Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber is an English composer and musical theater impresario. Several of his musicals have run for more than a decade in both the West End and Broadway. He has composed 21 musicals, a song cycle, a set of variations, two film soundtracks and a Latin Requiem Mass.

Early life

Lloyd Webber was born on 22 March 1948 in Kensington, London, the elder son of William Lloyd Webber (1914–1982), a composer and organist, and Jean Hermione Johnstone (1921–1993), a violinist and pianist. His younger brother, Julian Lloyd Webber, is a world-renowned solo cellist. On the BBC's genealogy series Who Do You Think You Are?, he learned that his mother's great-great-uncle was the soldier Sir Peregrine Maitland who in 1815 served as a major general at the Battle of Waterloo.

Accusations of plagiarism

Among the accusations of plagiarism that Lloyd Webber has received, the Dutch composer Louis Andriessen stated that he: "has yet to think up a single note; in fact, the poor guy's never invented one note by himself. That's rather poor". Lloyd Webber's biographer, John Snelson, acknowledged a similarity between the andante movement of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor and the Jesus Christ Superstar song "I Don't Know How to Love Him", but wrote that Lloyd Webber:

...brings a new dramatic tension to Mendelssohn's original melody through the confused emotions of Mary Magdalene. The opening theme may be Mendelssohn, but the rhythmic and harmonic treatment along with new lines of highly effective melodic development are Lloyd Webber's. The song works in its own right as its many performers and audiences can witness.

Personal life

• Imogen Lloyd Webber (born 31 March 1977)
• Nicholas Lloyd Webber (2 July 1979 – 25 March 2023)

Lloyd Webber (middle) with his then-wife Sarah Brightman (right) in 1985. He would cast her as Christine in The Phantom of the Opera which debuted in London the following year.

He then married English soprano Sarah Brightman on 22 March 1984 in Hampshire. He cast Brightman in the lead role in his musical The Phantom of the Opera, among other notable roles. They divorced on 3 January 1990, but have remained close friends and have also continued to work together.

Wealth

The Sunday Times Rich List 2006 ranked him the 87th-richest person in Britain with an estimated fortune of £700 million. His wealth increased to £750 million in 2007, but the publication ranked him 101st in 2008. The Sunday Times Rich List of 2019 saw him ranked the richest musician in the UK (overtaking Paul McCartney) with a fortune of £820 million ($1.074 billion). He lives at Sydmonton Court, Hampshire, and owns much of nearby Watership Down.