During the summer months of 2013 Morrison’s days and nights had been busy in preparation for the November release of the newest Lady Gaga album “ArtPop” on Interscope. The week we spoke Morrison was working rehearsals in New York as Lady Gaga hosted Saturday Night Live. After that it was off to Los Angeles to prepare for the American Music Awards with the Parnelli Awards the night before the upcoming AMA broadcast and then immediately off to Japan.
How Things Started
A native New Yorker, music has always been part of Mo Morrison’s DNA. “I started drumming at 9 years old,” says Morrison, “and studied with some truly great drummers.
I could read charts and got into the American Federation of Musicians. Fresh out of high school I was already a patron of the arts being a regular at the Fillmore East.”
Morrison got the bug for the concert production business in 1969 as an attendee at the Woodstock Music & Arts Fair. Morrison explained that “the Woodstock Festival was a defining moment, a cathartic change for me.”
His career started as a stagehand and usher at the Capitol Theater in Port Chester, NY around 1970. While working in the business Morrison pursued a degree in production design and music attending Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, NY. He also studied advanced lighting design at Lester Polakov’s Studio & Forum of Stage Design in New York City. That was 1973 and 1974. The Bachelor of Arts came in 1974.
At the start of 1972, promoter John Scher of Monarch Entertainment was in his first year at his first building, the Capitol Theater in Passaic, NJ. Morrison became the assistant stage manager there and it was an accident that became his big career break. “I was working a Pointer Sisters / Martin Mull show,” says Morrison. “The opening to the Pointer Sisters show was a Betty Boop cartoon. When the cartoon finished I pulled up the giant roll up movie screen with a fellow stagehand on one side of the stage. The screen fell off its roller on the opposite side of the stage and came crashing down. A stagehand quickly put it back on its roller and we pulled it back up and tied it off.”
“What I didn’t know at the time was when the screen fell on the opposite side of the stage from me, it fell on the production manager of the Capitol and hit him. He was hurt and rushed to the hospital. Bill Graham, who was managing the Pointer Sisters at the time, came running over and handed me this giant key ring from the production manager and told me that I was in charge. The production manager recovered and was fine, but he never returned to show business. I ran the Capitol for the rest of the decade.”
Said concert promoter John Scher, “With Mo leading the way, our Capitol Theatre became a must play for concert artists in the ‘70s and ‘80s, overcoming the fact that it was located in Passaic, New Jersey.” The irony has not been lost on Morrison that it was Bill Graham who was telling him he was in charge – in John Scher’s building!
Scher over the years would develop a great working relationship with the Grateful Dead and Morrison got his first taste of the road in touring theaters and arenas with the Jerry Garcia Band starting in 1973. That relationship with the Jerry Garcia Band eventually developed into working for the Grateful Dead with Morrison working with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead until 1983.
Morrison would again work for Scher and the Grateful Dead this time through Scher’s Metropolitan Entertainment as their production manager in stadiums around the world from 1993-1996. Scher says “Morrison led our production team as we began to promote and coordinate touring for the Grateful Dead, helping them set the standard for successful touring throughout the concert business. Also, when we co-produced the Woodstock ’94 and ’99 anniversary festivals, Mo was the first person I turned to, to head up the massive production aspect of those events.”
Morrison says, “Taking on the charge of running both Woodstocks was a truly special moment for me. While the spirit of ’69 rang true – besides being an enormous undertaking keeping the festivals going became extremely problematic. Both sites were, to say the least, less than desirable to stage a festival of this magnitude.”
Back To The Eighties: Mo Goes Independent
“After I left the Grateful Dead in the early ‘80s,” says Morrison, “I picked up a Blue Oyster Cult tour starting in Italy. By the time I got to Italy the entire tour had been cancelled. I flew to London looking for work and found my friend Michael Ahern, who was working as the Rolling Stones production manager. A few days before the Rolling Stones tour started, the opening act for the tour, the J. Geils Band, fired their production manager and called Ahern for a reference.”
“I jumped at that opportunity,” he adds. “Being the production manager of the opening act on a Rolling Stones stadium tour, not to mention taking over as production manager for the J. Geils Band during the height of their career, was a no brainer.”
In 1983 as Morrison was nearing the end of a J. Geils Band arena tour he soon found himself moving into stadiums again, this time production managing the 40-stop “World Reunion Tour” of Simon and Garfunkel and then as a site coordinator for David Bowie’s “Serious Moonlight” tour.
In 1985 Morrison worked as production manager for Raquel Welch “Live In Concert” in theatres around North America and in 1986 Morrison got the call to production manage for Cyndi Lauper’s “True Colors” tour in arenas worldwide.
Coming off that tour with Lauper, Mo got the call that started a decade-long working relationship. The result: Mo was employed as a site coordinator for 70 Michael Jackson stadium shows worldwide which made up the superstar’s “Bad” tour. The working relationship advancing stadiums stayed intact through another 40 dates on Jackson’s 1992 “Dangerous” tour and the 30 dates which comprised 1996’s “HIStory” tour.
In 1989 Morrison got the nod to be Prince’s production manager for 40 of his arena shows worldwide. By 1991 he was promoted to tour manager for another 40 Prince shows in arenas around the globe.
1990 saw Morrison as production manager on M.C. Hammer’s “You Can’t Touch This” tour in 60 arenas around North America. That same year Morrison worked the “International Rock Awards” for ABC Television. Morrison actually got his first taste of a live one-off show for television four years earlier as a staging producer on a live ABC Television broadcast for the Statue of Liberty’s Centennial Celebration airing July 4, 1986.
The Television Years and the Move to Los Angeles
Things were quiet on the television front until more work in that medium started coming Morrison’s way through the Home Box Office Network. In 1991, it was “Welcome Home Heroes with Whitney Houston” as staging producer for the live HBO production. Next, in early June of 1992 Morrison did a one-off event for Polygram Diversified: “Guns ‘N Roses Live from Paris,” again a live broadcast by HBO.
“HBO was all about shooting concerts and airing them live,” says Morrison. “The relationship just clicked and developed, eventually working so many HBO shows that it launched me and gave me credibility in the rest of the television market. They were a total first class outfit. They truly cared about the creativity and doing everything top notch with no compromises. I owe so much to them.”
After more HBO productions in the mid 1990’s Morrison decided to move to Los Angeles in 1996. Morrison explains, “The final move that launched me into TV was moving to Los Angeles. That first year in Los Angeles I literally turned down every single phone call I got to take on a tour. I orchestrated breaking into television because TV intrigued me.”
Explaining the move to concerts being shot for television, Morrison explains, “There were two separate and distinct camps. There was this cavalier attitude by the touring camp toward television people and the television people were of course immersed in their world of TV. They didn’t have any insight into music and how music should be shot for television.” Working to balance those two different worlds Morrison saw that as an opportunity and he started to market himself that way. “If I was going to make this transition into television I had to put a full stop on any and all touring. And I did.”
“I finally made my mark as a specialized niche guy, being the music guy and the television guy bridging both worlds and comprehending both entities.” This resulted in a 10-year break from concert touring. “The television folk liked the fact that I could talk to all the music talent, and the bands trusted me, knowing I would protect them. As I started to build a resume, working many TV shows and learning how that world worked, I started to merge those two worlds, having respect from both sides.
By 1999 he was off and running having made that difficult transition into television production. What followed were dozens of artist tributes, awards shows, fashion shows and live in concert style productions with Morrison working as staging producer or staging supervisor.
Highlights included:
1999: Cher from Las Vegas.
2000: Marc Anthony from New York, a Joni Mitchell Tribute from New York, Gloria Estefan from the Bahamas and ‘N Sync from New York.
2001: Madonna live from Detroit, Britney Spears live from Las Vegas and the Miss America Pageant from Atlantic City.
2002: Janet Jackson from Honolulu, Robin Williams on Broadway and the Miss America Pageant again.
2003: The Rolling Stones live from New York and “VH1 Divas Duets” in Las Vegas in 2004: Television productions of Britney Spears from Miami, Usher in Atlanta and Tim McGraw from Green Bay, MI.
2005: The production work in television continued highlighted by more big names such as Whoopi Goldberg from New York, Tracy Ullman in Los Angeles and then back to New York for the Dave Mathews Band and The Rolling Stones in Detroit.
2006: Barbra Streisand and Fashion Rocks.
2007: Justin Timberlake in New York and Fashion Rocks again.
2008: The “Country Music Television Awards” from Nashville, “David Foster and Friends” in Las Vegas and again over to New York for “Fashion Rocks.”
Patrick Stansfield, co-founder of the Parnelli Awards, went on record as saying, “Mo has virtually invented and perfected the whole genre of huge rock specials for the camera.”
Morrison earned an Emmy nomination as one of the executive producers on “Lady Gaga Presents the Monster Ball Tour: At Madison Square Garden.” That working relationship began in 2010 with the “Monster Ball Tour” continuing through the “Born This Way Ball Tour” and to the present day.
One Regret
Morrison’s one big regret is having had to sacrifice time with his family to a large extent for touring work. Morrison’s two past marriages produced three sons: Alex, Cody and Max. “I’m blessed to have great relationships with my kids, but not being there for them on so many occasions has always gnawed at me. They had to put up with long absences and I dedicate this Parnelli Hall of Fame award to all three of my sons.”
