Peter Posa

You did tours with people like Hank Snow, Slim Whitman, Marty Robbins and Demis Roussos, were they good to work with?

"That was through New Zealand, and they were extremely good to work with."

How did you come to know the Kiwi pop sensation girl group the Chicks?

"I discovered the Chicks, it happened at a party in Henderson and they heard the music coming in from the street across. They came up to me for an autograph, and I said 'you sing me a song and I'll give you an autograph.' They sang and Ron Dalton who was my recording manager and myself thought they were so good we said, 'right - we're going to record them'- and the rest was history."

What about Dinah Lee, another top New Zealand act of the '60s?

"I discovered her first hit, Don't You Know Yokomo. She was singing at a place called Mojo's in Auckland and I happened to go along one night and Viking Records already had a song planned for her first release. But I said to Ron Dalton, 'Dina Lee sang a brilliant song last night at Mojo's and I think you should record it. It's called Don't You Know Yokomo.' So he took my advice and it became her first major hit."

Just how many records did you actually make?

"Twenty albums, 14 EPs and 30 45s. I actually made more records in New Zealand than anyone in the sixties. In the '70's I made one album called Guitar Pops. My recording career was really based around '61-'66. We used to do an album in about two or three days at the most and some would be done in a day. About four would be released every year."

That's an extraordinary work rate compared to today where they're just putting out one album every two or three years . . .

"I know and it takes them about six months to record - especially with all their computer work and everything. I think a lot of the older equipment has a better feel to it than what they use today. We used to put down the rhythm and lead tracks down at the same time. The digital stuff is good and all that and its very clever - you can sort of take one note out and replace it with another note - but its very clinical.

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