Harold McNair's Eclectic Legacy

From jazz to rock to rnb to dance music, Harold 'Little G' McNair was playing it.

alpha boys school radio — The flute and saxophone were Mr McNair's primary instruments.

Flute player, vocalist, and saxophonist Harold "Little G" McNair was born 5 November 1931. McNair migrated to the UK in the 50s, settled in London and began performing at Ronnie Scott's club. The late Quincy Jones included Mr McNair in his "Birth of a Band" orchestra that toured Europe in 1960 and can be seen and heard on saxophone in this video from the Municipal Theatre in Lausanne, Switzerland. Click here to purchase the concert recording on Amazon.com .

Throughout the 1960s, Mcnair also contributed to a slew of jazz-inflected folk and progressive rock albums, including Martyn's The Tumbler and Davy Graham's Large as Life and Twice as Natural. During a visit to Mami, he recorded his first all-jazz album, Up in the Air with Harold McNair, after which he returned to the UK and released Affectionate Fink in 1965 for Island Records. The recording ‘The Hipster’ comes from his second UK album, the self-titled Harold McNair, and was issued on RCA as a 45 in 1968.