Simon Gledhill


Simon was born in Halifax, West Yorkshire, England, in 1965. He demonstrated a keen interest in music from an early age.

He began learning to play the piano accordion shortly before his sixth birthday and continued with that instrument for eleven years, winning several competitions along the way. When he was ten, his parents purchased a small electronic organ. After initially teaching himself to play it, he commenced formal studies with a gifted local teacher, Michael Woodhead, who gave him extensive tutoring in classical organ and piano.

Simon's first experience of the theater pipe organ was by hearing the late Ernest Broadbent play the Mighty Wurlitzer at Blackpool's Tower Ballroom. He subseqently discovered that a local, privately-owned instrument could be hired out by the hour, and began making weekly practice visits. In 1983 he entered and won the Northern Young Theatre Organist of the Year competition. Nigel Ogden, presenter of BBC Radio 2's The Organist Entertains, was on the audience, and invited him to make some recordings for the program on the (then) BBC theatre organ at the Playhouse Studio in Manchester.

These broadcasts resulted in a flurry of concert offers, and Simon has performed at all the major theatre organ venues in Britain, as well as touring in Germany, Holland, Australia and the USA. In America, he has played at such prestigious venues as the Oakland Paramount Theatre, Century II Center in Wichita (home of the ex-New York Paramount Wurlitzer) and the Pasadena Civic Auditorium (where ex-Reginald Foort/BBC five-manual Möller theater organ now resides). There have been eight appearances at National and Regional Conventions of the American Theatre Organ Society.

Simon was honored to accept the ATOS Organis of the Year award at the Society's 1997 National Convention in Indianapolis.

He combines his concert activities with a full-time career in corporate banking, based in London.

Last Update: January 30, 2000

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