This Is Your Life: Evelyn Glennie

Evelyn GLENNIE (1965-)

THIS IS YOUR LIFE - Evelyn Glennie, percussionist, was surprised by Michael Aspel while presenting a donation of special instruments from the Beethoven Fund for Deaf Children at Glencairn Primary School in Motherwell.

Evelyn was a promising student of piano and clarinet as a child, and was blessed with perfect pitch. However, at the age of eight, she started complaining of sore ears and hearing loss. Her condition steadily deteriorated and by the age of 12 she was profoundly deaf. She continued to play music and found she could perceive the quality of a note by the level of the reverberations she could feel in her hands, feet and body.

She started taking lessons in percussion, and graduated with honors from London's prestigious Royal Academy of Music in 1985. Realising her deafness affected her ability to play in an orchestra, she set her sights on becoming a soloist. Within a short space of time she would become a virtuoso multi-percussionist, performing internationally with a wide variety of orchestras and contemporary musicians.

programme details...

Edition No: 804
Subject No: 794
Broadcast date: Wed 6 Mar 1991
Broadcast time: 7.00-7.30pm
Recorded: Fri 16 Nov 1990
Venue: Scottish Television, Glasgow
Series: 31
Edition: 20
Code name: Chime

on the guest list...

Greg Malcangi - partner
Isobel - mother
Arthur - father
Roger - brother
Colin - brother
Edna Cadger
Isabel Gordon
Ron Forbes
Ann Rachlin
Ezra Rachlin
Pamela Dow
Patrick Moore
James Blades
Harry Secombe
James Galway
Richard Stilgoe
Jenny - aunt
Georg Solti
Princess Michael of Kent

production team...

Researcher: Sue Green
Writer: Roy Bottomley
Directors: Brian Klein, Terry Yarwood
Associate Producer: John Graham
Producer: Malcolm Morris

names above in bold indicate subjects of This Is Your Life

related pages...

A Musical Life

blowing a trumpet for the musicians

Photographs and screenshots of Evelyn Glennie This Is Your Life

Evelyn Glennie recalls her experience of This Is Your Life in this exclusive contribution to the BigRedBook website...

It was a horrible rainy day outside but inside we were entertained to a really endearing performance by the youngsters in the primary school. When Michael Aspel came through the door, I turned to Ann Rachlin and said: 'Oh Ann, that's wonderful for you, I'm so happy.' But she said: 'No, it's for you.' I couldn't quite believe it. I thought it was a bit of a wind-up actually. It was amazing. It had been a favourite programme for us to watch as a family so I knew very much about it. But I never thought I would be a subject. You just didn't think things like that happened to you.

I was very pleased with the programme. There was a lot of sensitivity, especially in terms of all the arrangements to get the guests to the studio. Not a single word leaked in any kind of way. I didn't have any clue that something might be going on behind my back. But, looking back, there was something unusual which caught my attention.

I had just started a relationship with my then boyfriend. We were living in separate flats in London when all of a sudden I saw this rather large case down in the cellar of my flat. I thought: 'That's a bit hasty of him. Does he think he's moving in already or something?' I got the wrong end of the stick completely. It turned out that his task for This is Your Life had been to fill a suitcase of clothing because I was just going to have the one set of clothes for the primary school. Of course he hadn't known me long enough to know what I should like to wear for such a programme. He just filled the case with things when I was not looking.

I was still a relatively young person, forging my way as a solo percussionist. But I had already had an autobiography published and had started a long-term record contract. I felt there was a wonderful pool of people and everybody mixed. We all know that success doesn't happen in isolation and I really did feel that we were celebrating together, and that the journey had been a team effort.

I don't like watching myself on television and I can't remember if I saw the transmission the following March. But the reaction to the programme was really, really healthy. I feel that This is Your Life allowed the viewers to get behind who I was as a person, how I do what I do and what my future might be. Along with other chat shows I did at the time, it really opened up an awareness of percussion, with a wide demographic of people coming through the doors of the concert halls.

Scriptwriter Roy Bottomley recalls this edition of This Is Your Life in his book, This Is Your Life: The Story of Television's Famous Big Red Book...

Just as astonishing was the musical Life of Evelyn Glennie – who had been an acclaimed solo virtuoso percussionist on the concert platform of the world from the time she was twenty-five.

Yet she is profoundly deaf.

This was a unique story of success against all the odds. Evelyn had made history by becoming the first full-time solo virtuoso percussionist ever. And as no fewer than six hundred instruments make up the modern percussion section, that's quite an achievement.

We hit the high road to her native Scotland to surprise her on 16 November 1990. She was at the Glencairn Primary School in Motherwell, presenting musical instruments on behalf of the Beethoven Fund for Deaf Children.

James Galway, Richard Stilgoe, Sir Georg Solti and Princess Michael of Kent were among those waiting to speak to her back at the studios of Scottish Television in Glasgow. What's more, astronomer Patrick Moore was there to re-create a duet of 'The Two Imps' he had played with her on the marimba at a literary dinner.

Confirmation of her international status came when she played Bartok's Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion with American virtuoso Murray Perahia and Covent Garden maestro Sir Georg Solti, and we had film of this great performance.

What is Evelyn's secret? She 'feels' notes from vibrations – the lower the note, the deeper and stronger the vibration low in the body; the higher notes she detects on the higher body – face, hair, finger-tips.

Her mentor, the world's greatest living percussionist James Blades, then aged ninety, made the journey to Scotland to make a prediction: that Evelyn Glennie will end her days as Dame Evelyn.

Series 31 subjects