MUSICIANS across the region are affectionately remembering Lindsay George as the heart of Ballarat Memorial Concert Band.
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The long-serving percussionist took great pride in the band, from overall performance to meticulous care in his instruments.
Mr George died on Saturday, aged 84. Those who played with him will farewell him in a march – marches were his favourite – in a service in Sebastopol on Friday.
It was in a visit with his father to watch Ballarat’s premier brass band that Mr George, about 13 years old, met the band conductor who asked if he could play drums. Mr George could not, but went away and came back in 1946 to join what was then known as the Soliders Sailors and Airman Band.
He kept his uniform from the 1940s and modelled it for modern Ballarat Memorial Concert Band members a couple of years ago.
Pam Clark, who played a tenor horn and later French horn with the band, fondly remembered trying to maintain Mr George’s old band uniforms after his wife Jean had died.
“One day he brought these old pants around, they were woolen and dark navy with a button fly, and asked me to shorten them for him – he used to think he was getting shorter, or they’d stretched – and I said, “Lindsay, these look about 100 years old”,” Ms Clark said. “He’d say he thought they still had a bit of wear in them...He takes a lot of pride in the band.”
Mr George was always the first to arrive and set up at practice, and he was always the last to leave.
His musical life extended to playing in the orchestra for Ballarat Light Opera Company musicals, the first was Oklahoma in 1962, and the BTV6 showband. Later, was a key member of the Ballarat Vintage Brass Band.
Ms Clark said the band community was very tight-knit and everyone from Ararat and Stawell to Maryborough and Creswick was very fond of Mr George.
An electrical fitter and turner by trade, Mr George became a maintenance man and part-time percussion teacher at Ballarat Grammar School from the mid-1970s to mid-1990s.
Mr George brought music into the lives of his three children: Craig has been a musician in the army and airforce bands; Heather teaches music at Ballarat High School; and Karen plays flute for enjoyment.