Leigh Harrison was born in the 1950s and has never felt the urge to do it again. Raised in Christchurch and taught piano and flute from an early age, Leigh eventually escaped to Dunedin, discovering guitar and saxophone in Timaru along the way.

A life-long addiction to writing and recording music was ignited by the acquisition of a Thorn 4218 open reel tape recorder in the early seventies. Groundbreaking technological advances followed, including the Stockpot Reverb Helmet and the classic formula [dining chair] + [sticky tape] = [microphone stand].

While studying music at the University of Canterbury, Leigh was indignant at being marked down for using examples from Beatles songs to illustrate the principles of modulation. Leaving ‘varsity resulted in the intriguing discovery that being a professional musician got you invited to better parties. A period of career experimentation followed, leading to the unlikely discovery that being an undertaker’s assistant produced more social action than being an apiarist, but neither of them held a candle to being a radio announcer.

Things really started cooking in the late seventies, and not just because a new reverb spring released the stockpot back to culinary service. Leigh began producing local bands. Amazed at the resulting increase in party invitations, Leigh sent her own demo to what was then CBS records and was offered an Australasian recording contract. Leigh now refers to this as The Lesser Mistake. Having successfully completed eight months of negotiations she turned the contract down. Don’t ask.

However, her work as an engineer and a producer continued, including a compilation album of Christchurch bands, and getting in on the ground floor of the Dunedin Sound with production credits on classics such as Bored Games “Who Killed Colonel Mustard?”

Insert marriage and children here.

Twenty years later, single but not getting invitations to very many parties anymore, Leigh released the solo album Inappropriate Touching in 2002. By this time she’d emigrated to the North Island and settled in Wellington after a circuitous pilgrimage through Hawkes Bay and Wanganui. Lean On The Angels followed two years later, then a number of projects with other musicians.

Currently working on material for her best-ever stand-out smash album (the next one), Leigh lives in Johnsonville and doesn’t care who knows it, especially if there’s a party invitation in the offing.

More at http://www.else.co.nz/music/

Turn Around I Fall Life as contradiction, confusion as hope, apples as oranges.

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