Richard is widely recognised as Australia's leading guitarist/composer. Born in the UK in 1955 he has lived in Australia since his parents emigrated in 1963. Largely self-taught he initially started writing music to expand his own repertoire, but now his works have been performed and recorded by many leading Australian and international players and feature on more than 30 CDs including labels such as ABC Classics, Naxos, Tall Poppies and Move Records. Many of the performers who have commissioned works from Mr Charlton are among Australia's leading guitarists such as Timothy Kain, Karin Schaupp and Slava Grigoryan.

His music combines a love of melody with a keen sense of harmonic and formal structure - music "to entice the ear as well as the intellect" (Fred Blanks - Northern Herald).

In 2004 Mr Charlton was awarded Instrumental Work of the Year at the APRA/AMC Classical Music Awards for his guitar quartet Stoneworks. In 2005 the UK magazine Classical Guitar, described him as, "producing some of the most inspired and accessible guitar works of the present era."

Richard has had works premiered at many major festivals worldwide, including the Adelaide Festival, the Radio France International Guitar Week in Paris, the Sonorities Festival in Belfast, the Hamburg International Guitar Festival, the BDZ Euro Festival of Zupfmusik and at Australia House and Bolivar Hall in London.

Mr Charlton uses the guitar in many musical combinations, collaborating with a diverse range of artists. This has recently included a work for guitar and string quartet for Matt Withers and the Acacia Quartet (2018), pieces for Guitar Trek, works for cello and guitar (Bach in the Dark), as well as music for the ABC Meditation program Classic Flow which featured William Barton, didgeridoo and Riley Lee, shakuhachi with guitarist Steve Allen (2019).

Richard's most recent guitar compositions have been a large-scale solo work for Tim Kain, The Sonata of Forgotten Dreams, (released on Naxos), a dramatized solo work for Karin Schaupp and a new quartet for Guitar Trek. His work as an arranger has seen him contribute to three Katie Noonan/Karin Schaupp duo CDs, one of which won an ARIA Award. He has also twice arranged music for choir and orchestra with guitar for the Lord Mayor's Christmas Carols in Brisbane. (2014 & 2017)