米キーボードマガジンのオンラインサイトにパンプキンズのキーボーディストLisa Harritonのインタビュー記事が掲載されています。記事によると彼女の家族は音楽一家で、そういった環境で育ったことが、現在彼女がパンプキンズでキーボーディストを勤めていることにとても役立っているようです。
また、彼女はビリーについて「彼は私がバンドの他の誰とも違ったバックグラウンドを持っていたということをリスペクトしてくれている。彼はとても協力的で決して私が非力であるように感じさせることはありません。」と語り、バンドの一員として活動していることにとても充実感を感じているようです。
原文は下記
Lisa Harriton And The Infinite Gladness
By Robbie Gennet | April, 2008
Can a jazz cat find happiness as a rock star? If it’s with the Smashing Pumpkins, that would be yes.
When the Smashing Pumpkins reformed for the first time since 2000, the call went out for a keyboard player who could fit into the huge sonic vision of founder Billy Corgan. Enter Southern California’s Lisa Harriton, whose bright red hair and genuine smile bring a welcome spot of sunshine to the Pumpkins stage show. The Pumpkins happen to be her first A-list professional gig, but it comes along a lifetime path of musical education and absorption.
Harriton grew up in Van Nuys, California, as the daughter of a film television composer father and a studio singer mother. When she was ten years old, she watched her father conduct an orchestra at Capitol Records for a film score that was later nominated for an Academy Award. Her mother sang on blockbuster films like Spiderman and War of the Worlds, and is a member of the Society of Singers, a tight-knit clique of top pros that has been together for years. Harriton started playing piano at five, taught by her mother until she enrolled in the L.A. chapter of the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, which is based in London. She graduated with distinction and cites it as a big part of her training. Equally important was the musical osmosis she’d experience nightly at home. “My room was right next to my dad’s,” she says. “There was a glass window between us, not even a wall. I heard everything. I would go to sleep hearing what ideas he started with. He could work all through the night. I would then wake up hearing what the idea sounded like completely finished. I think that being a part of his process was a big part of my musical experience.”
Following her high school graduation, her choices were to follow the classical path or see what else there was to discover. As it happens, Harriton found jazz. “At that time my brother had just started getting into jazz,” she says. “He was a couple years older than me and he was in the jazz department. I just fell in love with the jazz I was hearing. He was taking down solos on guitar and improvising and going to jam sessions. I would watch him and I thought he was so free up there, not reading the music and yet expressing himself. I thought that was cool. He inspired me. So I decided on jazz. That was my plan.” Harriton considers herself a writer more than anything, especially with the influence of her father’s symphonic composing. Consequently, what she brings to the Pumpkins is much more than chops. “When I play with the Pumpkins, I think really texturally with splashes of color,” she says. “I think as a composer and an orchestrator, not just as a keyboard player. It’s a really cool mix with Billy, because he definitely thinks that way in the big picture. He’s really inspiring.”
Harriton attended California State University, Northridge, studying under acclaimed teacher and virtuoso bassist Gary Pratt (“A brilliant conductor and wonderful friend and mentor.”) From that point on, she was playing in a lot of jam sessions, practice rooms, and garages. Harriton played in jazz ensembles and got into writing for big band. “There is my influence from my father again,” she says. “I discovered Maria Schneider. She is a brilliant composer and conductor, and she reinvented the jazz band. I remember seeing her in Keyboard. She is an acquired taste, but stretches the jazz band to the limit. I really respect her.”
Following her college experience, the road to the Smashing Pumpkins was fairly short, but involved another rock luminary. Harriton only auditioned for one band before the Pumpkins, which was Perry Farrell’s Satellite Party. “He was so nice and everyone in the band was super cool,” she says. “I just went in and had a great time in the audition. I didn’t even know what I was doing. I was so out of my element in a rock band. I couldn’t think about it and just had a good time. The next day my friend said there was a Craig’s List posting for the Pumpkins. They were reforming and my friend said that I would be perfect for it. He had a feeling. I called Azoff Management and sent in my bio. I sent a MP3 of this tune I did for my senior recital. I sent it because I thought Jimmy [Chamberlin, longtime Pumpkins drummer] had a jazz background so he might hear where I was coming from.”
But it was Perry who passed along Harriton’s name while visiting Corgan in the studio, which prompted Corgan to fly Harriton out to Chicago to audition. She was afraid they wouldn’t think she was right for the part, but Corgan thought otherwise. “I think Billy respected that I had a different background than anyone else in the band,” she says. “He is very supportive and never makes me feel stupid.” Once she began playing with the group, things gelled quickly and the band had a lot of fun together. “I love to play free,” she says. “We sometimes just jam. It is a great environment for taking chances. Billy is appreciative if you jump off the cliff and commit to your choice.”
Harriton listened to the Pumpkins’ music growing up and remembers her earliest impressions. “I heard the Pumpkins a lot from my brother’s room,” she says. “He would play all the cool stuff. I saw the Pumpkins on TV once, and I had this eerie feeling. Billy was wearing all black. He has such a look to him that was almost intimidating. I remember watching him on TV. I remember admiring the music. I’m just enjoying all the learning and growing.”
The keyboard chair for the Pumpkins had one fatal chapter in its past when keyboardist Jonathan Melvoin sadly overdosed on the road in 1996. Though there have been temporary players live (including the amazing Mike Garson at one point), Corgan himself played keyboards on the last Pumpkins album, Zeitgeist (along with everything else but the drums). Harriton worked closely with Corgan, designing sounds to reproduce what was on the record. She says, “The idea was to get me there first and to meet me and to kind of create the keyboard rig as we went along. They didn’t want to have any limitations. So we started from scratch. The only thing I brought out was a little controller to use my little [Apple] Logic sounds. Billy would come up with sounds and he was so passionate with them.
“I spent the first weeks of rehearsal, eight hours a day, just transcribing the string parts from ‘Tonight, Tonight’ because there weren’t any charts for anything. I write it all down in [Make Music] Finale. I need to see it. I did that for ‘Disarm’ too. It took about three weeks to figure out which songs I was going to play on and which ones I was going to sing on.”
A week before the production rehearsal, it was time to figure out her rig. She wound up with a Roland Fantom and AX-7 with a MIDIJet Pro wireless MIDI system. She also has a Hammond B-3 with Leslie 122 cabinet, and a Wurlitzer 140B. After an initial one-month tour of Europe, Harriton and Corgan visited the Moog factory. After trying out a Minimoog Voyager, they added it to her keyboard arsenal. “I had to have one,” she beams. “Billy and I had this talk. He said, ‘This is going to open a whole new world for the band. It would be great for you to play on the more heavy hitting songs.’ I can tweak the sound as I go and create sound effects. Just having the ability to alter the sound as a part of the performance is awesome.”
She also has a Yamaha Motif Rack from which she can pull sounds on the fly ― a handy resource, as the band has 70 tunes in their arsenal and the set list constantly fluctuates. Harriton explains: “About a half-hour before each show, Billy tells us the set list. Then I run out of the room and figure it out. The set list changes each night. I love it. It keeps everybody sharp.”
When asked what advice she has for players wishing to follow her path, she says, “I wish I was more of a gearhead! My musical background and training are primarily in acoustic piano. I had no idea I would find myself in one of the biggest rock bands of our time. It takes me a while to figure out my own gear sometimes, but I love learning more about analog synths, and all keyboard gear, really. I would encourage all piano students to learn about synthesis, because it can open up so many doors for you, not only in terms of different genres of music but also in terms of musical expression, too.
“I love being on the road,” she continues. “Sometimes the time away from home and erratic sleep schedule can be challenging. But I feel so fortunate to be making music for a living, with very talented people whom I respect so much. The key for me is gratitude. That helps to keep a perspective on what is really important and to keep my focus on the music.”
Sometimes it seems that what’s really important about working with the Pumpkins is having a sense of humor. Harriton’s AX-7 controller is an example. “It started off as a joke,” Harriton says. “We had just shot a video where I was jamming out with the AX-7, and having so much fun. The director said for me to do it again with some personality, and I just had a ball on that thing! Billy was joking around and said we should do that live. Well, we had a week break before we were going to Sweden, and when Billy came back, I had already bought the MidiJet Pro wireless set up and the AX-7!”
You can see Lisa Harriton with and without keytar in the Smashing Pumpkins new video, and on tour this year. Corgan has found himself re-energized and he’s focused on making the Pumpkins 2.0 the best version yet. And with Harriton’s smiling visage behind the keyboards, there’s no doubt they’ll succeed.
