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George Harrison




George Harrison (February 24, 1943 - November 29, 2001) was a popular
British songwriter and musician, best known as a member of The Beatles.
Note: Until Harrison was in his 40s, he believed that he was born on
February 25.

Born in Liverpool, England, and raised as a child at 12
Arnold Grove, he first attended school at Dovedale Infants, just off Penny
Lane. Later on, he attended the Liverpool Institute, a "smart school", but
was regarded as a poor student, and contemporaries described him as someone
who would "sit alone in the corner." In the mid-1950s he met Paul McCartney
(also a Liverpool Institute student) and later played lead guitar in the
band (initially called the Quarry Men) that eventually became the Beatles.

At the height of the Beatles' popularity, he was often characterized as the
"Quiet Beatle", noted for his introspective manner and his growing interest
in Hinduism. In the mid 1960s he began playing the sitar, which influenced
the sound of the Beatles music in such songs as "Norwegian Wood," "Love You
To", and "Within You Without You". His experimentation with the instrument
brought him into contact with the sitar virtuoso Ravi Shankar, who became a
close friend and mentor.

It was his meeting with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi that led him first into
meditation. In the summer of 1969, the Beatles produced the single "Hare
Krishna Mantra", performed by Harrison and the devotees of the London
Radha-Krishna Temple that topped the 10 best-selling record charts
throughout UK, Europe, and Asia. The same year, he and fellow Beatle John
Lennon met Swami Prabhupada A.C. Bhaktivedanta, the founder of the
International Society for Krishna Consciousness. Soon after, Harrison
embraced the Hare Krishna tradition and remained a devotee till his death.

While not the primary composer in the group (Lennon and McCartney wrote most
of the Beatles' material), as time went on his songs improved greatly and
his material earned respect from both his fellow Beatles and the
music-buying public. Notable examples include "Taxman", "Here Comes the
Sun", "Something", and "While My Guitar Gently Weeps", which was strongly
influenced by the music of his friend Roy Orbison and featured a guitar solo
by Eric Clapton.

After the Beatles split in 1970, Harrison released a number of albums that
were critically and commercially successful, both as solo projects and as
the member of other groups. After many years of being limited in his
contributions to the Beatles' catalog, he unleashed a torrent of material in
the first major solo work released after the breakup, the triple album All
Things Must Pass. The album included the number one hit single, "My Sweet
Lord", although Harrison was later sued for copyright infringement over
similarities between "My Sweet Lord" and the 1963 Chiffons' single "He's So
Fine". Harrison denied deliberately stealing the song, but he did lose the
case in 1976; in the ruling, the court granted the possibility that Harrison
had unconsciously taken the Chiffons song as the basis for his own song.

Harrison was probably the first modern musician to organize a major charity
concert. His Concert for Bangladesh on August 1, 1971, drew over 40,000
people to New York's Madison Square Garden, and raised millions of dollars
to aid the starving refugees of Bangladesh. The concert included other
popular musicians such as Bob Dylan, Leon Russell, Badfinger and Billy
Preston. Classical sitar maestro Ravi Shankar opened proceedings.

Harrison continued to issue records throughout the 1970s but successive
releases met with dwindling interest and sales. He formed his own record
label, "Dark Horse Records" in 1974 and issued a limited number of records
by performers such as Splinter, Attitudes and Ravi Shankar. He moved his own
output to the label in 1976, once his contract with EMI finished.
Immediately following the murder of his friend and former bandmate John
Lennon, Harrison composed a tribute song to Lennon, "All Those Years Ago,"
which found substantial radio airplay and continues to be a staple of
"classic rock" radio. But he released no records for five years after Gone
Troppo in 1982 was met with apparent indifference. He returned in 1987 with
the album Cloud Nine, co-produced with Jeff Lynne and enjoyed his biggest
solo hit in the UK (reaching number 2) when his cover version of "I've Got
My Mind Set On You" was released as a single.

During the 1980s, he helped form the Traveling Wilburys with Roy Orbison,
Jeff Lynne, Bob Dylan, and Tom Petty when they gathered in Dylan's garage to
quickly record an additional track for a projected Harrison European single
release. The record company realised the track ("Handle With Care") was too
good for its original purpose and asked for a separate album. This had to be
completed inside 2 weeks, as Dylan was scheduled to start a tour.

He was also involved in film production through his HandMade Films company,
providing financial backing for the Monty Python film Life of Brian after
the original backers (EMI Films) withdrew because of the supposedly
controversial subject matter of the film. Other films produced by HandMade
included Mona Lisa, Time Bandits, Shanghai Surprise and Withnail and I.

Throughout the 1990s, Harrison, a former smoker, endured an ongoing battle
with cancer, having growths removed first from his throat, then his lung.
There was also a 1999 attempt on his life by a crazed fan who stabbed him at
his home, Friar Park in Henley-on-Thames, puncturing his lung.

Harrison married twice. His first wife was the model, Patti Boyd, for whom
Harrison is supposed to have written the song, "Something". Following their
divorce, Boyd married Eric Clapton (said to have written "Layla" for her
after their earlier affair). Harrison married for a second time to Olivia
Arias, in September 1978. The ceremony took place at their home, with Joe
Brown acting as Best Man. They had one son, Dhani Harrison, born the
previous month.

George passed away at the home of a friend in Los Angeles, California on
Thursday, November 29, 2001, at the age of 58, death being ascribed to a
brain tumour. He was cremated and his ashes be scattered in the River Ganges.

His final album, Brainwashed was completed by Dhani Harrison and Jeff Lynne
and released in November 2002.

On November 29th, 2002, the first anniversary of his death, the Concert For
George saw the two remaining Beatles Paul McCartney, and Ringo Starr join
many of Harrison's friends for a special memorial concert at the Royal
Albert Hall in London that benefitted the Material World Charitable
Foundation. Ravi Shankar joined Jeff Lynne in a performance of "The Inner
Light," Eric Clapton and Lynne performed "I Want To Tell You" and "Here
Comes The Sun," Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers (with Jools Holland and Sam
Brown) performed "Taxman" and "I Need You," Starr performed "Photograph",
members of Monty Python (Michael Palin, Terry Jones, Eric Idle and Terry
Gilliam) performed "The Lumberjack Song," and McCartney and Starr performed
"For You Blue". For the finale, all of the artists went back on stage to end
with "Something," "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," "My Sweet Lord," (with
Billy Preston on keyboards), and "I'll See You In My Dreams".

Album Discography

   * Wonderwall (Film Soundtrack)
   * Electronic Sound
   * All Things Must Pass
   * Concert For Bangla Desh
   * Living In The Material World
   * Extra Texture
   * Dark Horse
   * 33 and 1/3
   * George Harrison
   * Somewhere In England
   * Gone Troppo
   * Cloud Nine
   * Traveling Wilburys Volume 1
   * Traveling Wilburys Volume 3
   * Live In Japan
   * Brainwashed

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