1. Geoffrey John Harvey was an English-Australian musician, pianist, conductor, musical director and television personality who worked at the Australian Nine Network for 38 years.
17 Facts About Geoff Harvey
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Geoff Harvey was born on 6 August 1935 in London, England, and lived through the Blitz during the Second World War.
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Geoff Harvey was born into a musical family: his father played the fiddle while his mother was a piano player.
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Geoff Harvey began playing piano and the organ at the age of six and when he was eight he began playing at his local Catholic church.
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Geoff Harvey came to Australia in the early 1960s to join EMI Music Australia, producing records for the label with Bryan Davies.
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Geoff Harvey was only due to stay in the country for a year but decided to remain, finding work in the new medium of television.
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Geoff Harvey joined the Nine Network in 1961 working on Bob Rogers' Tonight Show.
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From 1984 to 2002, Geoff Harvey was the musical director of Carols by Candlelight in Melbourne at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl before his successor John Foreman took over in 2003.
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Geoff Harvey appeared briefly on Sydney radio station 2GB alongside Kerri-Anne Kennerley in 2000.
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In 1998, Geoff Harvey was appointed as the joint patron of the Mo Awards alongside Tommy Tycho who had been sole patron since 1981.
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Geoff Harvey returned to studying in 2002, receiving his Associate in Music, Australia in organ in 2004 from the Australian Music Examinations Board and four years later his licentiate from Trinity College London.
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In October 2008, Geoff Harvey donated to the National Library of Australia his collection of 5,000 original arrangements and in 2011, he began teaching music in his studio at home.
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In 2017, Geoff Harvey still performed in live theatre, taking to the stage to play piano in his comedy revue Senior Moments with Lex Marinos, Benita Collings and John Derum.
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Geoff Harvey was a recipient of the Medal of the Order of Australia during the 2006 Queen's Birthday Honours for "service to the community as a musician and entertainer, and through support for charitable organisations".
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Geoff Harvey was a patron for ConnecTeD, from 1992.
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Geoff Harvey married fellow television personality Penny Spence and they had two children together: Eugenie in 1968 and Charlotte two years later.
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Geoff Harvey died on the Gold Coast in March 2019, aged 83.