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| Welcome To the Exclusive Interview With Morris Pert! |
| Legendary Avant Garde percussionist Morris Pert thrilled concert goers and record buyers throughout the 70's and 80's with his thrilling and over-the-top performances not only in the eclectic British jazz/fusion ensemble of Brand X, but also through his contributions on the albums of such artists as Peter Gabriel, Mike Oldfield, Kate Bush, and Paul McCartney. But what of Morris since those days? Morris has a new love of compsing chamber and orchestral music. He already has many symphonies and commisioned pieces to his credit, and Morris continues to be very active in the studio with orchestration and electronic music. Morris was kind enough to take the time to talk a bit about his new pieces and describe some of his fantastic ideas in this short but sweet interview! |
| Q: Morris, I want to thank you so much for taking the time to join me here on my site! It is a real pleasure to have you here! Most people I am sure will remember you for you incredible percussion work in Brand X as well as artists like Peter Gabriel and Kate Bush, but everybody wants to know what you are keeping busy with these days! A: I'm working on several projects at the moment including the writing and recording of my next solo CD. The music will be more or less a continuation of the Suntreader/Brand X style of instrumental material - plenty of percussion and more sampling. On the "serious" music side, I'm working on a very unusual piece. It's for taped electronics and samples,and a solo brass player who plays alto and bass trombones, an almost 10 foot long alphorn and an instrument called a carnyx. This is a type of Bronze Age warhorn used in Europe for many centuries B.C. After the curved mouthpiece, the horn rises vertically for about 6 feet ending in a carved boars' head! It was used to lead armies into battle and to scare the shit out of their opponents! There is only one playable replica in the world. I'm also working on 2 solo piano suites for publication - "Standing Stones" and "Mountains". A long term orchestral project is my 4th symphony - "Quiet Sun". Q: What led you into working with orchestrations and composing symphonies? A: Since I was a child, I've always loved the sound of a symphony orchestra - the sheer power of 60 or 70 musicians playing at full tilt. So it was my ambition from an early age to write for this combination. I wrote my first work for orch.,"Xumbu-Ata", during post-graduate studies in 1970, and it went on to win that years Royal Philharmonic Award in London. Since then I have written 3 symphonies, premiered in Tokyo, Glasgow, and Munich respectively, and several other orchestral works. My style is "expressionist-dramatic" using serialism, aleatoricism and many other avant-garde techniques. My orchestral music has been likened to your own Elliot Carter. Q: You have had a series of albums based on the theme of "The Suntreader". Can you tell me a bit about that project? A: Right, Suntreader was always a very loose collective of musicians, but all with the same desire to push back some boundaries. My main partner and long time musical associate, Peter Robinson (ed. note: former Brand X keyboardist) , had played in my previous band "Come to the Edge" with the Japanese percussionist Stomu Yamash'ta. I then formed Suntreader with Pete and at first Alyn Ross and then Neville Whitehead on bass. The latter unit recorded an album called "The Voyage" in the 70s for Island records but it was never released and subsequently lost! Only recently did I come across a copymaster, and it's now available on my own label [North by Northwest] from my website (www.morrispert.com) . Pete now lives in Hollywood and concentrates on filmscore writing, while Neville is working as a maker of acoustic and electric basses in Australia. As I live in the far North of Scotland, we're not exactly a working unit at the moment!! Suntreader is essentially on hold. Meanwhile my solo albums continue the Suntreader credo of uncompromising musical exploration. |
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