His first success was when, at the age of 20, Decca Records offered him a three year contract as Musical Director for the company based on his studio work with the Rolling Stones, Phil Spector and Andrew Oldham.  In the '60s he had his first hits as an arranger and producer:  AS TEARS GO BY, COME AND STAY WITH ME, THIS LITTLE BIRD, with Marianne Faithful, IT'S ONLY MAKE BELIEVE and IN THOUGHTS OF YOU with Billy Fury.  He also recorded early singles with Marc Bolan, Joe Cocker, The Small Faces, Van Morrison, Alan Price, Peter Frampton, Keith Richards, Shirley Bassey, Lulu, Jimmy Page, Roy Orbison, Gene Pitney plus several albums with his own orchestra.  In 1964, with these successes behind him, he was asked to go and work in America by Jerry Wexler, head of Atlantic Records and worked as a producer/arranger with Ben E King and the Drifters and several other artists on the label.  It was with the Drifters that he had his first number one hit in the American charts with UNDER THE BOARD WALK and little known Beatle hit SWEET GEORGIA BROWN.  Shortly afterwards his production of AS TEARS GO BY by the Rolling Stones also went to number one.  He considered his finest arrangement to be Sir Paul McCartney's, SHE'S LEAVING HOME on the 'SERGEANT PEPPER' album.  His early song writing hits included LADY GODIVA for Peter and Gordon, HIGH TIME and I'VE BEEN A BAD BOY for Paul Jones, EARLY IN THE MORNING for Vanity Fare and Cliff Richard and ANOTHER TIME, ANOTHER PLACE for Engelbert Humperdink, all top 10 hits in the U.K..
 

Mike was also Executive Producer, of the Andrew Lloyd Webber/Tim Rice concept album of JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR and produced the Murray Head single.  In the late '60s he wrote several film scores including PRIVILEGE with Paul Jones and Jean Shrimpton, RUN A CROOKED MILE with Mary Tyler Moore and THE ADDING MACHINE with Billie Whitelaw and Milo O'Shea.
 

In 1972, he went back to his Rock and Roll roots and discovered 'Gary Glitter' and the 'Glitter Band' and became a key creative figure in the 'Glam Rock' movement of the '70s.  Between then and 1978 he had 21 consecutive top ten hit records, writing all the songs with Gary Glitter himself and producing the records including I LOVE YOU LOVE ME LOVE which sold a million records in ten days and the Glitter anthem LEADER OF THE GANG.  Since then he wrote innumerable popular hits and sold over 30 million singles.  Mike received an Ivor Novello Award for I LOVE YOU LOVE ME LOVE,  and two consecutive Certificates of Honour for services to British Popular Music, and two BMI Awards for over a million radio plays of his songs in the USA.
 

In the early '80s he moved into music video production, producing music programmes including Tina Turner, Average White Band and Susan George, for one of the first Video independents, VCL.  In 1985 came the decision that the time was right to write his first musical.  He moved to Spain and it took five years, but out of it came MATADOR.  A hit album and single for Tom Jones (THE BOY FROM NOWHERE) was followed by acclaimed productions of the show in Chicago, Miami, San Diego and the West End.  In 1991 MATADOR won the Laurence Olivier Award for best choreography.