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Lorca Hart

Percussionist

Lorca Hart’s vision is to provide deepening creative musical experiences for himself and others. His career as both a performer and a teacher has been dedicated to the craft of drumming, jazz tradition and history, and ensemble collaboration.

Mr. Hart received his BFA from California Institute of the Arts in 1996. He was deeply inspired by teacher/mentors including Albert “Tootie” Heath, Joe La Barbera, Charlie Haden, Wadada Leo Smith, and many others. Lorca continues to be inspired by music education now as a faculty member for numerous musical education venues including Stanford Jazz Workshop, Mt. San Antonio College, SF Jazz and many other musical clinics and workshops. Additionally, Lorca teaches privately at his drum studio.

Lorca Hart

Lorca Hart

Lorca has performed in a vast array of musical situations, working with many of the West Coast’s (and beyond) finest artists including : Bobby Hutcherson, Ralph Moore, Carmen Lundy, Freddie Hubbard, Stanley Jordan, Craig Handy, Bennie Maupin, Azar Lawrence, Julian Lage, Hugh Masekela, Meklit, actor/musicians Jeff Goldblum and Peter Weller, Kyle Eastwood, Red Holloway, Plas Johnson, John Heard, Danny Grissett, Justo Almario, Phil Ranelin, Dave Pike, Don Menza, the Clayton Brothers, Anthony Wilson, Calvin Keys, storyteller/radio personality Joe Frank, Ronald Muldrow, Anton Schwartz, Kenny Washington, Nicolas Bearde and the Cross Hart Jazz Experience.

Lorca also leads his own trio featuring Josh Nelson on piano and Edwin Livingston on bass.

Lorca’s web site

Lorca accompanied Joe on stage for these performances:

The Blue Room, at the original Largo in Los Angeles
Just an Ordinary Man (Los Angeles)

Purchase Lorca’s CDs titles here – all proceeds go to Lorca.

Lorca Hart: “Recollections”
The Lorca Hart Trio “Colors of Jazz”
Lorca Hart Trio “Inspiration and Gratitude”

Reviews of Joe’s Work

"[Joe Frank] is one of the great, original radio performers. He's created a sound and style for himself - a complete aesthetic that's entirely his own. I first heard him when I was 19 and it changed everything for me. His work demonstrated the intensity and emotion that the medium is capable of; ingenious…fantastic."

Ira Glass, This American Life

"Although commonly categorized as radio drama, Frank's work bears very little resemblance to the stagy artifice of plays performed over air. Frank wanders deeply into the unconscious, producing Dionysian stories with a fairy-tale intensity whose effect is often funny, disturbing and deeply memorable."

Salon

"Radio's Prince of Darkness Rules the Freeways. [Frank is] alternately dark, bizarre and very funny - but always hard to turn off."

The Wall Street Journal

"In an arena in which formats are sacrosanct, Joe Frank has charted new territory with his literate, frequently bizarre, wildly funny essays and parodies... He can be funny, poignant, serious and off the wall - sometimes within the framework of the same piece. Unique is one word to describe it. Brilliant is another."

Los Angeles Times

"The world of Joe Frank is a wildly entertaining surrealistic universe...hilarious, unsettling, zany, powerful, moving and perhaps the most unique, inventive and effective use of radio since Orson Welles convinced much of America there was a War of the Worlds."

The L.A. Weekly

"Mixing bizarre monologues, multi-sequenced dramatic vignettes and mock-solemn critiques, [Joe Frank's work] is both sophisticated and surreal. A sizable cult has been growing around Frank...a rare radio talent."

The Village Voice

"A strange, different, wondrously offbeat, frequently hilarious, altogether brilliant piece of work..There's never been anything quite like it...Joe Frank is an audio Fellini."

The Los Angeles Times

"Joe Frank's often bizarre scenarios for the mind are decidedly offbeat radio fare...part surreal satire, part bizarre meditation, part fever dream."

Los Angeles Daily News

"Frank has created a series of dead-pan radio monologues so sharp and intelligent that during the quiet bits you can almost hear God taking notes."

The UK Guardian

"The perfect Joe Frank experience is driving down an unfamiliar highway alone at night. You turn on your radio and are greeted by a lush, resonant voice that lulls you into a seemingly simple tale of love: a man at an airport saying goodbye to his wife over the phone, which abruptly turns into a vision of betrayal, alienation and death - often from obscure disease - all brought about by some profound personal failing, which is redeemed at the last moment by a nearly transcendent moment of joy."

Salon