His career spanned from playing drums in his father's big band at the age of 13, through scoring films, to electronic music featuring tape manipulation of the sounds of birds, animals, insects and children.
He debuted at age 13, playing drums with his father's Big Band orchestra at the Paramount, Tottenham Court Road in London.
This was all in the 1940s during World War II, and during the Blitz he would play for eight hours every day and make his bed in the Warren Street Underground station while bombs exploded above him.
By 1957, the rise of Skiffle and Rock and Roll had brought an end to the Big Band era and Kirchin decided it was time to move on "because you're a prisoner of rhythm.
[4] He then moved to Sydney in October 1959 with his wife Theresa but as his possessions were being unloaded from the ship a strap broke and everything, including his recordings of the Kirchin band, was lost beneath the sea.
He also produced material for the De Wolfe library using the talents of young session musicians such as Big Jim Sullivan, Jimmy Page and Tubby Hayes.
The controversial recording of autistic children came about because of his wife who worked as a teacher at a special ed school in a little valley in Switzerland in the city of Shermat.
The use of his music in films exposed him to audiences and his clipped up and distorted sounds did very well at complementing the disturbing visual images within the horror and scifi genres.
From Brian Eno and Nurse With Wound to Broadcast – "We need role models like Basil Kirchin to go forward, and, as we can see parallels in his music and ours, hearing this confirms that we're doing the right thing".
[8] In early 2017, Hull-based production company Nova Studios Ltd worked with the Hull City of Culture 2017 team and Serious Music, to produce the documentary Mind On The Run, telling Kirchin's life story.
There was also a weekend-long festival of Kirchin inspired music featuring The BBC Concert Orchestra led by Will Gregory, The Hidden Orchestra, Evan Parker, Alan Barnes, Bob Stanley, Sean O'Hagan, Tim Gane, Matthew Bourne and contributions from Jonny Trunk of Trunk Records, Jerry Dammers, Richard Williams and Matt Stephenson of Nova Studios.
"When we [Eno and David Byrne] made My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, with the idea of using found voices as the centre of the piece rather than having them as an ornament, I’m sure the boldness and confidence I had for that partly came from Basil.” [10] Sean O'Hagan says Basil Kirchin's music "felt very real, very odd and slightly dangerous," "It brought me to very odd areas - noisy experimental, totally unmusical forays but also very lyrical songs and some absolutely beautiful film music" And Bob Stanley remembers listening to a track called Mind on the Run and described it as "terrific," "possibly something from The Avengers, like a chase scene or something, there's that really frenetic drumming and organ work.