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Glennie tours extensively in the northern hemisphere and performs with an extraordinarily wide variety of orchestras and contemporary musicians, giving over 100 concerts a year as well as master classes and 'music in schools' performances. She frequently commissions percussion works from composers and performs them in her concert repertoire. To date these original works include 53 concertos, 56 recital pieces, 18 concert pieces and 2 works for percussion ensemble.
Glennie has won many awards for her playing, including a Grammy for her recording of Béla Bartók's Sonata for two Pianos and Percussion. She is the recipient of fifteen honorary doctorates from universities in the United Kingdom and was awarded the OBE in 1993. She owns over 1600 percussion instruments.
Glennie has been profoundly deaf since age 12, meaning that she has some very limited hearing, which in no way inhibits her ability to perform at the international level, or at least no more than it prevented Beethoven from writing some of the greatest music ever written. She is the patron of many charities supporting the deaf, young musicians and groups involved with providing opportunities for people with a variety of disabilities.
She is in every way a worthy successor to the great British percussionist, the late James Blades.