Jazz Remembered
George Dawson
Reeds player George Harry Dawson was born in 19th May 1940 in Barnes, London. In his late teens, he won a scholarship to an art school. Here he honed his drawing and painting skills and years later, he painted a number of pictures of jazz greats including Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, King Oliver, Bunk Johnson, Charlie Parker and others, some of which he sold, some of which are still with his family. It was at art school that he also became seriously into jazz, and playing jazz.
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At 18, he played in Bix-inspired trumpeter Derek Budd’s Maryland Jazz Band, coming second in a jazz band competition. He also frequented central London jazz clubs run by Ken Colyer and Cy Laurie, and would sit in whenever possible. He said that they would play all night - taking care to “step over the dead bodies” (i.e., drunken and exhausted dancers who were kipping on the floor), for the price of a “greasy breakfast” the next morning. Initially George worked in factories, shops, garages, and as a painter and decorator before taking a job as a school caretaker in Harrow, but his first big music break came in 1960 when he was asked to join Steve Lane’s Famous Southern Stompers.
George Dawson with Steve Lane's Southern Stompers in the late 1960s including Nick Singer (banjo), Terry Vincent (drums), Ray Smith (piano), Bob Dwyer (trombone) and Dave Hill (sousaphone).
George’s son Paul says: “Perhaps he was recommended by a fellow musician when clarinettist Alex Revell was stepping down from the band. “Steve ‘auditioned’ Dad, and told him to go away, learn arpeggios on all of the chords in five vital jazz keys – Ab, Bb, C, Eb and F, I imagine – and come back next week. Dad learnt several arpeggios on all of the chords in all twelve keys, played them fluently for Steve, and was invited to join the band. He was clearly very keen and, despite their musical differences, was always proud of his association with the band, and grateful for the opportunities it gave him to record and tour all over Europe. He was also, I think, very grateful to Steve personally, for teaching him to read music, music theory and so on. While Dad’s clarinet playing initially reflected the style of those New Orleans players who had played with the 1920s bands that Steve Lane admired - people like Johnny Dodds and Omer Simeon, whose line Dad emulated, and then transforms and transcends on Steve’s recording of ‘The Chant’”
“By, by the middle of the decade he had developed a style entirely his own – fast-flowing, a babbling brook, passionate but not romantic, a hard-edged, pitiless suffusion of blues feeling and rapid precision, zeal controlled by a prodigious technique and instantly recognisable by those in the know.”
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Paul continues: “Dad had very definite musical ideas. At least two musicians who were in the band at the time have told my brother and me that they were frustrated at spending Wednesday night rehearsals “listening to Steve and your Dad argue”. Dad wanted more freedom. He was tired of playing “by the book”, the book in question being of Steve’s meticulous arrangements. He wanted to play more soprano sax – indeed, this became his main instrument from about 1970 onwards.”
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“The influence of Sidney Bechet was unmistakable in his soprano playing, but he was no mere Bechet copyist, for the influence of other favourite musicians, Charlie Parker in particular, also made itself felt. Dad had such power, fluency and emotional heft on the soprano that one fellow musician acclaimed him as, in the classic tradition, “the best player in Europe”. He also played alto sax, and very occasionally baritone and tenor.”
George (right) with Keith Nichols (trombone) and Digby Fairweather (cornet) in the mid-1970s
After Steve Lane, George played and recorded with many bands, most notably The Black Bottom Stompers and The West End Stompers. He recorded with Keith Nichols – a set of Keith’s own compositions which can be heard on the soundtracks of countless films and TV shows. He collaborated with pianist Ray Smith, trumpet players Freddie Shaw, Ken Sims, Chez Chesterman, Mike Cotton, Denny Ilett Sr, trombonists Mike Pointon, Mike Hogh and Mike Holt, and counter-culture author, actor and cornetist Jeff Nuttall, to name but a few. He played festivals and clubs in Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands , Poland and Czecholslovakia.
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Here is George with the Keith Nichols band playing South Side Shuffle:
Paul recalls: “Dad never forced his musical tastes on my brother and me. Growing up, though, we of course heard him practising, listening to jazz recordings in order to learn melodies, chords and phrases. And then, at night, as we lay in bed, we heard what the television playwright Dennis Potter called the music coming up the stair, as Dad cycled through his small but carefully chosen record collection. I remember in particular a 10-inch LP of Django Reinhardt recordings. These had a profound influence on me later on. Other late-night favourites included Bechet and Parker, of course, but also Bix Beiderbecke, Big Bill Broonzy, and so on. Eventually, John and I succumbed to jazz, and one of our greatest pleasures was listening to the music with Dad.”
George (left) at the Victoria in Highgate in 2010 with Al Mundy (saxophone), Don Smith (bass) and Wally Fawkes (clarinet)
Looking back, Paul says: “In the mid-1980s, I worked with Dad as his assistant caretaker. Our office was near a music room. Occasionally, a cleaner would call in sick, and we’d have to clean this room. In the process, Dad would retrieve discarded scraps of music manuscript paper from the bin or the floor. Then, in the office, during tea breaks – of which there were several, since Dad loved tea-, he would, upon these scraps, with a stubby 2b pencil, write music. Phrases he’d thought up. Ideas. While, on the back of the office door, there hung a white shirt, a black waistcoat with a bow tie in the pocket, so that when his working day was over, he could get on with his vocation. He would drive – to Southampton, Colchester, further afield - to play music. Jazz. A club. A concert. Applause. Acclaim. Home in the early hours. Up again at 6. Back to the day job. For decade upon decade.”
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Here is George in 2010 playing soprano sax on When You And I Were Young Maggie in an imprompto session at the Wenlock Arms in London with old friends Chez Chesterman (cornet), Holly Roberts (piano), Terry Vincent (drums), and his son, Paul, (guitar):
George continued for several decades with school caretaking by day and music by night. In 1997, George retired from his work at the school. He continued playing, and was musically busy until 2020, when he retired due to ill health.
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George passed away on the 9th September 2024. His music lives on in the memories of others and in his recordings.
Photographs courtesy of Paul Dawson
© Sandy Brown Jazz 2025.11