Hilary Davan Wetton was educated at Brasenose College, Oxford, and at The Royal College of Music, London, where he was a pupil of Sir Adrian Boult and won the Ricordi Conducting Prize. From 1979 he was the Director of Music at St Paul's Girls' School in Hammersmith where his precursors were Holst, Vaughan Williams and Herbert Howells. He is also the conductor of the Milton Keynes City Orchestra (with whom he has recorded Raff Symphonies for Hyperion), the Wren Orchestra, the City of London Choir and the Scottish Schools Orchestra. Appearances abroad have included concerts in America, Australia and Singapore, as well as in Europe. He was conductor of the Holst Singers from 1978 to 1990.

Hilary Davan Wetton was awarded the degree of Master of Arts, honoris causa, by The Open University in 1983.