Renee Geyer dead at 69
Australian singer and ARIA Hall of Famer Renee Geyer has died from complications following hip surgery aged 69.
Renee Geyer Photo: Joe Castro/AAP
Melbourne-born Geyer, one of Australia’s most respected and successful soul singers, was discovered to have inoperable lung cancer while being treated in hospital.
She died surrounded by family and friends, Mushroom Records announced on Tuesday.
“Naturally, we are all utterly devastated,” a statement read.
“Just last month, Renee sang to a full house and was looking forward to another busy year ahead doing what she loved most.”
“She lived her life as she performed – to the fullest – and her passing leaves a giant void in the Australian music industry.”
Fellow Australian Jewish songstress Deborah Conway told J-Wire: “Australia’s Queen of Soul has made her final exit stage left – she will be missed but not forgotten by the people who knew her, played with her, collaborated with her, watched and listened to her.
Renée was a force, perfectly encapsulated in Paul Kelly’s tailor-made song Difficult Woman.
I was on the receiving end of her abundance of personality plenty of times. The first time we met, she tried to punch me out, but she missed; she never apologised! Renée literally never held back, didn’t know the meaning of it. She made me laugh, and she pissed me off, but she was never, ever boring, and she made my life the richer for knowing her.
I wish her family a long life and that her memory be a blessing, a forceful one.”
Her cousin Tom Deutsch told J-Wire: “We were close when we were young, but she drifted away when she entered in the singing world.”
Renee’s Geyer’s parents had been Holocaust survivors, and her father, Eddy, was a member of the Great Synagogue’s choir.
Tom Deutsch added: “Renee wrote a book in which she explained that due to my father’s influence, she started her career in singing.
In the family’s early days, the Geyers ran a migrant hostel in Greenwich that housed Jews arriving from war-torn Europe. They looked after them until they sufficiently settled to care for themselves.”
He said that she had sung frequently at Jewish dances. Then she released her version of “It’s a Man’s World”, and her career took off.
He remembers Renee as being very sweet. I played with her brothers, but she was always around.
Renee Geyer never married. Her brother Robbie lives in Sydney, and brother Dennis lives in San Francisco.
Sydney’s best-known Jewish singer Shimon Farkas, cantor at the Central Synagogue, told J-Wire: “What a pity to lose such a beautiful singer.”
The Jewish Board of Deputies’ CEO Darren Bark said Renee Geyer, one of Australia’s most celebrated soul singers known for her distinctive, husky voice and passionate performances.
“A celebrated artist who recorded with the music world’s most famous singers including Sting, Joe Cocker and Chaka Khan, Ms Geyer was nominated for many awards including for her signature song, ‘It’s a man’s world’.
Renee Geyer was a proud Jewish woman who described herself as a ‘white Hungarian Jew from Australia sounding like a 65-year-old black man from Alabama”.
