Barry Gray (1925-1984)
Born ‘Jack Eccles’, Barry Gray is a man who has had a powerful influence on my composition. Director of Music for Gerry & Sylvia Anderson’s Century 21 Productions, Gray was responsible for writing and directing the electroacoustic music for the television series Stingray, Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, Joe 90, UFO, Space: 1999 and much other film, television and library music.
He was a francophile and one of the first television composers to use electronic musical instruments in his work. With his coining of the term ‘musifex’, he was far ahead in understanding languages of electronic sound and how these related to music as it had been used before. Six years in the RAF brought him precious experience as a military bandsman as well as a knowledge and appreciation of electronics through his signals work. His edge was that he could swing – as an example, listen to the way his Century 21 March saunters.
If you listen to his music today, what is perhaps most striking is the size of his sound from what were often relatively small ensembles. This he achieved however he could: getting as many of the best players together on the sometimes tight budgets he was given, overdubbing where necessary, playing a range of musical instruments himself and by a deep, hard-earned but always humble insight into harmony, counterpoint and orchestration. From Barry Gray I learned resourcefulness.
Gerry & Sylvia Anderson’s Supermarionation worlds risked being laughed at, inhabited as they were by puppets. Gray’s approach and sound left no doubt about how seriously he expected audiences to take the films his music was associated with. If you laugh at Anderson’s puppets, you are missing the point. Gray’s music is the elixir by which these worlds become real for the viewer.
I am proud to have inherited from the Barry Gray estate one of his early Ondes Martenots. Though old, this instrument has been professionally restored and I record it on many of my film scores. I studied Martenot performance under a pupil of Jeanne Loriod’s at the Conservatoire de Boulogne Billancourt in Paris.
Since then I have been able to arrange Barry Gray’s music faithfully with colleagues for concerts.
