Mark Simpson (clarinetist)

Mark Simpson (born 26 September 1988) is a British clarinetist from Liverpool, who won the BBC Young Musician of the Year 2006 title on 20 May 2006, playing Nielsen's Clarinet Concerto with the Northern Sinfonia and Yan Pascal Tortelier at The Sage Gateshead. In the same year, Simpson was also the winner of the BBC Young Composer of the Year competition, becoming the only person in history to have ever won both competitions. He resides in Merseyside and attended King David High School, Liverpool before attending the Royal Northern College of Music junior department where he studied clarinet with Nicolas Cox. He was also Principal Clarinet in the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, playing a Peter Eaton clarinet. After a term at the Royal College of Music, Simpson spent the rest of his gap year in Berlin, and as of 2008, has been attending St. Catherine's College, Oxford University reading for a BA in Music.

He is a composer, who was commissioned by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic and National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain to write his first orchestral piece, Threads for Orchestra , which premièred at The Sage Gateshead on 1 April 2008. His It Was As if the Earth Stood Still was broadcast over BBC Radio 3's "Hear and Now" in November 2005, and his Lov(escape) in the concert he gave as one of the finalists in the Young Musician competition in September 2006.

He has played at the last night of the proms in 2007 at Hyde Park London, performing Artie Shaw's Concerto for Clarinet.

On 3 July 2008 he played in Liverpool as the solo clarinetist for the premiere of Emily Howard's Liverpool, The World in One City along with the Liverpool Youth Orchestra and 500 primary school children.