Harrison Napoleon Bankhead III^[1] (March 1, 1955 – April 5, 2023) was an American jazz double-bassist.

Life and career

Bankhead became associated with the Chicago jazz scene in the early-1980s.^[2] Early in his career, he performed with Fred Anderson on tour and at Anderson's Chicago club, the Velvet Lounge.^[3] Bankhead has worked with Oliver Lake, Roscoe Mitchell, Von Freeman, Malachi Thompson, 8 Bold Souls, and Hamid Drake, and was a member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians. His first album as a leader, Morning Sun/Harvest Moon, was released on Engine, a sub-label of ESP-Disk, in 2011, and featured sidemen Edward Wilkerson, Jr., Mars Williams, James Sanders, Avreeayl Ra, and Ernie Adams.^[4] He followed this with Velvet Blue, with Wilkerson, Williams, and Ra, whose name and title track pay tribute to Fred Anderson and the Velvet Lounge.^[5]

Bankhead died on April 5, 2023, at the age of 68.^[6][7]

Discography

As leader

• Morning Sun/Harvest Moon (Engine Studios, 2011)
• Velvet Blue (Engine Studios, 2013)
• The Fire of Compassion (Engine Studios, 2014)

With Malachi Thompson

• The Jaz Life (Delmark, 1992)
• Lift Every Voice (Delmark, 1993)
• Buddy Bolden's Rag (Delmark, 1995)
• 47th Street (Delmark, 1997)
• Freebop Now! (Delmark, 1998)
• Rising Daystar (Delmark, 1999)
• Talking Horns (Delmark, 2001) with Hamiet Bluiett and Oliver Lake
• Blue Jazz (Delmark, 2003) with Gary Bartz and Billy Harper

With 8 Bold Souls

• Sideshow (Arabesque Jazz, 1992)
• Ant Farm (Arabesque Jazz, 1994)
• Last Option (Thrill Jockey, 2000)

With Dee Alexander

• Wild is the Wind (BluJazz, 2009)
• Songs My Mother Loves (BluJazz, 2014)

With others

• Frequency (Edward Wilkerson, Nicole Mitchell, Harrison Bankhead, and Avreeayl Ra) - Frequency (Thrill Jockey, 2006)
• Fred Anderson/Harrison Bankhead - The Great Vision Concert (Ayler Records, 2007)
• Nicole Mitchell, Harrison Bankhead, Hamid Drake - Indigo Trio: Live in Montreal (2007)
• The Turbine! (Harrison Bankhead, Benjamin Duboc, Hamid Drake, Ramon Lopez) - Entropy/Enthalpy (RogueArt, 2015)
• Shanta Nurullah's Sitarsys, Sitar Black (Storywiz, 2016)

References