Birthday profile

Delia Derbyshire

Delia Derbyshire, English musician, arranger and composer (died 2001)

Born
May 5, 1937
Died
July 3, 2001
Zodiac sign
Taurus
Birth year
1937

About Delia Derbyshire

Delia Ann Derbyshire (5 May 1937 – 3 July 2001) was an English musician and composer of electronic music. She worked with the BBC Radiophonic Workshop during the 1960s, including an electronic arrangement of the theme music to the British science-fiction television series Doctor Who. She has been referred to as "the unsung heroine of British electronic music", having influenced musicians including Aphex Twin, the Chemical Brothers and Paul Hartnoll of Orbital. == Biography == === Early life === Derbyshire was born in Coventry, daughter of Emma (née Dawson) and Edward Derbyshire. of Cedars Avenue, Coundon, Coventry. Her father was a sheet-metal worker. She had one sibling, a sister, who died young. Her father died in 1965 and her mother in 1994. During the Second World War, immediately after the Coventry Blitz in 1940, she was moved to Preston, Lancashire for safety. Her parents were from the town and most of her surviving relatives still live in the area.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Career and life highlights

Delia Derbyshire timeline

  1. In November 1960, she joined the BBC as a trainee assistant studio manager and worked on Record Review, a magazine programme where critics reviewed classical music recordings.
  2. Derbyshire's original arrangement served as the Doctor Who main theme for its first seventeen series, from 1963 to 1980.

The world when Delia Derbyshire was born

Delia Derbyshire was born in 1937. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1937

  • #1 song"A-Tisket, A-Tasket" – Ella Fitzgerald
  • Top movieSnow White and the Seven Dwarfs
  • Best-selling bookOf Mice and Men – John Steinbeck

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentJoe Louis becomes heavyweight champion
  • Top headlineHindenburg zeppelin explodes in New Jersey
  • Technology milestoneGolden Gate Bridge opens in San Francisco
  • Defining fadSwing music
  • Notable inventionShopping cart
  • World population2.30 billion

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderFranklin D. Roosevelt
  • Sports championNew York Yankees (World Series)
  • U.S. population128.8M

1937 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Delia Derbyshire's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19372026
Gas$0.20$3.45/gal
Average home$5,200$435,000
Average income$3,000$67,500
Minimum wage$0.25$7.25/hr (federal)
Movie ticket$0.25$11.95
Postage stamp$0.03$0.73
Population128.8M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, MusicBrainz, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.