Martin graduated from the Royal College of Music in 1984 having studied Saxophone and Clarinet as joint principle study under Stephen Trier and John McCaw. Whilst at college Martin won several woodwind prizes including the Boosey and Hawkes Music Prize. He returned to the Royal College of Music in 1994 as a Professor of Saxophone.

Martin made his solo debut at the Purcell Room in 1986 with Mark-Anthony Turnage’s ‘Sarabande’. From here on there has been a close relationship between the two. ‘Your Rockaby’ was written specifically for Martin – Mark dedicated the movement ‘Lullaby for Charlie’ to Martin’s severely autistic son. ‘Rockaby’ was premiered at the Royal Festival Hall with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and was later performed at the Royal Albert Hall during the Proms season. It too was the featured work in the BBC TV series ‘The British Century – ‘Turnage’’. It has gone on to be performed by the Los Angeles and London Philharmonic Orchestras.

Turnage’s ‘Blood on the Floor’ – a nine movement work for three Jazz soloists and orchestra – was premiered by the Ensemble Modern in 1996. Martin was joined by Peter Erskine and John Scofield and has since performed this piece with orchestras such as the Berlin Philharmonic under Sir Simon Rattle, The Hamburg and Tampere Philharmonic Orchestras, Avanti, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra again with Sir Simon Rattle and the BBC and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestras. ‘Blood’ has continued to evolve and last summer John Parricelli joined Martin at the Tanglewood Contemporary Music Festival with the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

At the beginning of this year Martin performed Debussy’s Rhapsody for Saxophone with the London Philharmonic under Vladimir Jurowski. Martin returned to Berlin featuring on Duduk as part of an overnight performance of Tavener's "The Veil of the Temple" with The Berlin Radio Choir in May. Turnage’s newest piece, About Water, was premiered with the London Sinfonietta at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in June. Martin was a featured soloist alongside John Patitucci, Gwilym Simcock and Mark Lockheart.

While Martin immerses himself in contemporary music he continues to play the full range of classical repertoire from Villa-Lobos to Frank Martin to Glasunov. Martin is a regular guest of the major London orchestras as both a freelance musician and soloist. In 2006 Martin performed the Glasunov with the BBC Welsh National Orchestra at Saint David's Cathedral in Pembrokeshire. He also travelled to Koblenz to perform Kancheli's Night Prayers with the Rheinische Philharmonie under Daniel Raiskin.

During the 2002 Prom season Martin was Clarinet soloist at the Royal Albert Hall with the BBC Big Band, under the direction of Leonard Slatkin, playing Bernstein’s 'Prelude, Fugue and Riffs’ which was later recorded for BBC Radio 3. He too was the featured soloist with the London Philharmonic in Bernard Herrmann’s Taxi Driver Suite, given as part of the Meltdown Festival; more recently he performed a suite of music based around the theme from ‘Poirot’ with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

This year Martin also appeared at the BBC Proms 2007 with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra performing Sir Harrison Birtwistle's "Panic" with Peter Erskiine on percussion.

Away from the concert platform Martin is frequently featured on film and TV sound tracks. Not only is he in demand as a saxophonist and clarinetist but can also be heard on ethnic woodwind instruments such as the Taragato and Duduk. He is fascinated by the complexity and timbrel differences between Western and Eastern instrumentation. Composers such as Stephen Warbeck, Rob Lane and John Lunn have been enticed by the Taragato’s ability to cross seamlessly from Middle East to West, while composers such as George Fenton and Hans Zimmer have been attracted to the stirring simplicity of the Duduk. In February Martin featured playing the duduk as guest soloist with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra on David Attenborough’s feature length film ‘Earth’. Martin’s film and television credits include Shakespeare in Love, Billy Elliott, Captain Corelli's Mandolin, King Arthur, Kingdom of Heaven, Bleak House, Hotel Babylon, Mrs. Brown and Planet Earth.

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