Biography

Mark trained in composition and musicology at Nene College Northampton (B. A. Hons) and Leeds University (M. Mus., Ph.D.).  His doctorate, completed in 2002, was on the music of maverick British composer Denis ApIvor, and he continues to write and research on this topic.  He taught guitar privately and as a peripatetic teacher for Calderdale local authority during the late 1990s, joining Leeds College of Music part-time in 1998 and becoming full-time in 2006.

In addition to his teaching work Mark is an occasional author and freelance consultant on educational music book projects, including Guitar from Scratch (with Microjazz’s Chris Norton, 1999) and, most recently, the Usborne series Very Easy Guitar Tunes, Easy Guitar Tunes and Guitar Tunes for Children, published in 2004.

Mark is also a composer and arranger of commercially oriented music for solo guitar and ‘classical’ ensembles in particular. His collection, Nineteen Gilbert and Sullivan Favorites for Classical Guitar was published by Mel Bay in 2004.  In 2005 his orchestral composition Fugue on the Final Countdown was performed by West Yorkshire Symphony Orchestra at the Beached music festival in Scarborough, prior to which a brief interview with Mark was broadcast on Look North. The work recently had its Leeds College of Music premiere at the Venue in June 2009. He is presently working on a new composition project, madeinmidi.com, an online vehicle for a series of machine-driven pop tracks.

Mark has also worked freelance as a professional music typesetter for Cambridge University Press (Julian Rushton’s Elgar: Enigma Variations), Boosey and Hawkes (Guitar from Scratch), The Consort and numerous private individuals. 

Mark is presently a Senior Lecturer in Music on the BA Popular Music Studies and BA Music Production courses at Leeds College of Music.