VOCALIST & DRUMMER SHERITTA “LOVE” HARRIS: THE SOUND OF FEELING
Baltimore native Sheritta “Love” Harris first caught my attention some years ago when she sat in at Clarence Ward III’s jam session at Tabor Ethiopian Café. There was something very focused in her playing, with a controlled energy and perfect sense of time. Much later, in March of 2021, I had the pleasure and privilege of playing with her at An die Musik. Since then, she has continued to grow her presence in the Baltimore jazz scene. Several Baltimore publications – Bold Journey (2024), Canvas Rebel (2023), and Voyage Baltimore (2022)- have published interviews with Harris. I’ll borrow from Bold Journey to recite her background.
‘Sheritta “Love” Harris started playing drums and percussion at Paul Laurence Dunbar Senior High under the direction of Charles Funn. She continued studying at University of the District of Columbia 2004-2006 under Allyn Johnson and the late Calvin Jones. She is currently a member of the Charles Funn Big Band and the New World Outreach Jazz Orchestra with Ronald Rolling, the lead vocalist for the jazz/funk/R&B/fusion band The Storage Unit Collective, and the drummer for the funk/R&B/70s and 80s cover band Nu Band featuring Tim Obasi. She has just joined the Joe Keyes Late Bloomer band. Her performance history also includes playing at Baltimore’s Jazzway 6004, An die Musik in Baltimore, Twins Jazz in DC, at the 2019 Baltimore Jazz Alliance Jazz Fest, and with multiple small ensembles and artists in the DMV area. She is currently the producer and host of The Vibe Check jam session, held at The Motor House on North Avenue on the 2nd Thursday of every month.
As she shared with me in our interview, Harris has found great satisfaction in learning the art of sound engineering and starting her own home recording studio in 2020 around the beginning of the COVID epidemic; she is currently studying audio engineering in an online course at Full Sail University. Her recording business is called Mervelous Entertainment, after her beloved late uncle Merv. She named her two drums sets after her mom: one, called “Mary,” is a set that was custom-built for her some 16 years ago; the other, called “First Lady,” is a Yamaha Signature Series set, for which her mom provided the funds.
In fact, Harris’s family is an important part of her life. Besides being a drummer, vocalist, band leader, and sound engineer, she is a full-time caretaker of her mom and her nine-year-old daughter Cataleya (nicknamed Leya)—and an entrepreneur. Harris started her own business on behalf of Leya and for her benefit. It is online at www.Lovefree1.com, selling apparel, home goods, accessories, and drinkware. Several of the items bear the phrase, “It’s the VibeCheck for me,” referring to her monthly jam session. Other items feature the word “Love” with pink cataleya orchids, inspired by Leya, who was named for this flower.
Speaking of some memorable performances, Harris recalls having the opportunity to sing two of her R&B originals, “Ski-Boo-Dye” and “We, Us, and Ours,” with the Charles Funn group – the first time the group had played something other than jazz. Another was when Dennis Chambers played in the Nu Band Concert in March of 2024, and Chambers signed her drum set. Still another, but less happy, occasion was before a performance at the Smithsonian with the Funn Band, when Funn accepted the Jazz Masters award. While unloading her bass drum, her brother broke the head. She draped her cardigan around it for a makeshift drum head and went on with the show.
Harris is in the process of mixing and mastering an album of eight songs, titled The Sound of Feeling, in which she sings, raps, and drums, with The Storage Unit band, along with drummer Raymond J. Spence, keyboardist Camille Scott, and bassist
Jordan Estevao. She hopes to release the album in 2025. “Music is what feeling sounds like,” she says, explaining the title of the album.
In all the magazine interviews mentioned above, Harris revealed how she overcame both physical and psychological challenges from rheumatoid arthritis through anxiety and depression. Therapy has helped her to achieve mental and spiritual balance, and she now emphasizes the importance of knowing who you are and accepting it. Expressing her thoughts, feelings and beliefs through music has also been therapeutic. She says it is “like having your favorite food every day without consequences” (quoted from CanvasRebel, 2022). “I’m grateful for the gift of music,” she says, “And grateful that I get to share it.” We in the Baltimore jazz community are grateful to her for sharing it with us.
–Liz Fixsen
Liz Fixsen is a jazz aficionada with a regular presence in the Baltimore jazz community. She is also a semi-professional jazz keyboardist and vocalist. She has been writing for and editing the Baltimore Jazz Alliance Newsletter for many years.