Jazz musician and former Oxford Mail columnist Pat Crumly has died, aged 66. Born and raised in Oxford, Mr Crumly was musically inclined from a young age and, according to his sister Janet Burgess, was always destined to become a musician.

Mrs Burgess said: "He was able to sing songs all the way through when he was just three years old and was always humming away, whatever he did."

Brought up in Hendred Street, East Oxford, he won a place at Southfield Grammar School here he started to learn various musical instruments.

Starting out on the clarinet, he moved on to the saxophone, which was to become his greatest love.

After leaving school, Mr Crumly went to work at Blackwell's music shop in Oxford, a job that allowed him to indulge his passion. Mrs Burgess said: "He loved it there as he could listen to music all day and look at the sheet music."

He played with many jazz, dance and blues bands in the city.

Leaving Blackwell's, Mr Crumly went on to work at John Lane, in Abingdon, where he became a gentlemen's outfitter. It was another job that gave him the time he needed to rehearse his music.

It was around this time that Mr Crumly met and married his first wife, Jenny, and the couple had two sons, Julian and Steve.

He later went on to form a progressive group called Edge, with other local jazz musicians and in the three years they played together, they recorded one album, called Uneasy Peace.

In the early 1970s he started presenting his own weekly jazz show on BBC Radio Oxford and wrote a jazz column in the Oxford Mail.

Deciding to take the plunge as a professional musician and tired of travelling to London to play there, Mr Crumly left Oxford in late 1979 and signed up with an agent in the capital.

He toured with the likes of The Animals and jazz legends George Melly, Alan Price and John Dankworth and often played at the capital's most famous jazz venue, Ronnie Scott's.

Mr Crumly also gave his time to community and charity projects. It was while working on one of these projects that he met his second wife Hannah, to whom he was married for the past 12 years.

He died on Sunday, September 28. His sister said: "I've got family of my own, but when you lose your baby brother it's a real shock. He has gone before me and I can't believe it. He had so much to offer the world."

A Buddhist ceremony will take place at Fulham Town Hall, in Parsons Green Lane, London, at 11am on Sunday, October 12, head of a funeral at Mortlake Crematorium, in Kew Meadow Path, Richmond, at 1pm.