MacDermot was born in Montreal, Quebec, the son of a Canadian diplomat. He was educated at Upper Canada College and Bishop's University (Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada). He received a Bachelor of Music from Cape Town University, South Africa and made a study of African music his specialty. He also studied the piano privately with Neil Chotem.
MacDermot won his first Grammy Award for the Cannonball Adderley recording of his song "African Waltz" (the title track of the album of the same name) in 1960.
MacDermot moved to New York City in 1964 where, three years later, he wrote the music for the hit musical Hair, which he later adapted for the 1979 film. Its Broadway cast album won a Grammy Award in 1969. The song from the musical Hair "Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In" reached number one for six weeks in 1969. The song Hair reached number one on the charts in 1969. His next musicals were Isabel's a Jezebel (1970) and Who the Murderer Was (1970), which featured British progressive rock band Curved Air. MacDermot had another hit with the musical Two Gentlemen of Verona (1971), which won the Tony Award for Best Musical. For that show, MacDermot was nominated for a Tony for best music and won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music. His later musicals, however, including Dude and Via Galactica (both 1973) and The Human Comedy (1984), were not successful on Broadway.
MacDermot's film soundtracks include Cotton Comes to Harlem, a 1970 blaxploitation film starring Godfrey Cambridge, Raymond St. Jacques and Redd Foxx, based on Chester Himes' novel of the same name; Rhinoceros (1974) starring Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder, and directed by original Broadway Hair director Tom O'Horgan; and Mistress (1992). MacDermot wrote his own orchestrations and arrangements for his theatre and film scores.
In 1979, MacDermot formed the New Pulse Band, which performs and records his original music. The band played as part of the on stage band in the 2009 Broadway revival of Hair. MacDermot's oeuvre also includes ballet scores, chamber music, the Anglican liturgy, orchestral music, poetry, incidental music for plays, band repertory and opera. In 2009 MacDermot was inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame.
Film director Jeff Lunger is in the post-production phase of a documentary on the life and work of MacDermot. Galt Macdermot lived on Staten Island. He has a son, Vincent MacDermot, who plays the trombone and drums on some albums. He also has a daughter, Elizabeth MacDermot, who teaches English at Staten Island Technical High School.
On November 22, 2010, MacDermot was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by SOCAN at the 2010 SOCAN Awards in Toronto.
MacDermot's music is popular with collectors of jazz and funk. Working with jazz musicians such as Bernard Purdie, Jimmy Lewis and Idris Muhammad, MacDermot created pieces that prefigured the funk material of James Brown. In recent decades, his work has become popular with hip-hop musicians including Busta Rhymes, who sampled "Space" from MacDermot's 1969 record Woman Is Sweeter for chart-topper "Woo hah!!", and Run DMC, who sampled the Hair song "Where Do I Go?" for their Grammy Award-winning "Down with the King". Handsome Boy Modelling School ("The Truth"), DJ Vadim, DJ Premier and Oh No have all sampled the same segment from "Coffee Cold", from Shapes of Rhythm (1966). As part of his Special Herbs series, rapper MF Doom sampled three MacDermot songs from Woman Is Sweeter: "Cathedral" for his song "Pennyroyal", "Space" for "Cinqfoil", and "Princess Gika" for "Hyssop". In 2006, rapper, Oh No, released an album produced completely with MacDermot samples, titled Exodus into Unheard Rhythms. Spanish hip-hop group SFDK used MacDermot's "Coffee Cold" for their song "Ternera Podrida" off the 2006 album "Original Rap University". The indie rapper J-Dilla used a sample of MacDermot's song Golden Apples (Part II) on his last album Donuts for his song Mash in 2006.
My Conviction
Galt Macdermot Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
That longer hair and other flamboyant affectations
Of appearance are nothing more
Than the male's emergence from his drab camoflage
Into the gaudy plumage
Which is the birthright of his sex
There is a peculiar notion that elegant plumage
When a... ctually
That is the way things are
In most species
Galt MacDermot's song "My Conviction" is a bold statement challenging the societal norms of masculinity through the use of metaphor and imagery. The opening line, "I would just like to say that it is my conviction," sets the tone for the rest of the song, emphasizing the singer's unwavering belief in his argument.
The next phrase, "That longer hair and other flamboyant affectations of appearance are nothing more than the male's emergence from his drab camouflage," suggests that men who choose to express themselves through hairstyles and clothing are shedding their societal expectations and are instead exhibiting their true selves. The metaphor of "camouflage" implies that the societal norms of masculinity are hiding men's true identities.
The following line, "Into the gaudy plumage which is the birthright of his sex," compares men's more flamboyant appearances to the vibrant plumage of male birds, implying that men have the right to express themselves in similar ways. The second verse emphasizes that this is not an abnormality, but rather a natural occurrence in most species, further reinforcing the argument that men have the right to express themselves outside of societal norms.
Line by Line Meaning
I would just like to say that it is my conviction
I hold the strong belief that
That longer hair and other flamboyant affectations
Hairstyles and other showy ornamentation
Of appearance are nothing more
Do not represent anything beyond
Than the male's emergence from his drab camoflage
Men's way of breaking free from mundane conformity
Into the gaudy plumage
To the gaudy and colorful display
Which is the birthright of his sex
That is an inherent right of men
There is a peculiar notion that elegant plumage
A strange idea exists that fancy displays
And fine feathers are not proper for the male
And refined outfits are not suitable for men
When a... ctually
Whereas in reality
That is the way things are
That is the norm
In most species
In the vast majority of animal kingdom
Contributed by Charlie K. Suggest a correction in the comments below.