The organisers of Mood Indigo (Mood-I) have announced the participation of the world’s top drummer Mike Portnoy who will perform on the opening night of the cultural festival organised by students of the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay (IIT-B). He will perform along with his band mates from the multi instrumentalist band of Neal Morse, who will kick off the fest on December 20.
Parth Loya, head of media and PR for the fest, said, “This year, we finalised the progressive masterpiece formed by five insane multi-instrumentalists, Neal Morse Band which apart from Morse (vocals, guitars, synth) includes Portnoy (drums, vocals), Randy George (bass, vocals), Eric Gillette (vocals, bass) and Bill Hubauer (synth, vocals).”
He added that every year Mood-I brings in exceptional talent from around the world to showcase their performance before students.
“In the previous editions, international bands like Simple Plan, Karnivool, and Porcupine Tree have performed at the outdoor amphitheatre of the campus during the fest and this year the American band will perform on the very first night of Mood-I.”
This is the band’s first visit to India where it will perform exclusively for Mood-I. When asked about the reasons for choosing the band, Darpan Sanghavi, a core group member of Mood-I said “Our ideology this year was to get a band that interests all types of listeners. With Neal Morse band and Mike Portnoy coming together, we believe we have done precisely that.”
Mr Portnoy, born in New York, attended the Berklee College of Music on a scholarship in 1985. There he formed the band Dream Theatre with whom he sustained a
successful career for 25 years, developing a devoted fan-base and record sales of almost ten million copies worldwide.