I’m compelled to call attention to jazz vocalist Karla Harris, who appeared with us on our Music Life and Times podcast, Episode 36. In addition to performing, she has been, from the earliest days of her career, dedicated to the music education of her local community. Initially it was her hometown St. Louis, where she was instrumental in developing a multi-disciplinary music curriculum she would personally deliver to young students in schools around the city. In Atlanta since 2012, she has not only graced virtually every jazz venue performing with the city’s top jazz musicians, and recorded several notable and noted albums of standards and originals, but since 2017 has served as an artist-in-residence at Kennesaw State University, where she teaches Applied Vocal Jazz to aspiring young singers.
What those singers get from Karla are insights that go beyond technique and even beyond the careers they aspire to. “Singing is a very vulnerable experience, and athletic,” she points out. “There are a lot of things you have to pay attention to. I really enjoy going in and working with these kids, talking to them about what they’re going to be, because those character traits and the soft skills we learn from jazz, we carry into our personal lives which reverberate into our community then into society at large. It’s a much wider look at what’s happening when we teach these kids about jazz, a lot of positives that make this planet a better place to be.”
Karla’s dedication to music education recently won her recognition as one of Atlanta magazine’s 2024 Women Making a Mark. “This jazz vocalist helps children discover a love of music,” the magazine noted. To which Karla added, “There are soft skills you learn with music, and jazz in particular, like collaboration, communication, and mutual respect. Jazz values are the same things we value as a society and as a democracy.”