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“The Jimi Hendrix of the harp” Steve Vai

“Dazzling harp playing, gorgeous jazz/pop singing, comic timing and impressive songwriting” Austin American-Statesman

“ Reshaping the serenely Olympian harp into a jazz instrument by warping it closer to the Blues”
New York Times


Short Blurb   |  Brief Bio  |  Longer Bio  |  Photos  |  Quotes


Deborah Henson-Conant ("DHC") is a GRAMMY©-Nominated one-woman orchestra. With electric harp, voice and a looper pedal that she layers sounds in real time, then weaves solo lines and vocals above it.

Her signature instrument is an 11lb carbon-fiber electric harp, designed specifically for her by the CAMAC Harp Company in France, it’s now one of the fastest-selling new harp models in the world and carries her name, the “DHC Light.”

Forget the demure harpist – forget the Classical Music -- forget dozing off in the back row. Henson-Conant is a showman, entertainer and solid musician who’s been compared to musical greats from Leonard Bernstein to Elvis Presley.

Her voice is compared to Carly Simon and Joan Baez; her playing to Chuck Berry and Jimi Hendrix; and her humor to musical comedian Victor Borge and even Eddie Izzard.

Her shows, her life, her instrument, her workshops and her music are all about transformation -- all tied together by powerful, funny, affirming stories and universal humor.

Legendary "Tonight Show" trumpeter Doc Severinsen calls her the "Wild Woman of the Harp," iconic rock guitarist Steve Vai says she's the "Jimi Hendrix of the Harp." See her once and you'll never look at a harp the same way again.

She's toured with the Boston Pops, opened for Ray Charles at Tanglewood, jammed onstage with Bobby McFerrin and offstage with Aerosmith's Steven Tyler.She’s been featured on television shows from Charlie Rose to Joan Rivers and "The View" and in two full-length PBS music specials.


"SHORT BLURB" (DHC in 1 Sentence)

(23 words / 146 characters including spaces)

Deborah Henson-Conant is a Grammy-Nominated electric harp virtuoso with a wicked sense of humor, a gutsy set of vocal chords and theatrical flair.


BRIEF ARTIST BIO

(106 words / 680 characters including spaces)

Deborah Henson-Conant is a GRAMMY®-Nominated recording artist and the world’s premier electric harpist. She’s known for her high energy shows with orchestra and on solo stages, her evocative singing voice, her fusion of music and theater - and.for transforming the classical concert harp into a "Street Harp" - a powerful, fully electric instrument a seventh of the size of a concert harp and fully electric. Her playing ranges from full-out bluesy to heart wrenching ballad. This is a feel-good, outside-the-box, bring-the-folks-you-love kind of show for audiences of all genders and ages- folks who want to celebrate what it means to passionately follow your own creative path.


SLIGHTLY LESS-BRIEF ARTIST BIO

(195 words / 967 characters including spaces) 

Deborah Henson-Conant is a Grammy-nominated electric harp virtuoso with a wicked sense of humor, a gutsy set of vocal chords and a theatrical flair. 

She's intimate, inventive, spontaneous and bigger-than-life - and she pulls sounds from the 32 strings of her custom-built electric harp that you'd never expect to hear from the instrument St. Peter hands out at the Pearly Gates: Blues. Jazz. Flamenco. Distortion.

She uses a foot-pedal to capture musical phrases on the fly and loop them together, building a pulse of sound an rhythms she improvises over, and tells stories of her own improbable life as she strides the stage strapped onto her harp like a musical centaur.

Poetic dissonance, movement, story and song – she pulls it all from the world's most cutting edge harp, built for her by the CAMAC company and named after her, the “DHC-Light.”

She's opened for Ray Charles at Tanglewood, toured with the Boston Pops as a featured soloist and with guitar legend Steve Vai as a rock harpist. Her music special "Invention & Alchemy" appeared on PBS Stations throughout the US and she performs her own solo shows in theaters and concert halls around the world.

PHOTO (ABOVE)

Photo above is by Beatriz Harley during a 2012 tour with Steve Vai.

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