Michael Smith is a British musician, arranger, musical director, music producer and composer.
He is a frequent collaborator of musician Damon Albarn having recorded and performed live with all of Albarn’s projects for the last thirty years including Blur, Gorillaz and The Good, The Bad and the Queen as well as in Albarn’s solo band.
Early life
Smith grew up in Bridport, Dorset and cites his high school music teacher Rex Trevett as the reason he took up music.
He obtained a 1st Class Degree in Jazz and Contemporary Music at the City of Leeds College of Music and a Post Graduate Degree in Jazz and Rock at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
Touring Musician
Smith gained experience as a successful and sought after studio musician and was a constant presence in the studio during the height of the Acid Jazz movement, recording, playing and touring with Corduroy, Mother Earth, James Taylor Quartet, The Brand New Heavies and Jamiroquai. In 2015 he was part of PJ Harvey’s live music installation at Somerset House recording her album ‘The Hope Six Demolition Project’.
Blur
Smith was originally hired as a saxophonist when Blur toured with a brass section in 1994 for ‘The Great Escape’ album tour. He later returned to Blur in the 2000s, playing saxophone on the song “Jets” from the Think Tank(2003) album and joining the Think Tank tour as musical director and keyboardist, a role he has reprised for the band on all of their tours since.
Gorillaz
Smith has been keyboardist and musical director in the Gorillaz live band since 2001. He has been the only constant member of the Gorillaz live band since the band’s debut, other than Damon Albarn.
Smith worked in collaboration with exiled conductor and leader, Essam Rafea on The Orchestra of Syrian Musicians Live Shows. It was produced by Africa Express and featured Damon Albarn, Paul Weller, Julia Holter amongst others and performed at London’s Festival Hall and the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury.
Film Score Arranger and Composer
Alongside Albarn, Smith co-composed and arranged the score for ‘The Kid Who Would Be King’ (Joe Cornish 2019) as well as the award-winning Broken (2012) starring Tim Roth and Cillian Murphy and directed by the current head of the National Theatre, Rufus Norris.
Smith won a Royal Television Society regional award in 2013 for Best Music for his score to 8 Minutes Idle Mark Simon Hewis) . He worked with Christoph Bauschinger to score The Exchange (2021) directed by Dan Mazer.
Documentary film composing includes –
Last Stop Coney Island: The Life and Photography of Harold Feinstein’ (Andy Dunn 2018), ‘Madeleine – One Year On’ (Director Emma Loach ITV) ‘Swim’ (2016) BBC Four, The Secret Life of the Classroom Director Fran Landsman Channel 4 and ’Betrayal’ (Scott Calonico 2019 Tribeca Film Festival).
Theatre credits include –
‘Double It: A Living Room Circus’ (Created and directed by Chen Shi-Zheng): ‘The Orphan of Zhao’ (directed by Chen Shi-Zheng), Dr Dee (Rufus Norris ENO) and Le Vol Du Boli directed by Abderrahmane Sissako, Le Théâtre du Châtelet in October 2020 and reopening April 2022.
Smith was also a co-music producer for Aardman’s 2018 animated feature ‘A Shaun the Sheep Movie – Farmageddon.
Orchestration/Arrangements
In recent years Smith has had a fruitful collaboration with French Duo ‘Birds on a Wire’ (Rosemary Stanley and Dom de Lena) as an arranger on two projects. Both were realised at Le Festival de St Denis in Paris. The first incarnation was with the duo plus the Britten Symphonia and in 2016 and more recently with the Mâitrise de Radio France in 2022 conducted by the Head of the BBC singers Sophie Jennin. This recent presentation has been hugely popular and the duo have taken the show around France performing the music with local choirs including a spectacular at Le Philharmonie in Paris in July 2023. Plans are afoot to bring Birds on a Wire to the UK to perform both projects at the Barbican in London.
Other orchestrations include –
Monkey Journey to the West at The Lincoln Centre Festival 2013.
Easy Virtue – Director Stephan Elliot (2008) starring Jessica Biel and Colin Farrell.
‘Lucy’ – Damon Albarn. End credit song “Sister Rust’
He has three grown up children with ex partner Hannah Loach – Martha Loach (27), Holly Loach (25) and James Loach (22).