Vision 4 Music Minutes With Guitar Genius

Steve Morse

This summer, Vision 4 Music had the tremendous opportunity to spend some time with Steve Morse, guitar hero and amazing talent performing with Dixie Dregs, Steve Morse Band, rock and roll’s legendary Deep Purple and formerly, Kansas. We met Steve in Atlantic City’s House of Blues before Deep Purple’s touring performance promoting “Rapture of the Deep”, their new CD to be released in October.

Vision 4 Music: Describe what it's like being on the road and touring with Deep Purple?

Steve Morse: Well, it's like a regular touring band in some ways and it's very easy. In fact, the one hard thing about it is that you'll be in other countries where's there's nothing in English you recognize. It's like spending $40 to send e-mails. Yeah, things like that and being away from family. That's the supreme number one thing. When there's a day off, that's what hits me the hardest. The actual travel is very comfortable because we usually have an easy day of travel- usually only 4-6 hours and then it’s time to go to the hotel and then to work.

V4M: How does touring affect your family life... how do you keep in touch?

SM: I make a call everyday to my son and my wife. When she's with me she calls her daughters. I try to give my son a little music theory question and stuff... at least one "something" everyday...a little tidbit for him to learn so it feels like he's getting something to remember out of each conversation. I give him a little quiz and tell him he's doing well. That keeps him up to date and we've always had some kind of meeting every day.

V4M: How does life on the road influence your playing and songwriting?

SM: In the old days it used to improve it because we'd be stuck like when I was with the Dregs for two days waiting for the next gig because we didn't have enough money to go anywhere else (laughs) and it was great to practice. Things just seem to have gotten more hectic. There's always something that needs to be done or there's more acts and you're more accessible with internet and e-mail so you're always dealing with stuff all the time even if there is a "day off" which is usually a travel day, not really a day off so it makes going home and working in my studio more of a relaxing thing than dealing with work. It's always been something I've looked forward to doing but now I'm thinking this is great...I can do whatever I want.

V4M: For you, what is the most crowd pleasing Deep Purple song that features you?

SM: Well, "Smoke" would be the #1. Highway Star, #2. Then, they let me do a little instrumental piece called "Well Dressed Guitar" that goes like this... (Steve plays a few measures.) It's got a very simple, straight ahead beat and in some countries we play in, that song goes over like a huge explosion because Ian Gillan gets behind me and pumps up the audience. He's like a cheerleader and he gets the audience to give an unbelievable reaction to that song. I don't know if that will hold true tonight because it just depends on the audience but generally it's been going really well.

V4M: What's the band's favorite song to perform?

SM: Good question. I don't know if everybody has a favorite but for Don and me, we love "Highway Star" and "Rapture of the Deep" because they're heavy on guitar riffs and organ riffs together. Everybody has a different favorite, though, other than those two.

V4M: How often do you get to practice individually or with the band?

SM: You never get a golden engraved invitation that says, "everything in your life is completely taken care and now you can practice, here's your guitar, sir". That will never happen. It's just pretty much, grab it while you can. For instance, I practiced some scales and stuff in the car today while we were sitting in traffic. I practice everyday.

V4M: Do you change the arrangement of your current songs to keep them interesting musically or do you just keep to the true original recordings?

SM: Actually, we change the arrangements quite often. And the band encourages improvisation. Like the beginning of Highway Star, for example, we do something different every night. Roger is in charge of making up whatever notes he's going to play. Whatever notes he plays determines the chords or melody I'm going to play because I have to listen to them and then we just build it up to hopefully create a musical climax.

V4M: When do you decide on updating an arrangement?

SM: If anybody suggests it, basically if anybody is unhappy with anything, we'll do something about it rather than saying, "four of us like it, you hate it, do this". If someone seriously doesn't like something, we're going to change it.

V4M: How does everyone get along on the road traveling day-to-day?

SM: I think really well. We're not as close as a band crowded in a cargo van sitting on top of our amplifiers, so we've got a very comfortable existence, and it's a pleasure to go to work and see everybody and go to the gig. We go to the gig and see everybody even if we didn't ride down the elevator with them or see them at lunch. We're still glad to see each other.

V4M: What type of monitors do you prefer, in-ear or on stage?

SM: On stage. Ian Gillan doesn't like any floor monitors so we have none. There's no center monitor whatsoever and no floor monitor so it's all blaring from the sides and I'm very close to one of them so it's definitely ear plug time for me. I have the equivalent of bigger PA than I've ever performed with the first 25 years of my life and its pointed right at me a few feet away, so yeah, it's very intense.

V4M: How has modern technology changed the sound of Deep Purple music?

SM: Bass drum has gotten louder in every band, not only Deep Purple. It's a tendency to...well, you know those rap albums you hear in cars? Subwoofer technology I think has changed. Drummers have to watch what they do when they go into a double bass pattern. They have to know it's pretty much that musically, everything is gone at that point so you had better really mean it as a climax. Ian does a great job with that. He definitely can work around whatever it is and make it musical. So we've got good things there. Another good thing in technology that has changed is that there are people who can sound better than they are if they use live pitch enhancement so it makes it a little harder for the audience to appreciate it when someone is really doing it live and in a big place. We've seen people in Florida where simple pitch enhancement may be source enhancement.

V4M: What size venues do you usually play? What is the band's preference?

SM: 4000-10,000 seats in a venue. The US is a little bit tougher nut to crack because the band has been pigeon-holed as a classic rock band which means it won't play any of the current stuff so people don't realize it's a current band. We play two songs and if we do have a new album, we go do an interview and it's, "so, you've got a new album, great! Here's a copy of it... why don't we play Smoke on the Water!"

V4M: Individually, what is your most memorable Deep Purple experience?

SM: I'd say there's a bunch of those. One I think of in particular was when we played on top of a mountain in Switzerland in the winter, outside while it snowed. You had to take an incline railroad, almost like a chairlift, straight up to get to it and then be taken in a track-vehicle like a Snowcat from the rail station to where we performed. Another time was when we played in a Moscow stadium with 3000 military people in front expecting a riot, and the time we were in China to do their first real rock and roll tour and being told "if you change the lyrics we approved you will go to jail". There are lots of things that were cool.

V4M: What are Deep Purple's current goals and future goals as a band?

SM: The current goal is to have the best show we can and make people glad they went to the trouble to come to the show. The future goal is to make new records that are good and that remind people of the Deep Purple they originally loved but that also sounds fresh with something different.

V4M: When did you realize you really made it personally in the music business?

SM: When we were playing with the Dregs and we each got a check for $1, playing for free in the middle of a park in Key Biscayne. We actually got paid for doing something that we thought no one would appreciate. Disco stuff was coming on real strong and we thought there was no way. Then people were clapping...strangers...random people liked it! They had been told to dislike it, is why. We didn't have a sign that said, "this is not fashionable music". It's just music. That really encouraged me. If you do something well, regardless of whether you're using a chain saw on a tree, it's what you do. That's what made me think that no matter what, I'd be able to make a living.

V4M: What is one of your favorite musical compositions of any genre...rock, funk, blues, country, classical?

SM: Anything by Bach. He was the heavy metal master of his day. His stuff is very rhythmic, just perfect. You can analyze it left, right, up and down, it's comes out great. It works great on any instrument. Anything he wrote you can play on any instrument.

V4M: What type of equipment do you have on your studio at home?

SM: 3 generations of equipment, 2 inch tape, 1/2 inch and 1/4 inch master 2 track recorders and a bunch of ADAT digital audio tapes for digital 2 tape recording of its time. A typical recording to computer and to hard disk setup with CubeX.

V4M: What do you think of the difference between analog and digital recoding?

SM: I prefer the days of analog recording. Personally I'm fine with digital recording. It doesn't bother me a bit. I don't see the big deal. I don't see a problem with it. Yes, it sounds very clean, so does soloing something without taping it. It sounds very clean and very clear with studio equipment anyway. I don't have issues with it. In fact in some ways it makes it easier. The reason I miss analog recording is that there was a time you perfected the material more before it was recorded. There's more performance time before a recording, I would say.