Morris Samuel Palter

Born in Canada, Morris Palter’s wide-range of musical interests have found him performing throughout North America, Asia, and Europe at some of the most prestigious festivals and concert venues including his Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall debut under famed composer/conductor Pierre Boulez in 2001. As a frequent guest at universities and conservatories worldwide, Morris has commissioned and/or premiered hundreds of new compositions, working with prominent composers and performers including Bob Becker, Joan Tower, Christopher Adler, Roger Reynolds, Anders Åstrand, Mark Menzies, Tom Hanks, Chou-wen Chung, John Luther Adams, James Tenney, Michael Roth, Phillipe Manoury, Scott Deal, Evelyn Glennie, David Lang, Stuart Saunders Smith, Eduard Zilberkant, Thomas DeLio, Michael Roth, Andres Diaz, Erik Griswold, Philip Manoury, Iancu Dimitriescu, Evan Ziporyn, Orlando Jacinto Garcia, Pauline Oliveros, Chris Tonkin, and Chinary Ung, among many others. Guest residencies include the “Roots and Rhizomes” summer percussion program (Banff Centre for the Arts), the Together Now Festival (Holland), the Open Ears Festival (Canada), the Technosonics Festival (University of Virginia), the University of British Columbia, the University of Miami, the University of Texas (Austin), Southern Oregon University, and the Royal College of Music (London, UK).

Recent commissions have included works from Bob Becker (“Sevenly Reward”), Bill Cahn (“Music of the Spheres”), Russell Hartenberger (“Black Coyote’), and Anders Astrand (“Just Arrived”)

As a Novelty Ragtime Xylophonist, Morris founded the Speak-Easy Duo in 2003 and has appeared at the Rocky Mountain Ragtime Festival in Boulder, CO, the Bohèm Festival in Hungary, the Rotterdam Conservatory, the Orange County RagFest, the Breda Jazz Festival, NL, the West Coast Ragtime Festival, the Ragtime Xylophone Institute in Delaware, and the Koninklijk Conservatorium, Den Haag. Morris currently directs the Speak-Easy Novelty Ragtime Band at the University of Arizona.

In 2000, Morris co-founded NOISE (San Diego New Music), which has presented the soundON Festival of Modern Music each January in La Jolla, CA since 2008. Previous to the soundON Festival, NOISE presented an annual concert season. Morris was a member of the percussion group redfish bluefish (Artistic Director, Steven Schick) from 1999-2005 and has also been actively involved with theatre, working as composer and performer at both The Old Globe Theatre and the Tony Award Winning La Jolla Playhouse, and has made recordings for numerous on and off-Broadway plays. July 2018 found Morris providing all the percussion music for the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles’s production of King Henry IV, featuring Tom Hanks.

Morris was the host and director of the Focus Day of Percussion at the 2010 and was a member of the Percussive Arts Society New Music/Research Committee from 2007-2015. He has been published in PAS journal and on Mellen Press, and can be heard on New World Records, Tzadik Records, Centaur Records, Mode Records, Innova, and RCA/BMG.

Since 2016, Morris has been the director of percussion at the University of Arizona where he oversees the undergraduate percussion ensemble and the graduate percussion ensemble (Malleus), as well as CrossTALK (electronic percussion ensemble). In 2018, Morris created a new technology course focused on the use of Ableton Live which is now also offered as an asynchronous course. Morris has served as the Chair of the Faculty Advisory Committee, and Chair of the Dean’s Advisory Committee for the College of Fine Arts.

In 2018, Morris is the founder and director of the Tócalo Tucson Summer Chamber Percussion Seminar. Past guests have included Casey Cangelosi, Bill Cahn (NEXUS), Bob Becker, (NEXUS, Steve Reich Ensemble), Matthew Burtner, Anders Astrand, Russell Hartenberger (NEXUS, Steve Reich Ensemble), and Michael Burritt (Eastman School of Music). Please visit tocalotucson.org for more details. Morris also served as President for the Arizona Chapter of PAS for three years (2021-2023). In this capacity, he oversaw, hosted, and curated numerous AZ Days of Percussion events.

Morris has received degrees from the University of Toronto (BM, 1993), the Royal Conservatory, The Hague (Artist Diploma, 1999), and the University of California, San Diego where he received his Master of Music (2000) and Doctorate of Musical Arts (2005) where he was also a Lecturer in Music from 2005-2007. Commencing in 2007, Morris was the Director of Percussion at the University of Alaska Fairbanks (Associate Professor, 2012 – 2017) and is currently a Professor of Music at the University of Arizona. Please visit percussion.music.arizona.edu for more information about the percussion program at the University of Arizona. As a proud member of the Black Swamp Percussion family, Morris was the driving force behind the BSP Multi-Bass concert drum – one of the most popular drums on the market today. Morris also holds endorsement contracts with Malletech, REMO drumheads, and Sabian Cymbals.