Born this Date: George Harrison

George Harold Harrison MBE (25 February 1943 – 29 November 2001) was an English rock guitarist, singer-songwriter and film producer. He achieved international fame as lead guitarist in The Beatles. Often referred to as "the quiet Beatle", or "The Dark Horse" Harrison embraced Indian mysticism, and helped broaden the horizons of the other Beatles as well as their Western audience. Following the band's breakup, he had a successful career as a solo artist and later as part of the Traveling Wilburys, and also as a film and record producer.

Although the majority of The Beatles' songs were written by Lennon and McCartney, Harrison generally wrote one song per side from the Help! album onwards. His later compositions with The Beatles include "Here Comes the Sun," "Something" and "While My Guitar Gently Weeps." After the band's breakup, Harrison continued writing, releasing the acclaimed and successful triple album, All Things Must Pass, in 1970, from which came the #1 single "My Sweet Lord". In addition to his solo work, Harrison co-wrote two hits for Ringo Starr, another ex-Beatle, as well as songs for the Traveling Wilburys — the supergroup he formed in 1988 with Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne and Roy Orbison.

Harrison married model Pattie Boyd on 21 January 1966, at Leatherhead and Esher registry office, with Paul McCartney as best man and only other Beatle present. They had met during the filming for A Hard Day's Night, in which the 19 year old Boyd was cast as a schoolgirl fan. After Harrison and Boyd split up in 1974, she moved in with Eric Clapton and they subsequently married. Harrison and Clapton remained close friends, and referred to each other as "husbands-in-law".

Harrison married for a second time, to Dark Horse Records secretary Olivia Trinidad Arias on 2 September 1978. They had met at the Dark Horse offices in Los Angeles in 1974. They had one son, Dhani Harrison. After the 1999 stabbing incident in which Olivia subdued Harrison's assailant nearly single-handedly, Harrison received a fax from his close friend Tom Petty that read: "Aren't you glad you married a Mexican girl?"

Blamed by Harrison on his smoking in the 1960s, he developed throat cancer which was discovered in 1997 after a lump on his neck was analysed. Despite radiotherapy the cancer spread, and he underwent an operation at the Mayo Clinic in the US during the early part of May 2001, to remove a growth from one of his lungs. Three months later, in July 2001, it was revealed that Harrison was receiving radiotherapy for a brain tumour at a clinic in Switzerland. Despite the treatments and operations, Harrison died on 29 November 2001 in a Hollywood Hills mansion that was once leased by McCartney and was previously owned by Courtney Love. His death was listed on his Los Angeles County death certificate as "metastatic non-small cell lung cancer".[135] He was cremated and his ashes were scattered in the Ganges River by his close family in a private ceremony according to Hindu tradition. It is said that he left almost $155 (£105) million in his will.

My favorite Harrison solo song from the album,
All Things Must Pass,
"I'd Have You Anytime"