Morton was born in County Armagh, Northern Ireland on 24 December 1939 and was drawn to music from an early age through his father's interest in jazz, which motivated him to teach himself to play the cornet.
[1] After leaving school, he taught mentally handicapped children for which he received training for a year in Manchester, where he bought his first guitar.
In 1962, he enrolled at Queens University in Belfast to study for a diploma in Social work, and began to attend folk clubs.
In late 1970, Morton moved to Scotland to study for a PhD at the University of Edinburgh, with a focus on the history of the treatment of madness, but he did not complete it.
[4] In 2006, the folk music magazine The Living Tradition covered Morton's life and career in an 11-page special published in their 66th issue.