Allison Morris
(b.1966)

Allison Morris is a songwriter, arranger, composer, pianist, pan player and teacher of music. Her work is heavily influenced by Jamaican folk tunes, Reggae and other Caribbean forms. 


Beginnings and Development

Allison grew up in Black River, in a house with a piano. She began making up short two-note tunes from an early age, before being exposed to formal piano lessons. Throughout her primary school days in her hometown, she would write poems and stories to entertain herself. 

Her early music teacher was Beryl Joyce Harris, a friend of her mother. Morris credits Mrs. Harris’ patience with her later successes at the piano, as in those early years she would have much rather have been in the plum tree next door than sitting around a piano. In fact, she often was.

By the time she reached Hampton School for Girls in 1977, Morris’ note-reading skills were at the stage where the notation began to look more like friendly words on a page. Pieces of music that would have previously been considered tedious became a challenge to conquer. Miss Donalda Johnston, also originally from Black River, was her teacher and mentor at Hampton, encouraging her to explore music of all eras, and guiding her through Grades 1 to 8 of the Royal Schools of Music Piano Exams.

The music-making tradition at Hampton was well established and being around other young musicians was as much of a learning experience as the formal, more classical lessons were. Morris was amazed at the natural talent of some of her peers, whose skills at playing by ear encouraged her to try and do the same. During these high school years, she began rearranging well-known tunes with her own words, usually to help herself study. 

The tune-making, poem-writing hobbies managed to remain separate for many years, until around age 18, which is when Morris remembers putting original melodies together with her lyrics. After high school, she taught music for a year at Immaculate Conception Prep School, writing short songs for devotion when a song with a requested theme couldn’t be found. This was obviously before the days of YouTube!

At UWI Mona, Morris joined the UWI Panoridim Steel Band, one of the most crucial steps in her development as a professional musician and composer. She began arranging songs for the band, an activity which she considers to be inextricably bound up with composition. Where did an arrangement stop and a new composition begin? It was hard to tell sometimes. 

After a few years in Kingston’s corporate world, Morris married and returned to live in Black River, establishing a private piano studio, and Genesis Steel Band at the St. John’s Parish Church. After starting her family, she resumed her studies in music, earning the Advanced Certificate in Piano, as well as the LRSM in Piano Teaching. She began teaching Piano at Hampton School in 2004, eventually assuming responsibility for the school’s choir, and starting Blueprint Steel Band at the institution. 

The Hampton School Choir was the catalyst for many of Morris’ compositions. She began to take more of an interest in Jamaica’s folk forms and was inspired by the pioneering work of Olive Lewin and Noel Dexter. She experimented with fusing well-known folk tunes together into single songs, creating new lyrics to tell topical stories. Eventually she began creating original folk-style songs, and Hampton became known in the performing arts community for songs which had not been heard anywhere else. Hampton’s musical and dramatic production Echoes was started by Morris in 2012.

Morris considers her tribute to Olive Lewin, written on the night of Dr. Lewin’s death, to be divinely inspired:  Peter I am Coming Home, verses by Allison Morris, chorus by God!  

Many of Allison Morris’ compositions have been enjoyed widely by live audiences but most, up to the time of writing, have not been professionally recorded.             

Compositions include:

Original Folk- Style Tunes
Peter I am Coming Home 
Aunt Vie
Lesson to POTUS 
Proverbs 
Would You Believe
Warning
Brick Pon Brick (175th Anniversary Song St. John’s Church, Black River)

Traditional Folk Song Adaptations
Something in Beijing
Mattie Mix Up
Serious Business (aka Cake Soap)
Foreign Smile
Cow Tief Confession https://youtu.be/KIBkKKuf9ew


Classical/Semi-Classical
Sound of the Clock

Popular
Embassy Appointment
Answer Yu Phone 
Where the Love Come From
Skabadee

Instrumentals
Holy Spirit Jamboree (Steel Pan)
Joy (Steel Pan) 
Steel Pan Alley (Steel Pan)
Creolisation of Bach (Steel pan adaptation of J.S. Bach’s Two-Part Invention No. 4 in D minor)
Bach In the Dancehall  (Keyboard adaptation of C. P. E. Bach’s Solfeggietto)