Murray Gusseck
Murray Gusseck is considered an innovator in the world of marching percussion. He started his career as a marching member of the Santa Clara Vanguard Drum & Bugle Corps (SCV) in 1988, aging out in 1992. He played tenors all 5 of those years under Ralph Hardimon, Glen Crosby, and Scott Johnson. As a member of those SCV drumlines Murray helped start a new trend of drumline parking lot “events” by composing entertaining battery compositions that attracted large audiences outside the normal competition arenas. All of these compositions are currently published in a collection entitled Parking Lot Etudes by Tapspace Publications (Portland, OR), a publishing company Murray co-founded with his friend and partner Jim Casella. He is also co-author of Fresh Perspectives, a standard method book for today’s drumlines. Both of these books can be found at www.tapspace.com
As a player Murray received many accolades for his tenor playing and for the extreme ability levels of the tenor sections and drumlines he was a part of during his tenure with SCV. He later went on to become a staff member of the corps for 9 years, and ultimately served as caption head and arranger. During the 14 years Murray was part of SCV, he won the Fred Sanford Percussion Trophy 5 times and the DCI First Place Award twice. He has taught and arranged percussion music for various high schools and winter percussion ensembles throughout the country, including Amador Valley (CA), Richland Hills (TX), Tunstall Concert Ensemble (VA), Fred C. Beyer High School (CA), James Logan High School (CA), and currently Evergreen High School (WA).
Murray attended San Jose State University where he studied world music systems and drumset with Royal Hartigan and Dan Sabanovich. As a drumset player, one of his main projects has been with a fusion trio called “Merge” (www.mergemusic.com), and currently the Ben Macy Trio from Portland, OR.
Murray proudly endorses Pearl drums, Remo drumheads, Vic Firth drumsticks, and Zildjian cymbals.
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