The Interview

Q: Where were you born and where did you grow up?

A: I was born at Gatton in the Lockyer Valley between Brisbane and Toowoomba, Queensland.  When I was three months old my parents moved to Rose Bay, Sydney NSW, where I spent my school years.  However, most of my school holidays were enjoyed travelling with my parents between Sydney and Toowoomba or on my grandparents’ dairy farm at Mt Tyson on Queensland’s Darling Downs.

Q: Was there anyone in particular who played an influential part in shaping your career?

A:  My early career was mainly in television where, during my 3-year contract to do four shows a week with BTQ Channel Seven, I worked with solid pros like George Wallace Jnr., Eddie Edwards and a multitude of guest stars – wonderful entertainers like Jenny Howard, Ken Littlewood and Toshi, Buster Fiddess, the Delltones, Judy Stone and Col Joye and the Joy Boys, many of whom shared their showbusiness traditions, etiquette and craft with novices like me.  However, the person who played the most influential part in showing me how to gain longevity in my career was my husband, Johnny Ashcroft.  He had been “trained” in the vaudeville era by The Great Levante, a star performer, who taught Johnny that the duty of real showbusiness pros was to pass on their knowledge and expertise to beginners.

Q: Gay I know it’s a long time since you started in the industry, how old were you when you first started?

A:  I was seventeen when I made my first professional performance.

Q: Where was your first public performance?

A: Other than singing on trams when I was little, I sang at Sydney’s Royal Easter Show as a 10-year-old.

Q: What was it that made you decide to go into the recording industry?

A:  In January 1973 I toured with the Johnny Ashcroft Show.  Johnny invited me to join him on an EMI album similar to one he’d issued in 1968 with Kathleen McCormack. Kathy had gone to the UK and he said he’d been looking for five years for ‘the right voice’ to replace her (and I was it).

Q: When was your first recording?

A: That same year (1973), I recorded that joint EMI album with Johnny Ashcroft.  We called it Faces of Love.  My solo monologue on that LP, The White Magnolia Tree, became my signature ‘tune’.  In these days when records come and go, sometimes in a matter of weeks, The White Magnolia Tree was available for over 33 years in a number of catalogues, including Readers Digest and EMI.  My first 45rpm single for RCA in 1975, Nobody’s Child coupled with My Home-coming Trucker’s Coming Home, Australia’s first female trucking song, was a double-sided feature on general charts.

Q: In total, how many cds / records did you record?

A: I recorded nine 45rpm tracks, was on ten LPs and six CDs or CD sets.  In addition, I sang on most of Johnny’s recordings since 1973, including the 1978 movie version of Little Boy Lost.  Jazz scatting as Lady Finflingkington on Connection Man with Johnny’s disco-singing alto ego, the Baron, was a hoot. This was on RCA’s 1981 LP, A Time For Change, which also featured one of our favorite duets, Imagine That!

Q: Having been in the industry for so long, you have seen a lot of changes, some good, some bad, are there any that stand out to you?

A: Yes, I worked through the transition from black and white TV to colour, from vinyl LPs to CDs, from videos to DVDs, through to the best days of Australian live performance venues.  But the early years were tough sometimes.  We stood on a stage with only a spotlight and a microphone, trying to build up a rapport with uneducated audiences.  Today, there are so many special effects, such as laser lights, giant screens and lip-syncing, that it is almost impossible to create that kind of personal contact with the people out-front. And I wonder if current performers get the same on-stage satisfaction as our generation did.  

Q: It must have been exciting being on the J O’K Sing Sing Sing Show?

A: It certainly was.  Johnny O’Keefe was another entertainer who believed in sharing his expertise with new-comers.  I learned a lot from Johnny about television performing.  O’Keefe was an innovative artist and it was wonderful to work with him in so many different situations.

Q: Then Bandstand with Brian Henderson?

A:  I was very young then and particularly enthralled to be working on early black and white TV shows like Bandstand, alongside the who’s who of the Australian television industry.  One of the many things we learned from each other was how to stare down the lens of a TV camera and look totally professional – with our knees knocking.

Q: Touring with Johnny Ashcroft – what sort of a tour was that? Just major cities & towns or did you go inland like Slim & Joy, with the caravan, dust and flies etc?

A:  No, we toured in the relative comfort of cars, motels and air conditioned venues in dozens upon dozens of towns and cities.

Q: The Opera House & Standing Ovations – that’s all exciting stuff?

A:  When the Sydney Opera House was only three months old, Johnny and I were very proud to top the bill at the first all-Australian country music show in its magnificent main Concert Hall.  This was under the auspices of The Australian Festival of Performing Arts.   Less than two months later, we again topped the bill during another first in that venue – the Australian Variety Show. Since then, I have performed six times in that giant Concert Hall. Opening and closing a concert with a huge Salvation Army Band and a 300-voice choir backing my 1976 Salvation Army Red Shield Appeal Song, Captain Joe Henry, was an experience in itself. Any Sydney Opera House Concert Hall appearance could never cease to be exciting.  But there were challenging work conditions like severe air-conditioning, which dried the mouths of singers working on a less-than-perfect-sound system. Although the sound progressively improved, ill-planned wardrobes in those “rabbit-warren” dressing-rooms that could not accommodate my long gowns, didn’t.  And there wasn’t even a private area close to the wings to cater for quick-changes.

Q: Your most memorable occasion?

A: It’s very difficult to choose one memorable occasion.  There have been many stand-outs over the years.  However, I think the opportunity to perform The Alexandra Waltz for Princess Alexandra at her Gala Royal Ball in Toowoomba – and then to receive a Royal Command to sing three more songs is extremely memorable, especially for a 17-year-old fledgling performer like I was.

Q: Your most embarrassing moment

A:  While I was standing on the set during the countdown to one of my TV appearances, I made the mistake of looking into the camera lens and imagining all my family and friends and the thousands of people who were “out there”, looking back at me.  I was so distracted by the thought that I missed the musical introduction to my song and came in on the wrong note.  Thankfully, it only took a few seconds to get it right but it was an unforgettable mistake and a lesson learned.  I concentrated on every intro in each of the thousands of songs I sang in the ensuing thirty-nine years of my career.

Q: You have accomplished quite a lot so you must have been entitled to some awards & special recognition, tell me about them.

A:  Joy, I’ve taken the easy way out and copied the following from my entry in Wikipedia - the Internet Encyclopedia. Credits and Awards – Chronological

• Royal Command Performance for Princess Alexandra
• Miss Australia Quest's Miss Darling Downs
• Sunday Mail’s Miss Kirra Sun Girl
• RSL Western Districts Girl In A Million
• Inaugural President of the Toowoomba Bachelor Girls’ Service Club
• Salvation Army Red Shield Appeal Song (Captain Joe Henry's Happy Hand-Clapping Open Air Rhythm Band)
• Inaugural Secretary of the Professional Country Music Association of Australia
• Finalist in Best Female category (Australasian Country Music Awards) Finalist in Best Duo - with Johnny Ashcroft (Australasian Country Music Awards)
• National Award for Service to Australia’s Country Music (Queensland Country Music Awards)
• Finalist for the Heritage Award with The Cross Of The Five Silver Stars (Australasian Country Music Awards)
• Multiple nominee in the Australian Variety Artists Mo Awards
• Imprinted in the Australasian Country Music Hands of Fame–Tamworth, New South Wales

Q: Gay I know you & Johnny have been married for 27 years, so something must have been right?

A:  Yes, we are so very lucky to love each other deeply, to be sentimental and romantic, to believe in close family ties, to share the same involvement in what became our joint careers and to enjoy the same things in our private lives.

Q: Having the same interests, was it ever a problem to keep your own careers separate and then bring them together when concerts called for it?

A:  No.  We’ve always respected and guarded each other’s separate identity.  Even when we performed together we never had a sense of losing it.  Like most people we have our individual strengths, which we are able to combine into a successful team.  For example, in relation to our current Johnny Ashcroft Here’s To You, Australia! CD set, Johnny supplied the original concepts and wrote or co-wrote 24 of its 28 tracks – and I loved my involvement in researching interesting stories about Australian events and personalities, especially on CD Two.  We recorded both solo and duo tracks and then I edited the original vinyls to create the CD masters.  Now we have teamed to make this broad piece of Australia’s heritage available to people.

Q: Elected Inaugural Secretary of the Professional Country Music Association of Australia?

A:  Yes, that was a great privilege.  I had the pleasure of working closely with many country music identities, including consecutive presidents Ken Taylor (ex-manager of Radio 2GB) and Lester V Coombs.

Q: You designed the logo for them?

A:  Yes, if your followers would like to see it, they can log onto www.gaykayler.com.au and find it on my From the Early Years page.

Q: You were instrumental in having country music accepted into the “Mo” Awards?

A:  In 1979, Johnny and I led the Professional Country Music Association of Australia (PCMAA) sub-committee’s submission to recognise country music as a separate entity in the Australian Variety Artists “Mo” Awards.  The “Mo” Awards Committee had steadfastly knocked back a similar request for the previous two years. Johnny made the successful presentation. At the next “Mo” Awards, staged at Sydney’s Regent Theatre in 1980, the PCMAA presented a country music segment, which included performers like Jimmy Little, Lucky Starr, Kenny Kitching, Max Richards (from Men Of Country), the Singing Kettles, Lorraine Delaney (whose daughter, Cassie, later married John Denver), Emma Hannah, Roger Thwaites, Johnny Ashcroft and me.  Emma, Roger, Johnny and I produced the segment.  Lester V Coombes was the executive producer.  But that night, the select audience had no idea that we were about to pull one of the prime reverse-psychology, tried and true showbusiness principles on them. Backed by the Tommy Tycho Sydney International Orchestra, instead of appearing in cowboy hats and faded jeans as expected, the male artists strode on-stage magnificently dressed in white formals with the women in full-length blue organza gowns and the whole audience gasped. That presentation brought the stunned audience of 2000 of our peers to their feet, the only standing ovation of the evening.  And luminaries like Sir Robert Helpmann, Peter Allen and even Sir William and Lady McMahon stood among them.  Now, 28 years later, it’s still said that the PCMAA, with one fell swoop, brought country music out of its musical closet to centre public attention upon this important element of Australian culture, where it remains today.  An Ashcroft composition, Do You Do This For A Living, Or Do You Work? was a highlight of that segment. 

Q: What was the award you got from Hon Bill Haydon?

A:  During the 1981 Queensland Country Music Awards, I was honoured to receive the National Award for Service to Australia’s Country Music.

Q: Tell me about putting your hands in the Hands Of Fame

A:  I was so proud to do my imprint at the same time as John Minson, a dear friend whom I’ve always admired and respected.

Q: Were there any permanent injuries resulting from the car crash?

A:  Multiple vertebral fractures and soft tissue injuries left me with chronic back pain.  However, nothing was serious enough to keep me from enjoying life and eventually returning to the career that I found so fulfilling.

Q: I must commend you on the superb job you did in the remaking of the CD “Here’s To You, Australia!” The endless amount of hours that would have taken, did you keep a time sheet on it?

A:  Thank you. Yes, I logged much of it.  It took seven months of solid concentration and, as the deadline approached, I sometimes sat at the computer for twelve hours looking for each individual vinyl click to remove manually – and there were at least a thousand of them.  I used no automatic vinyl refurbishment programmes because, as you are aware, such programmes can narrow down the sound, resulting in the loss of the warmth and ambience of the recognised superior vinyl sound.

Q: Are you still singing and doing appearances or have you retired from “life on the road” now?

A:  Johnny and I are enjoying another phase of our lives – retirement.  However, we sometimes wonder where we found the time to work!

Q: Is there anything you would like to add that we haven’t already mentioned?

A:  Joy, I would just like to add how much Johnny and I appreciate the wonderful work you and other presenters like you do for Australian music.  Without community radio stations and Australian-based web pages and newsletters like yours, there would be little if any presentation of our music.  You do a great service, not only for people like us, but also for our whole industry and for the public in general.

Thank you very much Gay, I appreciate that very much, as I’m sure the other presenters do too. We do it because we like it, but it is always nice to be appreciated. Thank you also for your time and effort in being part of this interview system.