Joe Morris

Joe Morris

Joe Morris is an American jazz guitarist from New Haven, Connecticut, known for free jazz and free guitar. He leads his own groups and records with other improvisers, including Mathew Shipp, William Parker, Whit Dickey, Rob Brown, Joe Maneri and Ken Vandermark. His releases appear on ECM, Hat Hut, Okka Disc, AUM Fidelity and his own label, Riti.

Style and approach

Morris is associated with a flowing single-note technique that draws more from traditional African musics and saxophonists such as Eric Dolphy and Jimmy Lyons than from other guitarists. He prefers a clean guitar sound rather than distortion or effects, though he sometimes uses a serrated pick to bow the strings and produce a more harmonically complex sound. He also plays banjo and banjo-uke, and in later years he focuses increasingly on bass.

Career and collaborations

An important early mentor and playing partner is the pianist Lowell Davidson, whose work is described as little recorded but highly regarded. Morris is often described as one of the most significant guitarists in free jazz since Sonny Sharrock.

Other artists with the same name

There are also American musicians named Joe Morris who work in other fields: a jazz and rhythm and blues trumpeter and bandleader born in 1922 in Montgomery, Alabama, and a drummer born in 1960 based in Phoenix.