by Helen Musa
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| Former Seeker Keith Potger… “So many young people write to me and say they’ve listened to the records that their parents loved.” Photo: Elizabeth Hawkes |
On the contrary, in the next few weeks he’ll be headlining the Canberra Legacy Variety Concert with a show he’s written, performing with Shortis and Simpson on the opening night at the National Folk Festival, jointly directing the festival choir with Simpson in a show called “From Georgia [Stalin’s birthplace] to ‘Georgy Girl’,” then appearing with the Royal Military College Band in “Music at Midday” on April 11.
I caught up recently with Potger at the home in Braidwood, which he shares with artist-photographer Elizabeth Hawkes, to find out how he does it.
“I don’t stay idle, I’m still writing songs and still recording them,” Potger says. “It keeps me off the streets.”
But these days his focus is on giving back to the community via charitable work and indeed, he says, it was he who initiated his involvement with the Legacy concert, the proceeds of which will go to supporting the widows, widowers and families of Australia’s Defence veterans.
One might imagine Potger to be a high-living Melburnian or Sydneysider, and so he was for a time, but he’s been living in Braidwood since around 2014, describing the move as “a wonderful decision which felt completely natural”.
He says he’s been able to engage with the local community in Braidwood, especially “with the fantastic National Theatre right across the road… Elizabeth and I started promoting concerts there, and now we think of ourselves as small-town impresarios.”
He even flirted with politics in 2021 for what he described as “about three and a half seconds,” putting up his hand to run for Queanbeyan-Palerang Regional Council, but he was ruled out because of a “faulty” nomination process.
As for the Legacy concert, Potger had always wanted to perform with an army band, so rang his old mate Barry Morrison, formerly of the band Xanadu, asking for a contact. Easy. Morrison said he’d been to school in Bundaberg with army band conductor (and “CityNews” music reviewer) Ian McLean and pointed him in the right direction.
McLean, who is both producer and MC for the Legacy concert, jumped at the idea and also put Potger in touch with Major Matt O’Keeffe, director of the RMC band, who signed him up for the midday concert on April 11.
According to Potger, both interactions proved “very agreeable”.
Besides, he’d already prepared a program called “Celebrating The Seekers”, which he could do either with a band or as a solo performance and was looking ahead to a NSW solo tour where he would perform in towns from Warren to Woy Woy (Spike Milligan is one of his heroes).
In “Celebrating The Seekers” he’ll talk a lot and perform his own versions of favourite Seekers’ songs, including “I’ll Never Find Another You” and the aforementioned “Georgy Girl”.
“I tell anecdotes about six decades in the music industry,” he says.
The six decades started when he was aged 16 in year 11 at Melbourne High School, where he formed his first trio, which by year 12 became a quartet.
“But The Seekers as we know them began in December 1962, when I was just 21… they’ve been such a massive part of my life.”
Already a master of the 12-string guitar, it was Potger who composed the riffs that became a trademark of the Seekers’ chart-topping recordings and he has continued life as a composer down the years.
After sailing for the UK in 1964 and enjoying an international career, The Seekers were named Australians of the Year in 1967, disbanded in 1968, reunited in 1992 to tour internationally for their Silver Jubilee, reunited again in 2013-14 for UK and Australian Golden Anniversary tours and appeared again in support of the “Georgy Girl” musical in 2014.
“Judith [Durham] is gone but Athol [Guy] and Bruce [Woodley] still live in Victoria and we keep in touch,” he says.
So, does their music resonate with a younger generation of music lovers?
“It depends on whether they heard it at home,” he says.
“So many young people write to me and say they’ve listened to the records that their parents loved.”
The Legacy show is determinedly aimed at the wider general public. He’ll be joined by an acoustic group from the Royal Military College Band, the Sing Australia Choir, Canberra artists, including jazz vocalist Leisa Keen, cellist Charlotte Winslade, bush poet Laurie McDonald and pianist Sam Row, who will play “The Swan” from “Carnival of the Animals” and the Chopin showstopper, “Polonaise Brillante”.
The show will conclude with the entire cast singing a medley of songs, naturally concluding with The Seekers’ classics “Morningtown Ride” and “The Carnival is Over”.
Canberra Legacy Variety Concert, Royal Theatre, National Convention Centre, 2 pm, Saturday, April 1. Bookings at Ticketek.
First published at City News website, March 22, 2023
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