Album Notes

Christa Grix Biography

Christa fell under the spell of the harp during her first lesson at 16. Two years earlier, she was transfixed by live jazz during a performance at her high school. The two influences have shaped, but not limited her explorations and accomplishments on the instrument.
Equally adept as both a classical and jazz harpist, she is one of those rare individuals who can make the transition from the jazz rhythm section to the symphonic string section sound effortless. The appeal and respect her music generates has taken her throughout the U.S., Canada and Europe as an invited soloist and clinician at all the major harp festivals and conferences.
Grix released her first jazz harp recording, “freefall”, in 1996, on the Freefall Music label. Her second recording, “Cheek to Chic” was released in 2002. Grix is Director of the Rocky Mountain Springs Harp Program, in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, where she teaches and leads harpists in an idyllic mountain setting each summer.

Jazz critic and WEMU, FM host, Michael Nastos, has commented on Grix:

\"Christa Grix is a harp player of considerable depth and vision,\" he writes. \"Her phrasing and lyricism suggest the obvious influence of jazz progenitor, Dorothy Ashby, but in many ways, she has taken those nuances and stepped it up a notch. Whether it be classical or jazz, it takes little time to realize what a precious musician Christa Grix is, and how she is literally able to do it all. That universal appeal, and her willingness to take risks with improvisation, is what sets her apart from the rest.\"