David Gilmour

• 1. Introduction

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  David Gilmour, the English guitarist born in 1946, once watched 120 of his own guitars go under the hammer in a single evening. On the 20th of June 2019, Christie's in New York held the sale, and it raised $21,490,750. The star lot was his Black Strat, which sold for $3,975,000. At that time, no guitar had ever fetched more at auction. Every dollar of the proceeds went to the environmental charity ClientEarth. Gilmour is best known as the lead guitarist of Pink Floyd, a band that by the early 1980s ranked among the highest-selling and most acclaimed acts in music history. How did a Cambridge schoolboy end up inside one of rock's biggest bands? What did it cost him to lead it? And why does his unhurried playing remain one of the most recognisable sounds in popular music?

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• 2. Cambridge to Pink Floyd

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  David Jon Gilmour was born on the 6th of March 1946 in Cambridge, England. His father, Douglas, was a senior lecturer in zoology at the University of Cambridge. His mother, Sylvia, was a trained teacher who later worked as a film editor for the BBC. He had three siblings, Peter, Mark and Catharine, and after several moves the family settled in Grantchester.

  In 1954, Gilmour bought his first single, Bill Haley's "Rock Around the Clock". Elvis Presley's "Heartbreak Hotel" stirred his enthusiasm in 1956, and the Everly Brothers' "Bye Bye Love" in 1957 turned his attention to the guitar. He borrowed a guitar from a neighbour and never gave it back. Then he taught himself from a book and record set by Pete Seeger.

  At age 11, Gilmour began at The Perse School on Hills Road in Cambridge, which he did not enjoy. Along the same road stood Cambridgeshire High School for Boys. Two of its pupils, Syd Barrett and Roger Waters, would later become his bandmates.

  In 1962, Gilmour began an A-Level course in modern languages at the Cambridgeshire College of Arts and Technology. He never finished it, though he eventually learned to speak fluent French. Barrett studied at the college too, and the two spent their lunchtimes practising guitar together. Later that year, Gilmour joined a blues rock band called Jokers Wild. They recorded a one-sided album and a single at Regent Sound Studio on Denmark Street in west London. Only 50 copies of each were made.

  At age 19, Gilmour hitchhiked to Saint-Tropez in France. Barrett and his friends drove there to meet him, and the group was arrested for busking. Gilmour and Barrett later went on to Paris, where they camped outside the city for a week and visited the Louvre. Around this period, Gilmour worked as driver and assistant to the fashion designer Ossie Clark.

  In mid-1967, Gilmour returned to France with Rick Wills and Willie Wilson, both formerly of Jokers Wild. They played as Flowers, then as Bullitt, without commercial success. Club owners who heard their covers of chart hits were reluctant to pay them. Soon after they reached Paris, thieves stole their equipment. Gilmour also sang lead on two songs on the soundtrack of the film Two Weeks in September, which starred Brigitte Bardot. Back in England that year, the band could not afford petrol, and they had to push their bus off the ferry.

  Pink Floyd had meanwhile released their debut album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, in 1967. The band was Barrett and Waters, plus Nick Mason and Richard Wright. In May 1967, Gilmour made a brief trip to London in search of new equipment. He watched the band record "See Emily Play" and was shocked to find that Barrett, who was suffering mental health problems, did not seem to recognise him.

  In December 1967, Gilmour accepted an invitation to join Pink Floyd and cover for the increasingly erratic Barrett. The first plan was to keep Barrett on as a songwriter who no longer performed. The band's business partner Peter Jenner said the idea was to have Gilmour "cover for Barrett's eccentricities". By March 1968, working with Barrett had become too difficult, and he agreed to leave. Mason later said: "After Syd, Dave was the difference between light and dark. He was absolutely into form and shape and he introduced that into the wilder numbers we'd created. We became far less difficult to enjoy, I think." In 1970, Gilmour attended the Isle of Wight Festival and helped with a live mix of a Jimi Hendrix performance.

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• 3. Kate Bush and Collaborators

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  In the 1970s, a friend of both families named Ricky Hopper passed Gilmour a demo tape by a teenage songwriter called Kate Bush. Impressed, Gilmour paid for Bush, then 16, to record three professional demo tracks to show to record labels. His friend Andrew Powell produced the tape, with the sound engineer Geoff Emerick. Powell went on to produce Bush's first two studio albums. Gilmour arranged for the EMI executive Terry Slater to hear the recordings, and Slater signed her.

  On Bush's debut album, The Kick Inside (1978), Gilmour is credited as executive producer on two tracks. One of them was her second single, "The Man with the Child in His Eyes". He later sang backing vocals on "Pull Out the Pin" from The Dreaming (1982). He played guitar on "Love and Anger" and "Rocket's Tail" on The Sensual World (1989). In March 1987, he also played guitar for her performance of "Running Up That Hill" at the Secret Policeman's Third Ball.

  In 1975, Gilmour played on Roy Harper's album HQ. In 1980, he co-wrote five songs on Harper's The Unknown Soldier. One of them, "Short and Sweet", had first been recorded for Gilmour's own debut solo album. In April 1984, Harper made a surprise appearance at Gilmour's Hammersmith Odeon gig to sing it, and the moment appears in the concert film Live 1984.

  The mid-1980s were crowded with guest spots. Gilmour played guitar on Paul McCartney's 1984 hit single "No More Lonely Nights". In 1985, he played on Bryan Ferry's sixth solo album, Boys and Girls, and on "Is Your Love Strong Enough" for the US release of Ridley Scott's film Legend. The music video placed Ferry and Gilmour inside footage from the film. In July 1985, Gilmour joined Ferry at the Live Aid concert at Wembley Stadium in London. That same year he contributed to Pete Townshend's White City: A Novel, including the single "Give Blood", and to Grace Jones's Slave to the Rhythm. He also played the title track of Supertramp's Brother Where You Bound. In 1986, he played on three tracks of Persona by the classical guitarist Liona Boyd.

  Gilmour also produced two albums by the Dream Academy. Their song "Life in a Northern Town" (1986) became a US top-ten hit. In December 1999, he played at the Cavern Club in Liverpool for Paul McCartney, alongside Mick Green, Ian Paice, Pete Wingfield and Chris Hall. The night became the concert film Live at the Cavern Club, directed by Geoff Wonfor.

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• 4. The Break With Waters

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  By the late 1970s, Gilmour had begun to feel that Pink Floyd was underusing his talents. In 1978, he released his first solo album, David Gilmour, which showcased his guitar playing and songwriting. Music written in the closing stages of that album arrived too late to be used. It became "Comfortably Numb" on the Pink Floyd album The Wall (1979).

  During the making of the Wall film and of the album The Final Cut (1983), the relationship between Gilmour and Waters deteriorated. The sour atmosphere led Gilmour to make his second solo album, About Face (1984). He used it to express his feelings on subjects ranging from his relationship with Waters to the murder of John Lennon.

  Gilmour toured Europe and the US for About Face, with the Television Personalities as support. They were dropped after their singer, Dan Treacy, revealed Barrett's address on stage. Mason made a guest appearance on the UK leg. Despite some cancellations, the tour eventually turned a profit.

  In 1985, Waters declared that Pink Floyd were "a spent force creatively" and tried to dissolve the band. Gilmour and Mason announced that they intended to continue without him. Waters resigned in 1987, which left Gilmour as the band leader.

  In 1986, Gilmour bought a houseboat named Astoria and moored it on the River Thames near Hampton Court, London. He converted it into a recording studio. There he produced the Pink Floyd album A Momentary Lapse of Reason in 1987, with contributions from Mason and Wright. Gilmour felt that Pink Floyd had become too driven by lyrics under Waters. He set out to "restore the balance" between music and words. The second album under his leadership, The Division Bell, followed in 1994. The feud with Waters, however, would outlast his departure by decades.

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• 5. Reunions and Last Words

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  On the 2nd of July 2005, Pink Floyd reunited with Waters to perform at Live 8. The performance lifted sales of the 2001 compilation Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd. Gilmour gave away his profits to charities that reflect the goals of Live 8. He said: "Though the main objective has been to raise consciousness and put pressure on the G8 leaders, I will not profit from the concert. This is money that should be used to save lives." He urged all Live 8 artists to donate their extra revenue. Afterwards, Pink Floyd turned down an offer of £150 million to tour the US.

  In 2006, Gilmour said that Pink Floyd would likely never tour or write material again. His words were: "I think enough is enough. I am 60 years old. I don't have the will to work as much any more. Pink Floyd was an important part in my life, I have had a wonderful time, but it's over. For me it's much less complicated to work alone."

  The door did not close completely. On the 11th of July 2010, Gilmour performed with Waters at an event for the Hoping Foundation in Oxfordshire. Onlookers said the pair seemed to have ended their feud, laughing and joking with their partners. On the 12th of May 2011, Gilmour made a surprise appearance with Waters during "Comfortably Numb" at the O2 in London. With Mason, he joined the rest of the band for "Outside the Wall" at the end of the show.

  The Endless River, released on the 7th of November 2014, was built from recordings that Gilmour and Mason revisited from the Division Bell sessions with Wright. Gilmour said it would be Pink Floyd's last album: "I think we have successfully commandeered the best of what there is... It's a shame, but this is the end." There was no tour, because he felt one was impossible without Wright. In August 2015, he repeated that Pink Floyd were "done" and that reuniting without Wright would be wrong.

  The quarrels with Waters carried on over album reissues and the use of the Pink Floyd website and social media channels. Mason, who stays close to both men, said in 2018 that Waters believes writing is everything and rates guitar playing and singing as less important. In 2021, Rolling Stone noted that the two had "hit yet another low point in their relationship". In early 2023, Gilmour's wife, Polly Samson, attacked Waters in a post on Twitter. Gilmour replied: "Every word demonstrably true."

  Yet in April 2022, Gilmour and Mason had reformed Pink Floyd to release "Hey, Hey, Rise Up!", a protest against the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The song samples a performance of the 1914 Ukrainian anthem "Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow" by the Ukrainian musician Andriy Khlyvnyuk. Gilmour called it a "one-off for Pink Floyd".

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• 6. Later Solo Albums

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  On the 6th of March 2006, his 60th birthday, Gilmour released his third solo album, On an Island. Guests included Wright, and Samson wrote lyrics. It debuted at number 1 on the UK Albums Chart. In the US it reached number six on the Billboard 200, his first solo album to enter the top ten there. On the 21st of September 2011, it was certified gold in Canada for sales of more than 50,000 copies.

  In May 2006, Gilmour toured Europe, the US and Canada with a band that included Wright and the Pink Floyd collaborators Dick Parry, Guy Pratt and Jon Carin. The DVD Remember That Night - Live at the Royal Albert Hall came out on the 17th of September 2007. For the final show, Gilmour played with the 38-piece string section of the Polish Baltic Philharmonic orchestra. That performance was released as Live in Gdańsk (2008).

  Barrett died in 2006. In December that year, Gilmour released a tribute, his own version of Pink Floyd's first single, "Arnold Layne". Recorded live at the Royal Albert Hall, it featured versions of the song by Wright and David Bowie. It reached number 19 on the UK Singles Chart. In early 2007, Gilmour reconvened his touring band and spent a week recording in a barn on his farm. Some of the recordings appeared on later solo albums.

  In October 2011, Gilmour released Metallic Spheres, an album with the electronic duo the Orb. Pitchfork wrote that he "sweeps in and out on guitar, dropping little shiver-inducing melodic runs like it's no big deal". His fourth solo album, Rattle That Lock, arrived in September 2015, and BBC Two broadcast the documentary David Gilmour: Wider Horizons on the 14th of November.

  On the 7th and the 8th of July 2016, Gilmour played two shows at the Amphitheatre of Pompeii. The live album and film Live at Pompeii reached cinemas on the 13th of September 2017. The album followed on the 29th of September and reached number three on the UK Albums Chart. Mayor Ferdinando Uliano made Gilmour an honorary citizen of Pompeii.

  From April 2020, during the COVID lockdown, Gilmour appeared in livestreams with his family, billed as the "Von Trapped Family". They performed songs by Barrett and Leonard Cohen. In July, he released "Yes, I Have Ghosts", with lyrics by Samson. His daughter Romany made her recording debut on backing vocals and harp.

  On the 6th of September 2024, Gilmour released his fifth solo album, Luck and Strange. It was recorded over five months in Brighton and London with the producer Charlie Andrew. Gilmour said Andrew has "a wonderful lack of knowledge or respect for this past of mine". Samson wrote most of the lyrics, which she said reflected themes of mortality and ageing. The album features keyboards that Wright recorded in 2007, lyrics by Gilmour's son Charlie, and harp and vocals from Romany. Gilmour felt it was his best work since The Dark Side of the Moon. It became his third solo album to reach number one on the UK Albums Chart.

  In September 2024, Gilmour also played guitar on a cover of "Comfortably Numb" by the American metal band Body Count. That month he began a tour for Luck and Strange, with performances in London, Rome, Los Angeles and New York. He replaced some of his musicians, saying he wanted to avoid "sticking quite so slavishly to the original records". In July 2025, he received the O2 Silver Clef award from the Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood. A concert film of the tour, Live at the Circus Maximus, Rome, opened in Imax theatres in September, with digital and home media releases in October.

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• 7. Sound and Guitars

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  "I copied - don't be afraid to copy - and eventually something that I suppose that I would call my own appeared." So Gilmour described his development. He names Pete Seeger, Lead Belly, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell, John Fahey, Roy Buchanan and Hank Marvin of the Shadows among his influences.

  In 2025, The Times wrote: "In an era of showboating, Gilmour sounded like no one else: his playing was all about tone, texture and a kind of languid grandeur." His lead style is marked by blues-influenced phrasing, expressive note bends and sustain. Gilmour himself said in 2006: "My fingers make a distinctive sound... they aren't very fast, but I think I am instantly recognisable." The Pink Floyd technician Phil Taylor agreed that the personality lives in his fingers, his vibrato, his choice of notes and how he sets his effects. No matter how well you copy the equipment, Taylor said, you cannot copy the personality.

  The author Mike Cormack wrote that Gilmour's playing from The Dark Side of the Moon onwards "defines the sound of Pink Floyd". He called Gilmour's third solo in "Dogs" "perhaps the finest in his entire career, a masterpiece of phrasing, spacing, tone and articulation". He praised the second solo in "Comfortably Numb" for leaving space and repeating licks, building to a climax before fading out.

  Gilmour also plays bass, keyboards, banjo, lap steel, mandolin, harmonica, drums and saxophone. He played the fretless bass on "Hey You" because he could do it more quickly than Waters. By his account, Waters would thank him for "winning him bass-playing polls".

  For his 21st birthday, in March 1967, Gilmour's parents gave him his first Fender guitar, a white Telecaster with a rosewood fretboard. After he joined Pink Floyd, he used it with one of Barrett's Telecasters as a spare.

  In 1970, Pink Floyd's US tour was cancelled after thieves stole their equipment in New Orleans. Gilmour then bought a Fender Stratocaster at Manny's Music in New York City. This became the Black Strat. He used it in most Pink Floyd concerts and on every studio album the band recorded between 1970 and 1983. It began with a rosewood fretboard and a white pickguard, and after a number of modifications it finished with a black pickguard and a maple neck. In 2026, it sold again, for US$14,560,000, once more the most expensive guitar ever sold at auction.

  In November 2006, the Fender Custom Shop announced two reproductions of the Black Strat, to be released on the 22nd of September 2008. Phil Taylor supervised them. The date was chosen to coincide with the release of Live in Gdańsk. The Relic model copies the wear of the original, while the NOS model is pristine.

  Another Stratocaster is the 0001 Strat, with a white body, a maple neck and a gold anodised pickguard. Seymour Duncan called it a "partscaster", because he assembled it from two different guitars. Gilmour used it as a spare and for slide guitar. In 2019, it sold for $1,815,000, a world auction record for a Stratocaster at that time. Gilmour also owns an early 1954 Stratocaster, believed to predate Fender's commercial release of the model.

  His collection reaches well beyond Fender. A Gibson Les Paul goldtop with P-90 pick-ups was used in sessions for The Wall and A Momentary Lapse of Reason. A Steinberger GL was his main guitar for the latter album. He played a Bill Lewis 24-fret guitar during the Meddle and Dark Side of the Moon sessions. His acoustics include a Gibson J-200 Celebrity acquired from John Illsley of Dire Straits and a Martin D-35 bought in New York in 1971.

  In 1970, Gilmour bought a Jedson steel guitar from a pawn shop while in Seattle. He used it on "One of These Days" from Meddle and on "Breathe" and "The Great Gig in the Sky" from The Dark Side of the Moon.

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• 8. Honours and Home

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  In May 2003, Gilmour sold his house in Little Venice to the ninth Earl Spencer. He donated the proceeds, worth £3.6 million, to the charity Crisis to help fund a housing project for homeless people. He was later named a vice-president of the organisation. He also gave £25,000 to the Save the Rhino foundation in exchange for a name suggestion from Douglas Adams. That suggestion became the title of The Division Bell.

  On the 25th of May 2009, Gilmour played a concert at the Union Chapel in Islington, London, with the Malian musicians Amadou & Mariam. It was part of the Hidden Gigs campaign by Crisis against hidden homelessness. In August 2009, he released an online single, "Chicago - Change the World", to promote awareness for Gary McKinnon, who was accused of computer hacking. It was a cover of a Graham Nash song, featuring McKinnon, Chrissie Hynde and Bob Geldof, and produced by Chris Thomas. His other causes include Oxfam, Greenpeace, Amnesty International, Nordoff-Robbins music therapy, Teenage Cancer Trust and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

  Honours followed. Pink Floyd were inducted into the US Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 and the UK Music Hall of Fame in 2005. Gilmour was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 2003 Birthday Honours, for services to music, and received it at Buckingham Palace on the 7th of November that year. On the 22nd of May 2008, he won the Ivor Novello Lifetime Contribution Award. He dedicated his Q Award for outstanding contribution to Richard Wright, who died in September 2008. On the 11th of November 2009, Anglia Ruskin University gave him an honorary doctorate.

  Rolling Stone ranked him the 14th-greatest guitarist of all time in 2011 and the 28th in 2023. MusicRadar called him, for many fans, "the missing link between Jimi Hendrix and Eddie Van Halen". In 2013, Gary Kemp of Spandau Ballet argued that Gilmour's work on The Dark Side of the Moon "must make him the best guitar player in recent history".

  On the 7th of July 1975, Gilmour married Virginia "Ginger" Hasenbein, an American model and artist, and the couple had four children. In 1994, he married the English writer Polly Samson, and they also have four. Their eldest, Charlie, born in 1989, was adopted by Gilmour. His biological father is Samson's previous partner, Heathcote Williams. Gilmour describes himself as left wing and a socialist, and in 2017 he endorsed Jeremy Corbyn in the UK general election.

  Gilmour is also an experienced pilot. Through his company Intrepid Aviation, he built a collection of historical aircraft. He later sold the company because it was becoming too commercial for him to enjoy. He lives near the village of Wisborough Green in Sussex. In 2015, he and Samson bought Medina House, a derelict bathhouse in Brighton and Hove, and had it redeveloped.

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