world" genre.

At his show Saturday at Bethlehem's 2nd Story Blues, Ricci will combine hard-driving harmonica solos with a masterful technique that includes the art of overblowing, where tension on the reeds from the player's wind pressure changes the notes on blues harmonicas to provide a complete musical scale.

In an interview from Kansas City, Mo., where he was recording music, Ricci says that in his music he strives for "50 percent intellect and 50 percent emotion. Both are valid. Otherwise, four or five songs will sound amazing, but soon every song sounds the same."

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In longer shows Ricci says, "I play what I feel like. If the blues is going over, I'll play shuffles and Sonny Boy. If the audience is made up of people in their twenties, I'll play rock and roll, which is what I call any music that can't be categorized."

"I'll try to build tension and create release," he says. He alternates fast and slow songs and familiar sounding numbers with songs by artists like avant-garde jazzman Sun Ra. "I'm trying to accomplish a trip, taking people on a little journey of discovery."

Ricci, a native of Portland, Maine, now living in Nashville, is not typical of artists on the blues circuit. He dresses like a punk rocker and has a stereotypical disregard for authority. He is not afraid to be honest with audiences; at a show at the former Bluetone Café in Easton he talked about his dark time of drug addiction. His musical tastes are eclectic, encompassing Betty Carter, the Breeders, Ani DeFranco and Danzing. He can talk about the occult or fine art as easily as about his music. He is also an engaging writer, judging from the blog on his MySpace site.

Ricci is also openly gay, an unusual stance in the blues world and one that has cost him bookings. And he is an outspoken follower of the late occultist Aleister Crowley, as well as a believer in ceremonial magic and numerology. Ricci says he has had death threats and people have brought weapons to his shows, so he has an understandably guarded attitude. "You don't confront anyone who is not intelligent," he says. "Their only recourse is violence."

Ricci is a perfectionist when it comes to sound. His quest includes his choice of harmonicas. He will buy classic Marine Bands off Internet sites like eBay — he won't buy newer models manufactured in China. He even distinguishes between the brass plates of various years like other people debate the best years of a type of wine. He modifies the harmonicas through his long process of "bastardization," which results in making the instruments "more airtight, responsive, and loud."

In Kansas City, Ricci had plans to record with Washboard Jo, an electric washboard player. This side project, called "Sex Kitten," has Ricci playing guitar. Although he claims his skills are modest, he writes about 75 percent of his songs on the guitar. Ricci hopes to tour with the duo, including performances at S&M and bondage clubs.

Ricci has performed with many different artists, including Junior Kimbrough and R.L. Burnside, along with the families of both men, before forming New Blood in 2002. Although he has cut back from playing 300 or so gigs a year, and now earns more per show, he says he is disenchanted with the music business. "Don't get me into talking about the industry," he says. "Not a day goes by that I don't think about quitting, maybe just playing for free and getting involved in mystical things." He quoted his mentor, the late Pat Ramsey, saying music was the only endeavor where "hard work, raw talent, and perseverance will get you absolutely nothing."

Still, Ricci says he "accepts the negative and focuses on the positive." He claims he has just "scratched the surface "of learning the harmonica, so we are likely to hear much more from Ricci.