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noizemagazine - Index

noizemagazine - noiZe Magazine Issue 60 May 2009 - Index

“Music was around me everywhere,”
at his parents’ or grandmother’s,
Quentin Harris says of his
childhood growing up in Detroit.
“From Ray Charles to classical—
everything,” Quentin says. “We
heard it all. I think that’s why I have
such an eclectic mindset.”
His father and younger brother
played trumpet; his mother played
violin, cello, and French horn; his
grandmother played piano; and
his older sister sang in the church
choir. So it’s no surprise that
Quentin developed quite a penchant
for music. When he was
only five, he taught himself to play
piano. Quentin didn’t have formal
training until he was 12, when
he was already playing Bach and
Beethoven. Clearly a prodigy, he
went through three piano teachers,
because they kept making him play
elementary pieces.
After his grandfather died, Quentin
came across his father’s old beatup
trumpet from high school. His
father bought him a trumpet of his
own, and the two would have competitions.
“Anything you can play,
I can play better,” his father would
say to motivate the young musician.
They would play together; that is,
until Quentin started to surpass him
in skill level. “And he kindly put
his trumpet down,” Quentin recalls,
with a laugh.
When he was 13, his father bought
him his first set of turntables.
Unlike most kids his age, Quentin
never wanted toys for Christmas
or birthdays, but instead asked for
records, radios, or other electronics.
It was also around this time that he
entered the recording studio. His
uncle, who had a hip-hop group,
would bring Quentin along to play
keyboard lines on the synthesizers
during their sessions. Before long,
Quentin was telling the group what
to do and directing them musically.
“I didn’t realize,” he says now,
“at the time, what I was doing was
being a producer.”
brass instruments with ease. He joined
the orchestra and jazz band, and was
even assigned a project where he had
to score and arrange the parts for the
whole school band. Quentin played keyboards
in his own band as well, where he
started experimenting with the sounds
of hip-hop and R&B—before they had
truly emerged on the scene. “It's always
been my mentality, even to this day,”
Quentin explains. “I'm always looking
forward and thinking ahead.”
Growing up in Detroit in the ‘80s,
Quentin was heavily influenced by the
sounds of pop and techno, which originated
in the Motor City. He was glued
to the radio. “Radio was very different
when I was growing up,” he recalls. “The
actual DJ was a DJ and not just a radio
personality.” Hearing such influences
as Prince and Michael Jackson as well
as the electronic stylings of bands like
Kraftwerk helped to shape the ear of the
budding producer. “I guess it made me
who I am today musically,” he says.
Motor City to NYC & Back Again
After high school, Quentin started taking
trips to New York. “That’s really when I
got the bug,” says Harris. “It was everything
I liked that was being played in the
clubs in Detroit, but on a bigger scale. I
knew this was where I needed to be.”
By the time he started high school,
Quentin was picking up other
The first DJ he heard in New York was
Junior Vasquez. “It was mind-blowing
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