ONE of George Michael’s backing singers has revealed the kind-hearted nature of the late star, after he gifted her £50,000 when she was struggling financially.
Shirley Lewis has shed light on one particular example of George’s generosity, which came in 2005, when she was married to Bros singer Luke Goss, and she and her ex-husband had money worries.
So bad was the then couple’s financial predicament at that time, that Shirley sold a watch for £5,000 in Hatton Garden to raise some much-needed cash, but then managed to lose the envelope it was in.
Thankfully George, who died from natural causes on Christmas Day 2016, at the age of 53, stepped in to see that she and Luke would be ok.
Shirley, 64, tells The Mirror: “I was talking to George on the phone and suddenly burst into tears.
“He asked what was wrong and I told him my husband and I were in a really bad place and I’d lost some cash, and he said he was going to give me some money and hung up.
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“The next day I woke up and he’d deposited £50,000 into my account! I called him and said I couldn’t take it and he said, ‘look, I just don’t want you to worry.’”
And George’s generosity didn’t end there, after asking Shirley to join him on tour as a backing singer, she insisted she wanted to pay the money back, but he wasn’t having it.
She says: “I told him ‘I’ll only come if you lower my weekly payment and you take the rest.’
“He said he wasn’t doing that so I told him I wouldn’t come then. ‘Oh, you are such a pain in my a***,’ he said, and that was the end of it – we never spoke about it again. He was such a generous man.”
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And Shirley wasn’t the only one of George’s backing singers he helped financially.
Jo Garland, was also assisted by George, after she too had an incident when she lost an envelope full of cash.
Having handpicked Jo as a backing singer after hearing one of her demo cassettes, George then asked her to move near him in Highgate, north London.
Jo took out three months’ rent in cash to secure a flat, but somehow managed to lose it. Thankfully, George came to her rescue.
Like Shirley, Jo also misplaced an envelope full of cash, but once again George used his own cash to help her out of the predicament.
And after “guardian angel” George replaced the cash with his own money, he told Jo not to “worry about it”, and even said he hoped “whoever found your envelope really needed it”.
Shirley, Jo and fellow backing singer Jay Henry, are about to embark on a small tour of eight live shows, performing some of George’s most iconic hits.
It kicks off later this month on March 17 at Southend Cliffs Pavillion.
