February 14: Musicians Sport Messy Hair: Accountants, Not So Much

Article featured in the Portico.

His career was proceeding just as he’d planned. Brian Morcombe, BA ’96, had a Guelph degree in management economics, his accounting certification and a job with PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, one of the top firms in the country. By the time he was 26, Morcombe was already a senior manager travelling the world to work with major clients.

Then one day his young son asked him to bring his guitar when they went to the park near their home in Guelph. “After the kids ran around for a while, I pulled out my guitar and sang a song,” recalls Morcombe. “People started to gather around. I played for more than 45 minutes, and the crowd kept growing. At the end, someone came up and asked for my name and phone number.”

That person passed his name to the Guelph Public Library, and he received a call asking him to perform at a library event. It went well, and they called him again. “They told me people were asking them to have me back.” The audiences for his shows became so big that the library had to close its doors to stop any more from coming in.

Other libraries and then festivals began calling. “Eventually, I had to ask for a three-week leave from work because I had a little tour going,” he says. As the tours and performances took up more time, he decided to leave the firm to focus on his music full-time. He now performs across Canada and the United States.

His Music with Brian and Friends stage show features dancing partners Melody the Hippo and Alan the Lion. Musicwithbrian.com offers free songs, video, lyrics and educational material as well as an opportunity to purchase Morcombe’s three CDs and a DVD.

Last spring, he found himself back outside his old office in downtown Toronto. “I actually parked in my old parking spot,” he says. “I made sure my hair was messier, though; musicians tend to have a different approach to fashion than accountants.” He was headed down King Street for the announcement of the 2012 Juno nominees. Morcombe’s album Everyone was nominated in the Children’s Album of the Year category.

He didn’t win the Juno but remembers the awards ceremony as a highlight: “To go in the room with all these famous people, these incredible talents – I was literally standing next to Blue Rodeo and watching Deadmau5 on stage just a few feet away – it was amazing.

“I was thinking: ‘In my previous life, I was meeting here with the likes of Paul Godfrey; now I’m being recognized for a completely different talent.’”
Morcombe’s wife, Susan MacKay, was obviously excited about the nomination.  “You deserve it and I’m not surprised,” she told him, but Morcombe adds, “I think she was surprised. I was!” He says her support has been crucial to his success, and it hasn’t always been easy. “She married an accountant, and then one day I woke up and said, ‘I want to be a musician.’”
MacKay is a psychological associate with a Guelph master’s degree in developmental psychology. She may have figured things out even before he did because  “music time” with their own children had taken over their living room and become a family tradition.

Truth is, Morcombe’s love of music was always there, hovering in the background. He began playing the organ when he was six but soon quit. It wasn’t until middle school that he learned to play the saxophone and discovered his passion for music.

“The sax is such a cool instrument,” he says. “My brother (Stuart Morcombe, B.Comm. ’95) played the trombone, and in the evenings we’d just jam and improvise. We had loads of fun.”

In high school, Brian’s ability to play and improvise music got him into the regional arts program at Mayfield Secondary School in his hometown of Brampton, Ont. “In my final year, I was on stage 126 times; we performed in places as far away as Vancouver, Halifax and Texas.”

His parents, though, didn’t see music as a viable way to make a living and encouraged him to find “a good, solid career” – like accounting.

But the music lingered. While working at a summer camp after high school graduation, Morcombe offered to teach the kids some music. “They said, ‘Great, get some guitars.’ But I didn’t know how to play the guitar,” he recalls. No problem. He taught himself guitar, then taught the kids, and learned a few other instruments along the way.

Knowing how to play multiple instruments means Morcombe can introduce kids to a greater variety of music than many children’s performers can. His shows are also built on his ability to write songs. In fact, the Juno-nominated Everyone CD has all original music. “That was a real gamble,” he says. “Our previous CDs were 50-50 original music and traditional songs that parents would know and recognize, but we found our original songs were popular in our shows.”

Morcombe’s new career has an important bonus: more time with his family. His three children are now nine, seven and two, and enjoy travelling with Dad to festivals and events instead of waving good-bye at the airport as they did during his accounting years.

What’s next? “I think TV is our next frontier,” he says. Morcombe has already met with people at Disney, Treehouse, Nickelodeon and other networks to discuss possibilities and is developing a broadcast-ready DVD.

“For years I was an accountant for people who took big risks and accomplished big things,” he says. “Now I’m trying to put into action the things I learned from them, and the advice I gave them. When opportunities like this arrive in your life, you have to embrace them.”