Australian Dictionary of Biography

Greg Gibson

Courtesy of Jim Styles

Gregory Edmund Campion Gibson (1930–1998), jazz musician and diplomat, was born on 23 January 1930 at Stawell, Victoria, younger of two children of Victorian-born parents James Gibson, doctor, and his wife Veronica Philhomena, née Fitzgerald. Greg attended the local primary school before boarding at St Patrick’s College, Ballarat (1942–47), where he participated in boxing (a school champion in his weight division), cricket, cadets, and religious societies. He was dux in his final year. Although he had rebelled against the discipline of piano practice as a younger child, he took a keen interest in music at boarding school, developing an understanding of chord structures and progressions on the ukulele and banjo-ukulele.

At his parents’ insistence, Gibson enrolled in medicine at the University of Melbourne’s Mildura campus in 1948. He failed the end-of-year examination and repeated the year in 1949; however, expecting he would fail again, he did not sit the final exam. He worked at odd jobs around Melbourne before returning to university in 1951 to study science. His studies did not last beyond the year as jazz became his passion. In June 1949 he had bought his first clarinet, and he soon fell in with musicians such as Frank Traynor, Graham Coyle, and Smacka Fitzgibbon, later recalling that in those times ‘jazz was like a religion to us’ (Williams 1981, 38).

In May 1952 Gibson enlisted in the Royal Australian Air Force. After three months as an air crew trainee at No. 1 Initial Training School, Archerfield, Queensland, he was transferred to No. 1 Basic Flying Training School, Uranquinty, New South Wales. There he trained as a pilot, but showing little interest or aptitude, he was discharged in December. In early 1953 he moved to nearby Cootamundra to join the renowned Cootamundra Jazz Band, playing regularly around the region while supplementing his income by selling insurance, driving a truck, and working at the local abattoir. He was inspired by seeing the American jazz and blues musician Louis Armstrong perform eight times over five days in Sydney in 1956. Two decades later he remembered it as ‘the greatest thrill of my life’ (Gibson 1976).

Gibson moved to Canberra in 1957. That same year, he married Queanbeyan-born Laural Merle Johnston on 20 April at St Christopher’s Cathedral, Forrest. Having already established a reputation as an accomplished musician, he enlivened a ‘fairly dismal’ (Gibson 1976) local jazz scene by forming the Greg Gibson Quartet, which played regularly in the Carlton Lounge at the Ainslie Rex Hotel.

Soon after his wedding, Gibson had accepted a position at the Department of External Affairs (later Foreign Affairs) to secure a steadier source of income. His first overseas posting was to Kuala Lumpur (1959–61) where he played and broadcast with pianist and composer Alfonso Soliano, one of the Federation of Malaya’s most prominent artists. So began a practice that Gibson would sustain throughout his career of playing regularly with local jazz musicians. On his return to Canberra, he formed a new quartet and recorded with some of Australia’s foremost jazz musicians in a one-off project, the Pix All-Star Australian Jazz Band. In October 1962 he was posted to Brussels, where he continued his musical odyssey, sometimes playing up to seven nights each week. He added a baritone saxophone to his armoury, and performed occasional gigs in Britain. Transferred to Athens in 1964, he was disappointed with the lack of jazz music.

Returning to Canberra in late 1966, Gibson formed the New Capital Jazz Band, which played regularly in the Federation Lounge at the Hotel Dickson from 1968. He played with Soliano again during his next posting to Bangkok (1970–71) before forming the quartet Mood Indigo with his friend from Melbourne days, Graham Coyle, in Canberra. Their 1972 concerts in Sydney and Melbourne attracted national recognition. After a posting to Jakarta (1976–78), Gibson joined the long-standing Canberra band The Fortified Few.

In 1980, following his divorce from Laural, Gibson married Mary Diana Boulter at Glen Iris, Melbourne. During his next posting at the Australian High Commission in London (1981–85), he sustained his ‘jazz diplomacy’ (Canberra Times 1982, 15), forming Jazz Australia/UK Incorporated with visiting and local musicians, including Māori singer Joy Yates. He was involved in overseeing the administration and business of Australia House, where he was also known to stage concerts. Throughout his career, Gibson balanced what he described as a ‘faintly challenging daytime job which is intellectually amusing’ with jazz as ‘the mainstay that keeps my sanity’ (Williams 1981, 39). ‘It’s like getting off the chain, to blow clarinet,’ he observed. ‘You forget all about work: the whole thing goes all out the window’ (Gibson 1976). His final posting was as Australia’s high commissioner to Malta (1987–90). In 1992 he and Mary moved to Melbourne, where he played with the Creole Bells until 1995.

Gibson was drawn to traditional and mainstream jazz; modernist music, particularly if he sensed that it had lost a connection with its foundations, left him cold. ‘In my book,’ he said, ‘music has to retain some sense of melody and rhythm … roots is where it’s at’ (Williams 1981, 38). His style of playing though was dynamic, admired by amateurs and leading professionals alike. Canberra reed player Terry Wynn remembered hearing him for the first time: ‘I was absolutely floored by his attack and fire’ (Sharpe 2006, 169). Pianist Graham Bell described his tone as ‘very fruity and vital’ (Jones 1998, 17). Though Gibson’s career as a diplomat meant that he connected only sporadically with the Australian jazz scene, he was extremely well regarded as a musician. Jazz historians have rated him in ‘the top echelon of Australian clarinettists’ (Bisset 1979, 173) and ‘among the major contributors to the evolution of an essentially Australian style of jazz’ (Williams 1981, 35).

Those who knew and played with Gibson remembered an unassuming and engaging man. Outside of music and work, he was a model train enthusiast, and built the model railway later housed in the Junee Roundhouse Railway Museum. He died of bronchopneumonia on 10 January 1998, at Malvern, and was cremated. His wife Mary, stepdaughter Catherine, and three children from his first marriage, Julie-Anne, Katherine, and Peter, all survived him.