Just as I was surprised to receive an email from Richie Wilkinson recently containing a cutting from the Bundaberg News Mail headed Keen Interest in Rowing, I was just as pleasantly surprised to more recently receive another email from him containing a PDF of the 1963 version of the Bundaberg State High and Intermediate School’s Annual Grand Variety Concert. Thanks Richie for sharing these memories.
The concert was held in the Wintergarden Theatre which was/is situated in Maryborough Street, Bundaberg. The theatre was opened in 1920 and had seating for about 1500 patrons.
The image above is similar to what I remember it used to look like (we had to ride past it twice each school day). I don’t remember it being blue nor do I remember the tree on its left hand footpath. I suspect that AI had a hand in adding the tree, the colour, the people and the cars.
The concert I am referring to in this article was held on Thursday, 11th July, 1963. My brother Trevor and I were listed as item 6 on the program as “Electric Guitars”. Neither of us can remember much about the experience.
It is notable that the featured image at the top of this article was generated by our friends at ChatGPT from information I provided. It is not totally accurate given that neither of us had expensive guitars as are illustrated in the image. But the amplifier is probably more accurate, given that we had a 5 watt amplifier to make enough noise to be heard around such a large venue.
Neither Trevor or I can remember what we played but he suggests it could possibly have been The Shadows song Foot Tapper. It is a good chance that Foot Tapper was in the repertoire given that the song was released by The Shadows in 1963 and probably was their biggest hit for that year.
One of the things I do remember about the performance is that our mother made red “jerkins” for us to wear on stage. Haven’t heard the term “jerkin” used for such an article of dress for at least forty years but that is what we called them. Today we would probably call then a vest or something similar. I am not sure we each wore a tie either but who cares.
The thing that probably struck me most about viewing the program in 2026 was the manner in which Item 6 was defined. In contrast to many of the other items, Item 6 included only our names and “Electric Guitars”. It seems there was no attempt to legitimate our repertoire by including the names of the songs we were to play or their composer as was the case with most other items.
1963 was a time when the guitar boom of the early rock ‘n’ roll era was sweeping the world. The inclusion of “Electric Guitars” possibly reflected the growing influence of modern popular music among regional Queensland students. Having us perform alongside choirs, drama, ballet and gymnastics shows how quickly contemporary popular music was finding its place in student’s personal entertainment and the school’s efforts to recognise those changes.
