Geoff Brash, who died in 2010, was a gregarious Australian businessman and philanthropist who encouraged the young to reach their potential. Born in Melbourne to Elsa and Alfred Brash, he was educated at Scotch College. His sister, Barbara, became a renowned artist and printmaker. His father, Alfred, ran the Brash retail music business that had been founded in 1862 by his grandfather, the German immigrant Marcus Brash, specializing in pianos. It carried the slogan “A home is not a home without a piano.”
In his young days, Brash enjoyed the good life, playing golf and sailing, and spending some months travelling through Europe, having a leisurely holiday. He worked for a time at Myer department stores before joining the family business in 1949, where he quickly began to put his stamp on things. In one of his first management decisions, he diverged from his father’s sense of frugal aesthetics by re-carpeting the old man’s office while he was away. After initially complaining of his extravagance, his father grew to accept the change and gave his son increasing responsibility in the business.
After World War II (1939-1945), Brash’s had begun to focus on white goods, such as washing machines and refrigerators, as the consumer boom took hold. However, while his father was content with the business he had built, the younger Brash viewed expansion as vital. When Geoff Brash took over as managing director in 1957, the company had two stores, but after floating it on the stock exchange the following year, he expanded rapidly and opened suburban stores, as well as buying into familiar music industry names such as Allans, Palings and Suttons. Eventually, 170 stores traded across the continent under the Brash’s banner.
Geoff Brash learned from his father’s focus on customer service. Alfred Brash had also been a pioneer in introducing a share scheme for his staff, and his son retained and expanded the plan following the float.
Geoff Brash was optimistic and outward looking. As a result, he was a pioneer in both accessing and selling new technology, and developing overseas relationships. He sourced and sold electric guitars, organs, and a range of other modern instruments, as well as state-of-the-art audio and video equipment. He developed a relationship with Taro Kakehashi, the founder of Japan’s Roland group, which led to a joint venture that brought electronic musical devices to Australia.
In 1965, Brash and his wife attended a trade fair in Guangzhou, the first of its kind in China; they were one of the first Western business people allowed into the country following Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution. He returned there many times, helping advise the Chinese in establishing a high quality piano factory in Beijing; he became the factory’s agent in Australia. Brash also took leading jazz musicians Don Burrows and James Morrison to China, on a trip that reintroduced jazz to many Chinese musicians.
He stood down as Executive Chairman of Brash’s in 1988, but under the new management, debt became a problem, and in 1994 the banks called in administrators. The company was sold to Singaporean interests and continued to trade until 1998, when it again went into administration. The Brash name then disappeared from the retail world. Brash was greatly disappointed by the collapse and the eventual disappearance of the company he had run for so long. But it was not long before he invested in a restructured Allan’s music business.
Brash was a committed philanthropist who, in the mid-1980s established the Brash Foundation, which eventually morphed, with other partners, into the Soundhouse Music Alliance. This was a not-for-profit organization overseeing and promoting multimedia music making and education for teachers and students. The Soundhouse offers teachers and young people the opportunity to get exposure to the latest music technology, and to use this to compose and record their own music, either alone or in collaboration. The organization has now also established branches in New Zealand, South Africa and Ireland, as well as numerous sites around Australia.
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Olympic games and Kazakhstan
July 17 at 11:35 am
Taufik KARIMOV, a political analyst
On the eve of the main sporting event of the quadrennial year-the London Olympics-let's remember the achievements of Kazakhstani athletes at the Olympic games of our time.
Participation of Kazakhstani athletes in the Olympic games of our time should be divided into two parts – first as part of the USSR national team, and then, after independence, as part of the national team under its national flag.
However, first I want to warn readers – here you will see some discrepancies with the generally accepted data. For example, it is believed that for the first time Kazakhstan took part in the Olympics in 1956, in my opinion – in 1952 (then, by the way, the first medal was won, and not in 1960, as it is believed).
The first Olympic champion-Kazakh in official sources is called the wrestler Zhaksylyk USHKEMPIROV (1980), although in fact this is Alzhan ZHARMUKHAMEDOV (1972). Without detracting from the merits of our outstanding athlete, we just note that Ushkempirov is indeed the first Kazakh Olympic champion who represented Kazakhstan directly. And Kazakh Zharmukhamedov, who became the champion of the Munich Olympics in the Soviet basketball team, then lived in Moscow and played for CSKA. Then we all lived in a single state called the USSR, and it often happened that the best athletes, and not only from Kazakhstan, played for other Union republics. However, in order