George's legacy lives on

George Harrison may have been the quiet Beatle, but he was a busy Beatle, too, according to his widow, Olivia.

The Los Angeles-born former record executive spoke to the LA Times about the work she is still doing in her husband’s name more than three years after his death from cancer.

“He had this extraordinary work ethic,” she said. “He never stopped. He always had something going.”

Her goal is to complete all the work Harrison had started before he died.

She is hoping to re-release his landmark 1971 album, The Concert For Bangla Desh, later this year and is instrumental in preparations for dance troupe Cirque Du Soleil’s Beatles-based show that should be unveiled in Las Vegas sometime next year.

She is currently overseeing next week’s US publication of a tribute book to accompany the 2002 memorial concert called The Concert For George.

Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr and dozens of others have contributed to the ultimate coffee table tome, with all proceeds going to the charity Harrison funded, the Material World Foundation.

“I need a five-year plan just to finish everything he started,” said Olivia, who still wears her wedding ring.

The hand-made books are a limited edition of just 2,150 and are selling in the US for $540 (€402.40) each. Another 350 deluxe editions of the 308-page book are signed by Olivia – and all of those have already sold out.

Olivia tells the Times that her husband’s humour was often overlooked because of his spiritual interests.

“He always said: ‘The biggest break of my career was getting into the Beatles. The second biggest break was getting out of them.”’, said Olivia. “He always said: ‘If you’re going to be in a band, you might as well be in The Beatles.”’

Olivia first met Harrison when she was working for his Dark Horse record company in LA.