Don Burrows

Don Burrows (1928-2012) was an extremely influential mainstream saxophonist/clarinettist/flautist, whose long professional career spanned six decades. He was born in Boorowa, a small farming village in New South Wales. His parents were keen amateur musicians, who had their own band playing local dances. At the age of 5, Burrows family relocated to the resort village of Bondi in Sydney, where his father had purchased a bakery. His first instrument was flute, and by age 14 he had added the clarinet. Prodigiously gifted, he studied at the Sydney Conservatory, and was good enough to play professionally in dance halls and on the radio by 16. Too young to be drafted in the second world war, Burrows became first clarinettist for ABC’s Symphony Orchestra, and also played in their big band.

Burrows made his recording debut as a band leader with ‘On Camera’ on Columbia in 1963, with a sextet that included New Zealander Judy Bailey on piano, Polish guitarist George Golla, John Sangster on vibraphone, and multi-instrumentalist Errol Buddle. The title came from the fact that much of Buddle’s work by the 1960s involved playing for TV shows. He recorded three more albums for Columbia in the 1960s. Golla and Burrow had first worked together in 1959, and their association would continue into the 1980s. Together they played at Newport and Montreux Jazz Festivals in 1972, and recorded an album at the newly opened Sydney Opera House in 1974. In 1973, Burrows had won a Gold Record for the album Just The Beginning, and had also started Australia’s first jazz course at the New South Wales Conservatorium, where he became Chair of Jazz Studies in 1979. Burrows gave more and more of his time to education in the 1980s, and took extra time to mentor one of his students in particular – a young multi-instrumentalist, James Morrison, who has become one of Australia’s most successful jazz stars, and who was a member of Burrows’ band for much of the 1980s.

Over the years Burrows worked with many visiting musicians, inlcuding Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Oscar Peterson and Dizzy Gillespie. He was awarded an MBE in 1973, made an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1987, and received many honorary doctorates for his services to jazz education. He was inducted into the Australian Jazz Hall of Fame in 2007. In 2015, Morrison released a retrospective of his work together with Burrows, ‘In Good Company’.

Key Recordings:
On Camera (Columbia 1963)
At The Sydney Opera House (Cherry Pie 1974)
In Good Company (ABC 2015) with James Morrison