Maxwell Maybury was extremely nervous the first time he played the saxophone in public.

“It was a nightmare,” the 80-year-old remembered. “It was at the Somerset Cricket Club. I was supposed to play The Impossible Dream. It was impossible for me to start. Not a sound came out of the saxophone. I felt like crawling through the floor.”

Decades later, he is a veteran music teacher and musician who has played in venues all over the island, opening for the likes of Quincy Jones, the Four Tops and the Temptations. He still gets butterflies.

“Even now I have to be on my third tune before I really relax and get into what is going on,” Mr Maybury told The Royal Gazette.

On April 30, he will be honoured during International Jazz Day Bermy Style, a dinner and concert at Grotto Bay Beach Resort & Spa in Hamilton Parish.

Mr Maybury first met event organiser Wendell “Shine” Hayward in 1983 when he played for one of Mr Hayward’s jazz suppers.

“He has been calling me ever since,” Mr Maybury joked.

The saxophonist grew up on Heathcote Hill, Sandys, the sixth of 14 children.

As a youngster at West End Primary, he was bored and unchallenged. The work was just too easy. He was pushed up two grades, but it did not help. He was given the chance to take the exam for the Bermuda Technical School in Devonshire.

“The teacher said I was too young, but could take the exam for practice,” Mr Maybury said.

When he came out of the examination, he was astonished that the older boys had found the test difficult. He thought it was a cinch. The instructor announced that he had passed, but because he was so young, would have to wait two years before he could attend. He was so disappointed that he never went back to school.

“I had a paper route at the time,” Mr Maybury said. “I would make myself late coming from that. By that time everybody in the house was gone.”

His older brother caught on, and said if he was not going to go to school, then he had to go to work with him and learn carpentry.

In his free time, Mr Maybury loved singing with a group of children in the neighbourhood. They were so good that they attracted the attention of a neighbour who worked at the Naval Air Station in Southampton. The neighbour played the saxophone in clubs in St George’s.

“He asked us if we wanted to sing with him when he entertained there,” Mr Maybury said. “On Friday nights he would pile us in the car and drive down there.”

Mr Maybury loved the singing, but it was the neighbour’s saxophone that intrigued him. He really wanted to play too, but there was absolutely no money in his house for an instrument.

While learning carpentry, he put his wages aside to buy a saxophone, using a savings account at the post office in Hamilton.

“In those days you could do that,” he said. “When you wanted to take your money out, they would cut you a cheque. I didn’t know anyone with a bank account. Nobody had any money to save. People often bought groceries on credit.”

After several years of putting money aside, he managed to save £54. He took the cheque home.

“I put it on the bureau while I was getting a shower,” he said. “My mother [Flora] came in and found it.”

She quickly took possession of it, making him sign the back so she could cash it. When he told her it was for a saxophone, she questioned his sanity.

“It was the beginning of September and my sisters needed new school dresses and my brothers needed shoes,” he said. “I cried for about a month.”

After that, he learnt to be tight-lipped about any plans he had, even with his family. It took him three more years to save up for the saxophone.

He was eventually able to buy a state-of-the-art Selmer Mark VI for £60, with the help of a loan from a friend. He still plays it.

“Today the same instrument costs thousands of dollars,” he said.

In the meantime, he found a job at the Southampton Princess Hotel, working his way up from carpenter’s helper to carpenter and eventually manager of all maintenance departments. Then he took a course to become an engineer.

After 16 years, he was made redundant and given enough in redundancy pay to finish off the house he was building, and take his wife and children on a cruise.

He is proud that he built his own home without taking out a mortgage.

“I was playing in bands nights,” he said. “I would sift sand to build my home before I went to work in the morning.”

A long affiliation with The Salvation Army’s Somerset Brigade Band allowed him to travel the world.

He has never forgotten his humble beginnings, and has given private lessons to many youngsters for free.

“My advice to them is the three Ps,” he said, “practice, practice, practice.”

He and his wife, Lois, have been married for 57 years. They have one biological son and several foster children and grandchildren.

International Jazz Day Bermy Style will be held on April 30 at the Grotto Bay Hotel Resort in Hamilton Parish, also featuring Pan Man Pancho, the Tino Martinez Quartet, and the Saltus Jazz Band. Other saxophone players will be Calvin Symonds, Isman Lovence, Cher-Ann Brangman, Sir Clarke and Shine Hayward. There will be cocktails at the bar at 6pm, then a buffet dinner at 7pm.

· Tickets are $185, available at www.bdatix.bm