August 1: Singer & guitarist Dhani Harrison- AKA as George Harrison’s son- is 35-years-old today.



Photo by S. Beals

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Dhani Harrison was born 1 August 1978. He grew up with his parents in Henley-on-Thames, in Friar Park, the estate on which his father had lived since 1970. One of Harrison's earliest memories, from the age of six, is receiving a drumming lesson from his father's friend and bandmate, "Uncle" Ringo Starr.

Dhani's professional music debut was assisting in recording his father's final album, Brainwashed, and completing it with the assistance of Jeff Lynne after his father's death in November 2001. Harrison formed his own band, thenewno2, in 2006.

Harrison is an alumnus of Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, United States, where he studied visual arts, obtaining a Bachelor of Arts. After graduating from Brown in 2001, Harrison pursued a career as an aerodynamicist; however, he decided to follow in his father's footsteps as a professional musician.

Dhani participated in the Concert for George on the first anniversary of George Harrison's death. The concert was organized by Eric Clapton and featured some of George's friends and collaborators, including former Beatles bandmates Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr as well as Clapton, Billy Preston, Ravi Shankar, Jeff Lynne, Tom Petty, Jim Keltner, Joe Brown and Prince.

Dhani Harrison played backup acoustic guitar for most of the concert. Before the finale, McCartney relayed to the audience, "Olivia (George's widow) said that with Dhani up on stage, it looks like George stayed young and we all got old."

In April 2006, thenewno2, had begun recording. The band released a music video, "Choose What You're Watching,"featuring Harrison on lead guitar, synthesiser and vocals and Oli Hecks on drums and synths. He also contributed to the 2007 EP by Heather Porcaro and the Heartstring Symphony, Rooney's 2007 CD Calling the World.

Dhani He was involved in a re-working of the Beatles' "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" entitled "The Heart Gently Weeps," which was the first single on the Wu-Tang Clan's album, 8 Diagrams, released in December 2007.

Thenewno2's debut album, You Are Here was released online on 11 August 2008. The song "Yomp" was featured as a downloadable song for the Rock Band series, and "Crazy Tuesday" was featured as one of the 20 free songs that were downloadable with the purchase of Rock Band 2.

In 2009, it was announced that Harrison was collaborating in the development of The Beatles: Rock Band, a music video game released on 9 September 2009 on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Wii gaming platforms. Dhani Harrison was instrumental in the creation of the game and urged McCartney and Starr to participate.


Harrison said during an interview with the Chicago Tribune in an interview that he is "working on Rock Band 3 and making the controllers more real so people can actually learn how to play music while playing the game."

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For more about Dhani and thenewno2, visit this Website:

http://thenewno2.com/

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