Gillinson joined the London Symphony Orchestra in 1970 and in 1984 was asked by the Board to become Managing Director, a position he held until becoming the Executive and Artistic Director of Carnegie Hall in 2005.
Sir Clive Gillinson was born in India in 1946 and began studying the cello at the age of 11, playing with the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music, where he won the top cello prize, and then went on to become a member of the Philharmonia Orchestra.
Under Gillinson’s leadership, the London Symphony Orchestra initiated some of the city’s most successful artistic festivals, established an annual residency in New York from 1997 and was a founding partner in the Pacific Music Festival in Japan. Gillinson also developed the LSO Discovery music education programme and created LSO St. Luke’s, its music education centre, and LSO Live, the orchestra's award-winning international recording label.
Gillinson served as Chairman of the Association of British Orchestras; was one of the founding Trustees of the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts; and was founding Chairman of the Management Committee of the Clore Leadership Programme.
Among his many awards, Gillinson received an Honorary Doctor of Music degree from the City of London University and is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music and the Royal Northern College of Music. He has been a Visiting Fellow at St Catherine’s College Oxford and is an Honorary Fellow of the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. He was awarded the CBE in the 1999 New Year Honours List and received the 2004 Making Music Sir Charles Grove Prize for his outstanding contribution to British music. He is the only orchestra manager ever to be honored with a knighthood, in 2005.
In 2016, Gillinson co-authored a book, Better to Speak of It, published by Arch Street Press, offering first-hand experiences of how creativity can be applied with substantial results.