He was the founder of a great school of English horn playing.
His grandson Dennis Brain was to become perhaps the most famous horn player of all time.
When he was 12 he joined the Scots Guards and played the horn in the band.
In orchestras he nearly always played fourth horn, so his nickname was "George IV".
The four horn players in that orchestra, Adolf Borsdorf, Thomas Busby, Henri Van der Meerschen and Brain, were often called "God's Own Quartet" because they blended together so well.