Kathleen, left.
The lovely Kathleen Maloney is a busy lady, ABBA tribute artist, music teacher, wedding singer, and one time Commonwealth Games chorister that was starstruck by Ian Thorpe’s large feet, but that’s another story!
On answering the phone for our chat ,Kathleen responsibly tells me to hold the line while she pulls up her car so we can chat. Kathleen has never been to Tasmania before but is very much looking forward to her trip performing the part of Agnetha from ABBA in ‘Gold: the ultimate ABBA show. Kathleen is particularly keen on experiencing the cooler weather in contrast to being ‘hot and bothered’ living in Queensland.
Kathleen says she is a ‘massive” ABBA’ fan and playing Agnetha comes as second nature to her, having played the ABBA songstress in other ABBA tribute acts. In fact she was enlisted for this production by a drummer friend who worked in the band and had also worked with Kathleen on previous occasions.
Kathleen’s naturally long blonde hair and similarity in looks meant ‘being’ Agnetha didn’t need a lot of physical adjustment. In an ironic twist, both names, ‘Kathleen’ and ‘Agnetha’ both mean ‘pure’ and this fits in well with not only the ‘pure’ sound but also ABBA’S wholesome, squeaky clean reputation that appeals to a wide demographic. Kathleen informs me that she has studied video to master Agnetha’s hand movement and like the rest of the band Kathleen has also studied the Swedish language(via the internet) to authenticate her performance.
Fans will not be disappointed with the authentic replication of the clothes. The jump suits and capes are twins to the originals.
Kathleen tells me that on a cruise featuring Marcia Hines and The Temptations she found the group under the scrutiny of one of ABBA’s original managers who gave the tribute act the thumbs up as well as some little tips to embellish the act.
The performance itself, as well as featuring all the great hits is scripted, but there is also liberal ad lib’s. The production is divided into a 45 minute opening and a break before another hour of performance.
The evening promises fun with fans expected to ‘rock up’ with fancy dress and of course there will be plenty of audience participation.
It’s time for our chat to end and for Kathleen to ‘rock up’ to one of her other jobs and teach youngsters to sing!
You can see Kathleen sing as Agnetha in ‘Gold: the ultimate ABBA show’ on Friday `the 25th of April at The Country Club Casino, Launceston and Saturday, 26th April at The Theatre Royal.
Paula Xiberras
