A Very Full Winter

Posted by Andre Harness

1/30/2026

Howdy to anyone who reads these. And if nothing else, welcome to my ongoing online journal.

The latter half of November, and all of December and January, flew by. Life was full in the best ways, both at home and on the bandstand.

• I hosted Thanksgiving this year, which meant having my family all together under one roof. That alone felt like a win. My wife was an absolute rockstar, and between the traditional Thanksgiving spread and my mother’s tamales, nobody left hungry.

• I also made a trip up to Dallas for Anime Frontier, where I finally got to meet the cast of Critical Role. I mentioned them in my last blog, and when the opportunity presented itself, I jumped on it. They were all generous, kind people, and I am still keeping up with their latest streams.

• Christmas season meant a lot of travel. San Antonio, Beaumont, and everywhere in between. It was busy, but grounding, and a good reminder of how lucky I am to have family spread across Texas.

• On the creative side, I am stepping into a new role as a Game Master for a Daggerheart campaign with friends. Collaborative storytelling scratches a very real creative itch, and I am enjoying learning how to guide a shared narrative without forcing it.

• Musically, The Golden Triangle Big Band closed out the year strong. We hosted a joint concert with Vidor High School and performed at the city’s Christmas tree lighting event. Both were meaningful ways to connect with the community and remind me why this band exists in the first place.

• January took me to New Orleans, where I spent a week volunteering full-time at the 17th annual Jazz Education Network conference. This marked my seventh JEN conference, my sixth as a volunteer, and my fourth as a full-time volunteer. I am still hoping to add “performer” to that list one of these days, but every year I show up grateful to learn, serve, and reconnect with the jazz community.

• I bought a baritone saxophone, which rounds out my instrumental family!

Now, onto the music.I am especially excited to share that I have begun working with a new mentor, Horace Alexander Young. 

Horace is a Houston-based pianist, composer, and educator whose work bridges straight-ahead jazz, spiritual jazz, and deep improvisational practice. His music is performed widely, including by the Conrad Johnson Orchestra, a big band I perform with in Houston. Hearing his writing in that context initially drew me in. I also reached out to Horace while applying for the John Stites Award, asking if he might be willing to serve as a mentor. Although I was not selected for the award, Horace generously offered to continue working with me anyway. We made time to meet at JEN this year, where he was performing on several concerts.

Our lessons have been nothing short of energizing. What struck me immediately was how collaborative the experience felt. We were not just talking concepts. We were playing, listening, reacting, and building ideas together. His enthusiasm is genuine, and that kind of reciprocated investment is rare. It lights a fire under me to grow, to dig deeper, and to show up prepared and curious. Our primary focus so far has been Horace’s improvisation method. Rather than centering ii–V–I vocabulary around Dorian or standard tonic-based pentatonics, his approach emphasizes Locrian scales and pentatonics built on the fifth of the key center.

When you place Locrian material in this way, color tones naturally fall on strong beats, forcing your ear toward extensions and altered sounds. Horace refers to these as “ear openers,” and that description feels spot on. In just two sessions, I could hear and feel myself making different improvisational decisions, choices that felt more intentional and less habitual. The same is true with the pentatonic built on the fifth rather than the tonic. The melodic movement becomes less predictable, and the lines breathe differently.