Kerry Churchill Minnear (born 2 January 1948) is a

multi-instrumentalist A multi-instrumentalist is a musician who plays two or more musical instruments, often but not exclusively at a professional level of proficiency. Also known as woodwind doubler, doubling, the practice allows greater ensemble flexibility and mor ...

musician and composer. He is known primarily for his work with the

progressive rock Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog) is a broad genre of rock music that primarily developed in the United Kingdom through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early-to-mid-1970s. Initially termed " progressive pop", the ...

band

Gentle Giant Gentle Giant were a British progressive rock band active between 1970 and 1980. They were known for the complexity and sophistication of their music and for the varied musical skills of the members. All of the band members were multi-instrument ...

from 1970 to 1980. He graduated from the

Royal Academy of Music The Royal Academy of Music (RAM) in London, England, is one of the oldest music schools in the UK, founded in 1822 by John Fane and Nicolas-Charles Bochsa. It received its royal charter in 1830 from King George IV with the support of the firs ...

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

with a major in musical composition and minor in piano and classical percussion. As a member of

, he contributed to all 11 albums over the 10 years life of the band. Though he is adept at several instruments, he primarily played keyboards and provided back up and lead vocals. In addition to keyboard, he also played a multitude of other instruments such as the cello, recorder, guitar, and classical percussion (including

vibraphone The vibraphone (also called the vibraharp) is a percussion instrument in the metallophone family. It consists of tuned metal bars and is typically played by using Percussion mallet, mallets to strike the bars. A person who plays the vibraphone ...

marimba The marimba ( ) is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars that are struck by mallets. Below each bar is a resonator pipe that amplifies particular harmonics of its sound. Compared to the xylophone, the mari ...

xylophone The xylophone (; ) is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars struck by mallets. Each bar is an idiophone tuned to a pitch of a musical scale, whether pentatonic or heptatonic in the case of many African ...

timpani Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion instrument, percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a Membranophone, membrane called a drumhead, ...

and

snare drum The snare drum (or side drum) is a percussion instrument that produces a sharp staccato sound when the head is struck with a drum stick, due to the use of a series of stiff wires held under tension against the lower skin. Snare drums are often u ...

). He also composed the original musical soundtrack for the 1996 video game ''

Azrael's Tear ''Azrael's Tear'' is a 1996 first-person adventure game that presents an eschatological conspiracy fiction narrative about a futuristic Grail Quest. It was published by Mindscape and developed by Intelligent Games. Plot The game is set in th ...

'' along with Ray Shulman. In the years following the dissolution of Gentle Giant, Minnear was a member of a Christian music band, The Reapers, in the 1980s. He was also a teacher and church organist. He also played occasionally with the group Three Friends, which reproduced Gentle Giant songs in concert.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Minnear, Kerry 1948 births Living people English rock keyboardists Progressive rock keyboardists British performers of Christian music People from Shaftesbury Gentle Giant members Alumni of the Royal Academy of Music