Neil McGovern live and works in London. He graduated with distinction from the Masters programme at Royal College of Music and with first class honours from the BMus programme at Birmingham Conservatoire. During his studies he won several competitions, including the Winifred Micklam Prize, the Birmingham Conservatoire Saxophone Prize, and was Highly Commended in both the Doris Newton Music Club Prize and the Royal College of Music Concerto Prize.

Neil performs contemporary classical music and has worked with Ensemble Intercontemporain, Pierre Boulez, Louis Andriessen and Michael Finnissy. He also works extensively with composer Ed Bennett whose saxophone concerto Do Not Bend, he premiered. He also performs and records with contemporary music group Decibel who have performed at The Warehouse and King's Place in London, as well as holding residencies at Ulster University and Birmingham Conservatoire. He is part of the British contemporary saxophone quartet Syzygy.