Richard Glassby

​Born in Aberdeen, Richard grew up in a small village in Aberdeenshire and found his interest in music during high school, where he first learnt classical piano and then for his third year took up playing drum kit. During his time at school, Richard played with rock bands and played in some armature Musical Theatre shows.

It wasn’t until university that Richard began to take an interest in Jazz. Whilst studying Classical music at Aberdeen University, Richard joined the student big band. Through playing alongside other jazz musicians, Richard learnt the fundamentals of jazz and in his third year began lessons with Alyn Cosker, where he had up to that point been studying classical percussion with Lisa Nicol and playing jazz in his spare time. Richard changed his degree in third year to Music Education and won both third and fourth year performance and education prizes in 2018 and 2019 respectively, becoming the first jazz drummer in Aberdeen University to do so, where he then left Aberdeen University with a First-Class Honours.

Richard has played with several bands including the Aberdeen Jazz Orchestra, the Aberdeen University Jazz Orchestra, The Houlies (Ceilidh band), Serial Chillers (Latin Band) and Hamlet who are a fusion jazz band consisting of five others Richard met whilst in the big band at University. Richard has played several Musicals and played also for function bands.

Richard has just received the George Duncan Prize for Jazz Composition at the RCS for music that now features on his debut album Eclipse. 

Richard is currently based in Glasgow and is studying a Masters in Jazz at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, where he now teaches and continues to develop and perform around the city.

Awards

George Duncan Award for Jazz Composition 2020

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