The Stage

William Davies

Published Wednesday 12 April 2006 at 11:40

Organist, pianist and composer William Davies was familiar to BBC Radio listeners for many years on programmes such as Friday Night is Music Night, The Organist Entertains and his own series Just William.

He also composed scores for many television programmes, notably Alistair Cooke’s America (1972) and Alan Bennett’s Sunset Across the Bay (1975).

Davies was born in Bolton, Lancashire on June 26, 1921. He began playing the piano at an early age and at the age of 18 gained an ARCM diploma.

He worked as a bookbinder before serving in the RAF in Sri Lanka.

He frequently broadcast with the BBC as a piano accompanist and on All India Radio. On being demobbed, he became the organist at the Gaumont Theatre, Wolverhampton and in 1947 transferred to the Gaumont, Finchley.

In 1953 he joined the Jack Hylton organisation as a musical director. In 1956 he joined the BBC’s London Studio Players, where he remained until 1964.

As a freelance he was something of a star attraction and attracted large audiences when he played the organ at churches and cinemas all over the UK.

He married Eileen Watts in 1943. The couple had three daughters and the marriage was dissolved in 1988. In 1991 he married Felicity White. He died in Hastings, East Sussex on March 2, aged 84.

Patrick Newley