“I woke up to Eric and George playing ukuleles at the foot of my bed”: Session pro George Terry recalls the first time he met a Beatle

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Session heavyweight George Terry has had quite the career, having amassed credits with ABBA, Bee Gees, Diana Ross and many, many other big-name acts over the years.

Not only that, during the 1970s the unsung electric guitar hero was Eric Clapton’s guitarist, providing chops on No Reason to Cry (1976) and Backless (1978), and hitting the road on numerous occasions throughout the decade.

Through Slowhand, Terry was also given the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet a Beatle – which took place after a particularly heavy night of drinking.

Speaking in the new issue of Guitar World, Terry recalled the time he was able to meet George Harrison while staying at Clapton’s house.

“The band had to practice jams of slow blues tunes for over a week,” Terry explains. “It drove me crazy to do the same thing every day. After more than a week of it, I had a little too much Jack Daniels and went to sleep in the upstairs bedroom.

“Early the next morning, I woke up to Eric and George playing ukuleles at the foot of my bed. I thought I was dreaming, but the hangover assured me I wasn’t.”

Terry’s time as Clapton’s guitarist during the ’70s was certainly eventful, even without the impromptu ukulele jams with George Harrison.

As he explains elsewhere in his Guitar World interview, Terry once had to step in and cover his boss’ playing when Slowhand was spiked with LSD before a show.

The pair would do great things together in the 1970s, and as Terry recalls, their relationship began rather spontaneously: Terry – who was at this point already a seasoned session player – spotted Clapton walking towards Criteria Studios, and offered to give him a lift.

“After giving Eric a ride to the studio, I told him I played with an in-house band that Mack Emerman [who founded Criteria Studios in 1958] let hang out there.

“I told Eric that we usually play for fun, in between being called into sessions, and invited him to join us if he wanted to play a bit or run down a song. He took me up on the offer and we played a few different kinds of grooves.”

To read the full interview with George Terry – plus conversations with Joe Perry, Frank Marino and Pat Travers, Bowie sideman Carlos Alomar and Funkadelic's "Blackbyrd" McKnight – pick up Guitar World's November 2024 issue from Magazines Direct.