George Martin was only 29 years old when Preuss retired as head of Parlophone in April 1955, leaving GM to take over the label. He should have been in the club.

February 1967; photo by Henry Grossman. “George always had a very pragmatic streak. He never let the so-called glamour of show-business seduce him. He always saw through phoney people very quickly. He was the practical one, the one who could mend the amplifier or change the fuse. And he is one of the most generous people I know. If you were a friend of George in need, he would reach into his pocket and give you his last penny. Equally, if it were a matter of principle, he would defend you to the last. If ever I were in trouble, George Harrison is the kind of person I would like to be able to turn to.” - George Martin, With A Little Help From My Friends: The Making of Sgt. Pepper (1994) “There was a time in the Nineties when Dad was very sick. He was confined to bed and things were fairly touch and go for a while. George [Harrison] was wonderful, simply wonderful; he came over to visit and brought Dad a Ganesh elephant symbol, telling him it would keep him safe and well. He was such a comfort to the whole family during a difficult time. He was a very keen gardener, the grounds of his home were just beautiful, still are, and he helped Mum a lot with our garden. He would drive over to see us with as many plants as he could fit on to the passenger seat of a McLaren F1! He meant a great deal to my dad; to all of us.” - Giles Martin, Express, May 27, 2012 “I spoke to George Martin recently, and he was talking about all the ‘20 years ago today’ stuff and The Beatles CDs, and he said, 'Never mind, George. It’ll soon be gone and we can go back into our shells.’” - George Harrison, The Observer Magazine, 1987 Q: “George Martin recently admitted he still felt embarrassed about not giving you more attention in the studio. He claimed he’d been ‘beastly to George.’” George Harrison: “He wasn’t beastly to me, but he spoke to me recently and said his only regret was that he didn’t realize sooner what I was. He already had enough to deal with, I suppose, with this band The Beatles who already had two guys out there writing and singing. He didn’t really need to try because in those days most groups had their songs written for them. It was all quite new. But only this summer he said to me, Will you ever forgive me, George? (Laughs) He’s such a gentleman! It was nice of him to say that, you know.” - Q, 1988

“I said to the boys, after we’d done a few takes of rather nondescript songs, I said, ‘Come into the control room and have a listen and see what we’ve been doing. And if there’s anything you don’t like, tell us.’ And George was the one who took the leap. And he said, ‘Well, I don’t like your tie for a start.’ And the others were horrified. They thought, God, he’s blown it. But of course, I fell around laughing. I thought it was — it was so cheeky, and so funny that I… you know, he endeared himself to me.” - George Martin, Living In The Material World (x)

In 1943, at the age of 17, George Martin volunteered the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy. He left the service in January 1947.

(Photos from "If these walls could sing")

9 May 1962

Originally underwhelmed by their demo but thinking it at least "worth following up," and subsequently influenced by various political goings-on at EMI, George Martin offers Brian Epstein a contract for the Beatles.

“Paul was John's sounding-board, of course, and George had a huge amount of input, which, to my eternal regret, I didn’t sufficiently recognise at the time, but Ringo’s opinion was always important to John, just because he knew that with him there’d never be any bullshit. He’d often turn to Ringo and ask what he thought and if Ringo said, ‘That’s crap, John,’ he’d do something else.”

GEORGE MARTIN, "John Lennon: The Life" by Philip Norman

GEOFF EMERICK'S ACCOUNT OF THE JOHN-ON-ROOFTOP LSD INCIDENT

- Geoff Emerick and Howard Massey, Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles (2006)

Paul’s first LSD trip with John was on March, 21, 1967. During the recording of the song “Getting Better” John accidentally took LSD. After he noticed that something was wrong he let George Martin know that he wasn’t feeling well and he couldn’t concentrate. George and Paul were aware of the situation, but George Martin wasn’t. He really thought that John was just feeling ill so he took him to the roof in Abbey Road. As soon as Paul and George knew what was going on they went up to get John. That night Paul decided to take John home (Cavendish) and drop acid with him for the very first time. 

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“We stood there for a minute or two, with John swaying gently against my arm. ‘I’m feeling better,’ he announced. Then he looked up at the stars. ‘Wow..’ he intoned. ‘Look at that! Isn’t that amazing?“.

I followed his gaze. The stars did look good but they didn’t look that good. It was very unlike John to be over the top in that way. I stared at him. He was wired-pin-sharp and quivering, resonating away like a human tuning fork. No sooner had John uttered his immortal words about the stars than George and Paul came bursting out on the roof. They had come tearing up from the studio as soon as they found out where we were. They knew why John was feeling unwell. Maybe everyone else did, too - everyone except for father-figure George Martin here! It was very simple. John was tripping on LSD. He had taken it by mistake, they said - he had meant to take an amphetamine tablet. That hardly made any difference, frankly; the fact was that John was only too likely to imagine he could fly, and launch himself off the low parapet that ran around the roof. They had been absolutely terrified that he might do so. 

I spoke to Paul about this night many years later, and he confirmed that he and George had been shaken rigid when they found out we were up on the roof. They knew John was having a what you might call a bad trip. John didn’t go back to Weybridge that night; Paul took him home to his place, in nearby Cavendish Road. They were intensely close, remember, and Paul would do almost anything for John. So, once they were safe inside, Paul took a tablet of LSD for the first time, ‘So I could get with John’ as he put it- be with him in his misery and fear. What about that for friendship?” - George Martin       

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“I thought, Maybe this is the moment where I should take a trip with him. It’s been coming for a long time. It’s often the best way, without thinking about it too much, just slip into it. John’s on it already, so I’ll sort of catch up. It was my first trip with John, or with any of the guys. We stayed up all night, sat around and hallucinated a lot. 

Me and John, we’d known each other for a long time. Along with George and Ringo, we were best mates. And we looked into each other’s eyes, the eye contact thing we used to do, which is fairly mind-boggling. You dissolve into each other. But that’s what we did, round about that time, that’s what we did a lot. And it was amazing. You’re looking into each other’s eyes and you would want to look away, but you wouldn’t, and you could see yourself in the other person. It was a very freaky experience and I was totally blown away. 

There’s something disturbing about it. You ask yourself, ‘How do you come back from it? How do you then lead a normal life after that?’ And the answer is, you don’t. After that you’ve got to get trepanned or you’ve got to meditate for the rest of your life. You’ve got to make a decision which way you’re going to go. 

I would walk out into the garden - ‘Oh no, I’ve got to go back in.’ It was very tiring, walking made me very tired, wasted me, always wasted me. But ‘I’ve got to do it, for my well-being.’ In the meantime John had been sitting around very enigmatically and I had a big vision of him as a king, the absolute Emperor of Eternity. It was a good trip. It was great but I wanted to go to bed after a while. 

I’d just had enough after about four or five hours. John was quite amazed that it had struck me in that way. John said, ‘Go to bed? You won’t sleep!’ ‘I know that, I’ve still got to go to bed.’ I thought, now that’s enough fun and partying, now … It’s like with drink. That’s enough. That was a lot of fun, now I gotta go and sleep this off. But of course you don’t just sleep off an acid trip so I went to bed and hallucinated a lot in bed. I remember Mai coming up and checking that I was all right. ‘Yeah, I think so.’ I mean, I could feel every inch of the house, and John seemed like some sort of emperor in control of it all. It was quite strange. Of course he was just sitting there, very inscrutably.” - Paul Mccartney

George Harrison with George Martin circa February 28, 1967 during the “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” recording sessions at Abbey Road Studios. Photo by Henry Grossman © Grossman Enterprises LLC.

(http://www.henrygrossman.com/)

George Martin, posted by Linda McCartney’s official Insta on January 3, 2023. Caption there reads “George Martin. Abbey Road Studios, London, 1968.”

Tug of War • Part 1

George Martin and Paul McCartney; Sgt. Pepper sessions, 1967.

Rubber Soul sessions, 1965