Phillip Wilcher

It was through Vince Fronza in May 1992, that Wilcher met and befriended Ruby Keeler, (August 25, 1909 – February 28, 1993) the American actress, dancer, and singer who was paired on-screen with Dick Powell in a string of successful early musicals at Warner Bros. particularly, 42nd Street, and was Al Jolson's wife.

Less than a year later, when Ruby Keeler died, Wilcher was to publish his own obituary honouring her in a local newspaper - the Western Suburbs Courier.

In a remembrance titled 'Memories are like Ruby's", Wilcher wrote: Last year, while performing in the United States for the Liberace Foundation for the Creative and Performing Arts, I had the pleasure of dining with the legendary Ruby Keeler who died last weekend. She was Al Jolson's wife and held her own exact and satellite place in the expanse of 20th century theatre and film. The only thing unknown to me was the woman herself. Unpretentiously elegant in her summer frock and hat, she looked up at me from her table with Picasso eyes and smiled. I sensed there was an innate and articulate goodness about her. Like gold-plate on silver, this alone is worth remembering, for this alone was Ruby Keeler.

Phillip Leslie Wilcher was born to Naomi Joy Thompson (8 April 1929 – 21 June 2005) and Leslie James Wilcher (16 January 1923 – 20 August 2022), a World War II veteran.

Wilcher grew up in Camperdown.

Phillip Leslie Wilcher (born 16 March 1958) is an Australian pianist and classical music composer who was a founding member of the children's music group the Wiggles.

When Wilcher published his first work, "Daybreak", at the age of 14, he was one of the youngest classical composers in Australia.

Wilcher has published over 100 piano-related works and has performed both solo and with ensembles.

Rita Crews for The Studio Quarterly Magazine described his style as "free-flowing, with an underlying romantic character, one in which melodic line and lyricism are all-important elements".

His music has been broadcast by radio stations ABC-FM and 2MBS-FM – the latter has aired two documentaries, Wilcher and the French Connection and Wilcher's World.

In 1976 Wilcher became an assistant editor for J. Albert & Son's Classical/Educational Division.

These were formative years for Wilcher, not only because of his work in the classical/educational department but the world of pop/rock music as well.

Through his work at Alberts, Wilcher came to know Vanda and Young, Bon Scott from AC/DC and particularly, Marc Hunter of Dragon.

Wilcher on Marc Hunter: "At that time, I had no idea who he [Marc Hunter] was! Neither did he elaborate much on himself. We just spoke as if we were friends and true to his word, whenever he was at Alberts to record, he would always visit with me, and talk about music. Marc was a gentleman through and through and nothing short of stylish. After leaving Alberts in 1979, I never really saw him again, but my memory of him was such that when decades later he died, I cried. I will still shed a tear for him from time to time. He was a good man; someone I will never forget."

During the 1980s he worked for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).

According to Wilcher's autobiography, it was while working at the ABC Wilcher came into contact with American Pulitzer-Prize winning composer Ned Rorem, who was to prove a major influence upon Wilcher's way of thinking, and how he considered creativity one's primary purpose for being.

As Rorem had once written Wilcher: "The meaning of Life is to seek Life's meaning."

Although musically they are of different worlds, Wilcher considers Rorem a mentor.

The two shared a correspondence spanning over 30 years.

Rorem to Wilcher: "Meanwhile, get your work done, there are too few people who know (as you and I know) what they want to do and how to do it."

Also in the 1980s, Wilcher developed a kinship with the friends and family of American pianist, Liberace, visiting them many times in Las Vegas.

In the late 1980s, Wilcher began working in the Macquarie University early childhood music program.

During his years of employment at Macquarie University's Institute of Early Childhood, Wilcher was invited by music lecturer Emily App to conduct a guest-tutorial/master class, centred around the art of Music and music-making for children.

Emily App wrote of Wilcher's class: "Students were amazed. I think it took their level of thinking about music to greater heights."

On his return to Australia after first visiting the US in May 1989, where he played for a celebration honouring Liberace's birthday at the Desert Inn, Wilcher received a letter of appreciation dated 6 July 1989 from Vince Fronza, who had read the eulogy at Liberace's funeral two years earlier.

Fronza to Wilcher" "We managed a visit to Lee's (Liberace's) grave, and I touched that part of the mausoleum where his body is, spoke softly telling him of meeting you, and that we know he arranged it."

As of 2004, he resided in Concord and owns no cell phone, watch, or car: "My entire life since I was a boy was writing music and that has overshadowed everything. I would be happy living in an oversized cardboard box with a piano and a blank sheet of manuscript paper".

Wilcher started piano lessons at the age of eight; his first teachers were Gladys Woodward and Jean Teasel.

His interest in composing music began at an early age, before his teens.

At the age of 14, Wilcher published his first piano composition, "Daybreak", with the Sydney-based music company, J. Albert & Son, making him the then-youngest published composer in Australia.

The track was later recorded in 2006 by John Martin on his CD, Ancient Rivers.

It was around that time Richard Gill awarded Wilcher a prize in the City of Sydney Eisteddfod for a work titled ‘Autumn Mists.’ Wilcher had entered it along with four other pieces, a Barcarolle, a Rhapsody, an Etude (which Gill praised as a "noble effort" that "rivaled Chopin’s Etude Opus 10 No. 4 in its ideas and difficulty") and a smaller study he likened to the Opus 110 by Brahms, in both style and difficulty.

In his autobiography 'Thinking Allowed' Wilcher recalls: "He was very kind to me, and encouraged me to continue on, suggesting – even foretelling – that mine was a name worth remembering."

For seven years, after he published "Daybreak", Wilcher was a student of composer and musicologist, Franz Holford, who was an editor at J. Albert & Son; he later composed music with Holford for over twenty years.

One of the many highlights during Wilcher's student years with Holford was a meeting with Fernando Germani who was organist of the Basilica of St. Peter in Rome during the reign of Pope Pius XII.

Germani was visiting with Holford at his home in the Sydney suburb of Hunters Hill where the young Wilcher played for him Chopin's Mazurka in B♭ minor, Op. 24 No. 4.

At the end of his performance, Germani was so moved by what he had heard he shed a tear.

Wilcher's piano piece, "Autumn Rain", was published when he was 17, by J. Albert & Son.

He also studied with classical musicians Neta Maughan and Elpis Liossatos, and began a thirty-year association with composer Miriam Hyde.

Hyde is quoted as saying of Wilcher: "I find great satisfaction in the fact that we - Australia - have one composer who can succeed in a medium of sensitivity in spite of the ugliness and violence predominating in so many countries."