Dudley George Simpson (4 October 1922 – 4 November 2017) was an Australian composer and conductor. He was the Principal Conductor of the Royal Opera House orchestra for three years and worked as a composer on British television. He worked on the BBC science-fiction series Doctor Who, for which he composed incidental music during the 1960s and 1970s. When Simpson died aged 95 in 2017, The Guardian wrote that he was "at his most prolific as the creator of incidental music for Doctor Who in the 1960s and 1970s, contributing to 62 stories over almost 300 episodes – more than any other composer."[1]
When John Nathan-Turner became producer of Doctor Who in 1980, he decided that the music needed to be updated, and took Simpson out for a meal telling him how much he appreciated his work on Doctor Who but that it would no longer be required as he intended to have the BBC Radiophonic Workshop provide music from that point. While Simpson was contracted to score Shada, the unfinished nature of that production meant he never started work. As a result, his last broadcast work on Doctor Who was for The Horns of Nimon.[9]
In 1993 Simpson's music for five Doctor Who serials from the early Fourth Doctor era was released on an album called Pyramids of Mars.
In the 2017 restoration of Shada, a dedication to Simpson was shown in the end credits.
Blake's 7 (1978)
In 1978 the BBC launched a new science fiction series, Blake's 7, produced by former Doctor Who director David Maloney. It ran for 4 series and 52 episodes. Simpson provided the theme music for the series and was also responsible for the incidental music for 50 of the episodes that were broadcast from 2 January 1978 to 21 December 1981.[5] The two exceptions are the episode entitled "Duel" (the eighth episode of series one) for which director Douglas Camfield chose to use stock music,[10] and "Gambit" (the eleventh episode of series two), which was scored by Elizabeth Parker of the Radiophonic Workshop,[11] the special sound creator of series two to four.