George Harrison was lead guitarist, songwriter and singer with The Beatles. Although often overshadowed by the partnership of Lennon and McCartney during the band's lifetime, he emerged as a significant talent in his own right.
The early years
Harrison was born on 25 February 1943 in the family home at 12 Arnold Grove, Wavertree, Liverpool.
His parents were Harold and Louise Harrison, who had roots in Ireland. They had three other children: Louise, Harry and Peter, all of whom were older than George.
In 1950 the family moved to 25 Upton Green in Speke. George went to school at Dovedale Road, where he passed his 11 Plus and gained a place at the Liverpool Institute for Boys, a local grammar school.
He attended the Institute between 1954 and 1959. Not an especially gifted child academically, Harrison struggled as a student and left without any qualifications. He had trouble relating to his teachers, and insisted on wearing tight jeans and long hair, much to his parents consternation.
In 1959 Harrison formed a skiffle group, The Rebels, with his brother Peter and a friend, Arthur Kelly. Harrison's mother bought him a guitar for £3, and the group's debut gig at the British Legion club in Speke earned them 10 shillings.
Harrison considered becoming an apprentice engineer after leaving school, but music dominated his passions and he performed with a number of fledgling groups in Liverpool. In 1958 he met the Quarry Men, whose ranks included Paul McCartney, a friend of Harrison's from the Institute.
Although Harrison was considered too young to join the group, he did fill in when their regular guitarist Eric Griffiths was unavailable. Eventually he was accepted as a full member, despite the reservations of the Quarry Men founder and leader, John Lennon.
Paul introduced me to George and I had to make the decision whether to let George in. I listened to George play and said, 'Play Raunchy' [a 1958 hit for saxophonist Bill Justis]. Then I said, 'OK, you can come in.'
I couldn't be bothered with him when he first came around. He used to follow me around like a bloody kid, hanging around all the time. He was a kid who played guitar and he was a friend of Paul's which made it easier. It took me years to come around to him, to start considering him as an equal.
The band became Johnny and the Moondogs, and later the Silver Beetles. Their first trip to Hamburg in August 1960 took place while Harrison was just 17, and the Reeperbahn, the red light district where they played, proved an educative experience: "Everybody around the district were homosexuals, transvestites, pimps and hookers and I was in the middle of that, aged 17," he said.
The first trip ended in Harrison's deportation for working under-age. When they returned in March 1961 The Beatles had become more assured as performers, and in June cut their first single, My Bonnie, as the backing band for Tony Sheridan. For this they were paid 300 marks with no royalties.
Related articles:
- UK LP: Wonderwall Music by George Harrison
- US LP: Wonderwall Music by George Harrison
- If I Needed Someone
- George Harrison to get Hollywood Walk of Fame star
- Unpublished George Harrison lyrics go on show at British Library
He WAS an academically gifted child, that's how he got into the institute. He hated the school and the teachers.
An honorable man .. a guy who stand next after Abe Lincoln ..
Read this snippet in a BBC article today:
"Meanwhile, George spent years sniping at Paul in public. The two men briefly reunited with Ringo in the mid-90s, but George soon pulled the plug.
Most embarrassingly, George, Ringo and Yoko all sued Paul in 1985, when they discovered that he was making more from the group's records than they were."
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8243000/8243561.stm)
Was wondering if you could shed some light, particularly on George's sniping at Macca.
I'm sure the examples are out there in interviews from the time, but I don't have any to hand. This extract from the Anthology book (2000) should explain the situation though:
"Personally I'd found that for the last couple of albums – probably since we stopped touring – the freedom to be able to play as a musician was being curtailed, mainly by Paul. There used to be situation where we'd go in (as we did when we were kids), pick up our guitars, all learn the tune and chords and start talking about arrangements.
"But there came a time, possibly around the time of Sgt Pepper (which was maybe why I didn't enjoy that so much), where Paul had fixed an idea in his brain as to how to record one of his songs. He wasn't open to anybody else's suggestions. John was always much more open when it came to how to record one of his songs.
"With Paul, it was taken to the most ridiculous situations, where I’d open my guitar case and go to get my guitar out and he'd say, 'No, no we're not doing that yet. We're gonna do a piano track with Ringo, and then we'll do that later.' It got so there was very little to do, other than sit round and hear him going, 'Fixing a hole...' with Ringo keeping the time. Then he'd overdub the bass and whatever else.
"It became stifling, so that although this new album was supposed to break away from that type of recording (we were going back to playing live) it was still very much that kind of situation where he already had in his mind what he wanted. Paul wanted nobody to play on his songs until he decided how it should go. For me it was like: 'What am I doing here? This is painful!'
"Then superimposed on top of that was Yoko, and there were negative vibes at that time. John and Yoko were out on a limb. I don’t think he wanted much to be hanging out with us, and I think Yoko was pushing him out of the band, inasmuch as she didn't want him hanging out with us.
"It's important to state that a lot of water has gone under the bridge and that, as we talk now, everybody's good friends and we have a better understanding of the past. But talking about what was happening at that time, you can see it was strange."
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As for the court case, on Monday 25 February 1985 it was reported that George, Ringo and Yoko filed an $8.6m lawsuit against Paul for breach of contract, alleging that he was earning a "preferential royalty from Beatles records to the others, as an incentive for him to re-sign with Capitol as a solo artist." McCartney's lawyers admitted this was true, but pointed out that Capitol did not decrease the royalties of the others.
Thanks for the update Joe, and kudos on the site.
It is tempting to pigeon hole any of the four into pre-determined ideas of their personalities etc., and when it comes to George it's easy to see him as a gentle soul.
But one ought to remember that at the time of John's death, he and George were not on speaking terms at all.
Something that apparently cast a shadow over George's final years.
Point being - they were just blokes - incredibly gifted and talented blokes but filled with all the human flaws the rest of us have.