Ian McCubbin was born in Leicestershire in 1958. Benefitting from the musical education provided by the Leicestershire County School of Music, he studied bassoon and piano to a high level during his formative years. In due course Ian moved to Oxfordshire to pursue a scientific career but from the mid-1980s onwards he turned his hand to arranging and – subsequently – composition, for bassoons and for small woodwind groups, in which he is essentially self-taught. To date he has produced more than 50 bassoon quartet arrangements, 17 arrangements for wind quintet, and a number of original works for wind quintet.
Having now retired from the day job, he works regularly as a piano accompanist for local exam centres and continues to arrange and compose.