Verity and Mike Productions
Professional Entertainment
A Portrait of Matt Monro
Matt Monro, the Singer's Singer, visited Australia 16 times before his untimely death in 1985 at the age of 54. He often performed in Canberra. The only existing live cabaret video recording of Matt was taken in Melbourne in 1967 on his first tour of Australia and there is a CD recorded off the mixing desk in Twin Towns RSL on his final tour in 1984. Winifred Atwell who also toured extensively throughout Australia with her honkytonk piano was his mentor and gave Terry Parsons, the singing bus-driver, his stage name. His record producer was George Martin, who also produced The Beatles. Matt is best known for the songs Portrait of my Love, My Kind of Girl, Yesterday, Born Free, the 007 Bond movie theme From Russia with Love, Softly, as I Leave You and Walk Away.
Michael Whittaker celebrates Matt Monro's visits to Australia, assisted by screen presentations, sensitively recreating all your favourites from the Matt Monro Songbook, using specially commissioned backing tracks, providing an insight into how this unassuming singer became the international star he deserved to be. Further information about Matt Monro may be obtained at Wikipedia and the official fan club website. Contact us for an A3 poster for venue use.
Portrait of my Love released in Australia in 1961
Why Not Now was the 'B' side of the single Portrait of my Love
How Do You Do was released as a single in Australia in 1966. It was written especially for Matt by Mike and Bernie Winters to promote audience interaction (as demonstrated by Matt's 1967 film recorded at the New Twenties Club in Melbourne - the only video of Matt's cabaret act in existence).
Audience Feedback from 'A Portrait of Matt Monro'
'..a seamless relationship achieved between his voice, video presentation and the music of Matt Monro. I was quickly enthralled by Michael's knowledge and his ability to entwine the life of Matt Monro with his own personal connection to the singer. This created a strong empathy between the presenter and audience which led to positive audience feedback. The presentation was truly professional and not to be missed.' - E.B.
'and on the subject of sounding good – no, make that great – when you use your lower register it’s goose-bump material. Seriously mate, you should do a show-full of those' - P.R.
'a lady said after the show – she’s been to the John Denver tribute show and while it was slick and polished, she and her companions enjoyed yours more because of your stories and anecdotes. And you sang to them, not at them. Great distinction there and a real take-away' - D.G.
'after the show l stayed sitting in my position up the back and a woman came up from the front and said to a friend of hers sitting nearby “Wasn't that a fantastic show!" - G.B.
In a show preview of A Portrait of Matt Monro at Tuggeranong Seniors, Canberra, Australia on 14 July 2015, a lady in the audience who had seen a live performance of Matt Monro at Twin Towns RSL in 1984, his very last show in Australia (Matt made 16 visits to Australia) was very moved by Softly As I leave You. Later she explained she had not realised until then just how sick Matt must have been at the time. This spoke very strongly of the lady's emotional connection with the original performance (as well as Matt’s professionalism).
A Portrait of Matt Monro performed at the Q Theatre, 2 September 2015
A Portrait of Matt Monro performed at the Empire Theatre, 10 March 2016
