Eric Harland

Eric Du'sean Harland rose to prominence as an elite jazz drummer and one of the most sought-after players from 2000 onward, his path marked by determination and resilience. Born in Houston, Texas, in 1978, he is the nephew of local vocalist Leo Polk. During his teenage years he carried substantial extra weight that drew ridicule from peers, unsympathetic instructors, and occasionally relatives. His devout mother, certain she had witnessed a divine sign at his birth, came to believe he was destined to become the messiah and consulted voodoo priests along with witch doctors to validate that conviction.

Harland discovered belonging through music, taking up orchestral percussion and, by age fourteen, developing a deep admiration for Elvin Jones. He often retreated to his room to play along with John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme as well as albums featuring Jeff Watts, Jack DeJohnette, Dave Weckl, and Steve Gadd. His professional work began locally in 1993, and he completed his secondary education at Houston’s High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, where he earned first-chair honors in the regional and state jazz ensembles for 1992–1993. A workshop visit from Wynton Marsalis prompted the trumpeter to urge the young musician to pursue further jazz training in New York City.

Harland enrolled at the Manhattan School of Music on a full scholarship, yet exhaustion and self-imposed starvation led to a collapse in 1996 that sent him back to Texas. There he restored his physical and spiritual equilibrium while studying theology at Houston Baptist University with the goal of ordination. Once he returned to New York City noticeably lighter, steady work followed with Marsalis, Terence Blanchard, Stefon Harris, Joe Henderson, and, most significantly, Betty Carter, whom he accompanied until her passing in 1998.

Additional partnerships encompass an extensive roster of contemporary jazz figures: Greg Osby, Joshua Redman, Geri Allen, Kenny Garrett, Michael Brecker, Jason Moran, John Patitucci, Ravi Coltrane, Jimmy Greene, Mark Shim, Gregory Tardy, Rodney Jones, Mark Sherman, Aaron Goldberg, Joel Weiskopf, Stefano di Battista, Brett Sroka, Jacky Terrasson, John Swana, Edward Simon, Liberty Ellman, Kathy Kosins, and Zakir Hussein. He has also joined major tours and sessions with McCoy Tyner, the Dave Holland ensemble and big band, the SF Jazz Collective alongside Redman, Miguel Zenón, Nicholas Payton, and Bobby Hutcherson, and, most notably, the Charles Lloyd Quartet. Harland has contributed to multiple film scores and, following his considerable weight reduction, has maintained a parallel career in modeling. He issued the album Voyager: Live by Night in 2010 and, the following year, appeared on James Farm with saxophonist Joshua Redman.