Fact #159532
When:
Short story:
Elton John proposes to German recording engineer Renate Blauel again, in the Mayur Indian Restaurant, Sydney, Australia, Oceania.
Full article:
Patti Mostyn ( Australian publicist to Elton John) : When Elton had finished recording in Montserrat, he came out here for a tour, but there was still some mixing and overdubbing to be done, which he was doing in Sydney.
Gary Clarke : While Renate and Elton worked in the studios, I ran various errands, including procuring cocaine.
Elton John : She knew I had boyfriends in the past, of course… She wasn't calculated in the least. She wasn't someone who was thinking, ‘I'm going to change this person.’ She just loved me and I thought I'd give it a whirl…
Patti Mostyn : The Friday evening before the wedding, I'd made a dinner reservation for Elton at Mayur's Indian restaurant in the MLC Centre. "Make it for two," he said, and I, of course, thought I was the other person. It wasn't that silly an assumption as we, the tour group, all tended to dine together every night in one form or another.
Anyway, I rang his PA, Bob Halley, telling him, "I've made Elton's dinner booking for this evening. What time is he picking me up?Well, he's not," came the swift response. "He's taking Renate.Who's Renate?" I asked, quite puzzled. I'd never heard of her. I was quickly told she'd worked on the recording of the Breaking Hearts album on the Caribbean island of Montserrat. She was in Australia to do some remixes or something. I didn't think any more about it.
I went out to dinner with John Reid, who was Elton's manager at the time, and then we all met back at the Sebel later that night.
Debu Benerjee (owner, Mayur restaurant) : It was very romantic. I could see they were in love. We put them at a corner table and had some nice sitar music wafting softly over them. Perhaps that is what did it.
They ordered tandoori chicken, beef curry, kebab and pilau rice and poppadums. They seemed totally preoccupied with each other. Mr Elton John didn't even notice another diner who came up to the table to ask for his autograph. The lady with him was very beautiful, and dressed in a beige-coloured dress. I couldn't hear the conversation, but it was obvious they were discussing something very serious. He kept reaching over and touching her hand. Then, when the meal was over, they sat back and smiled at each other a lot over coffee.
Patti Mostyn : They came back to the Sebel Town House just after midnight. I remember he walked in with Renate on his arm, and she was wearing a yellow dress.
Dee Murray (bassist) : I looked up and there they were in the doorway, holding hands. Elton said, 'Guess what, man? I'm engaged.'
Patti Mostyn : The amazing thing was that nobody laughed. I think we were all just stunned. Shocked.
Clive Franks (record producer) : He rang me to say 'I'm getting married to Renate' I was half-asleep and said, 'You're kidding?' It was such a shock.
Kiki Dee : The press somehow got hold of my number and rang to ask if it was true. It was a complete shock. Everyone was taken aback. His friends knew Renate in a professional capacity. She had worked with Elton and, in fact, engineered a track of mine, The Loser Gets To Win. But marriage?
Bernie Taupin (Elton John’s lyricist) : It was unexpected, but it wasn't in the least out of character. I always knew that if Elton suddenly got a bee in his bonnet about wanting a family, it was likely to happen pretty suddenly.
Dee Murray : The jeans and t-shirts we'd always seen Renate in suddenly just went. Suddenly, each time you saw her, it was in another nifty little designer number.
Patti Mostyn : Elton’s PA, Bob Halley, and myself now had just four days to get the whole thing together, but it went amazingly well. We had some unusual problems, like the fact that there simply wasn’t enough Cristal champagne in Sydney for a wedding of that size, so we had to have supplies flown in specially. And we had to get the bride and bridesmaids’ dresses made up over the weekend by a designer in Brisbane. The whole thing ran to about £50,000 in the end.
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Gary Clarke : While Renate and Elton worked in the studios, I ran various errands, including procuring cocaine.
Elton John : She knew I had boyfriends in the past, of course… She wasn't calculated in the least. She wasn't someone who was thinking, ‘I'm going to change this person.’ She just loved me and I thought I'd give it a whirl…
Patti Mostyn : The Friday evening before the wedding, I'd made a dinner reservation for Elton at Mayur's Indian restaurant in the MLC Centre. "Make it for two," he said, and I, of course, thought I was the other person. It wasn't that silly an assumption as we, the tour group, all tended to dine together every night in one form or another.
Anyway, I rang his PA, Bob Halley, telling him, "I've made Elton's dinner booking for this evening. What time is he picking me up?Well, he's not," came the swift response. "He's taking Renate.Who's Renate?" I asked, quite puzzled. I'd never heard of her. I was quickly told she'd worked on the recording of the Breaking Hearts album on the Caribbean island of Montserrat. She was in Australia to do some remixes or something. I didn't think any more about it.
I went out to dinner with John Reid, who was Elton's manager at the time, and then we all met back at the Sebel later that night.
Debu Benerjee (owner, Mayur restaurant) : It was very romantic. I could see they were in love. We put them at a corner table and had some nice sitar music wafting softly over them. Perhaps that is what did it.
They ordered tandoori chicken, beef curry, kebab and pilau rice and poppadums. They seemed totally preoccupied with each other. Mr Elton John didn't even notice another diner who came up to the table to ask for his autograph. The lady with him was very beautiful, and dressed in a beige-coloured dress. I couldn't hear the conversation, but it was obvious they were discussing something very serious. He kept reaching over and touching her hand. Then, when the meal was over, they sat back and smiled at each other a lot over coffee.
Patti Mostyn : They came back to the Sebel Town House just after midnight. I remember he walked in with Renate on his arm, and she was wearing a yellow dress.
Dee Murray (bassist) : I looked up and there they were in the doorway, holding hands. Elton said, 'Guess what, man? I'm engaged.'
Patti Mostyn : The amazing thing was that nobody laughed. I think we were all just stunned. Shocked.
Clive Franks (record producer) : He rang me to say 'I'm getting married to Renate' I was half-asleep and said, 'You're kidding?' It was such a shock.
Kiki Dee : The press somehow got hold of my number and rang to ask if it was true. It was a complete shock. Everyone was taken aback. His friends knew Renate in a professional capacity. She had worked with Elton and, in fact, engineered a track of mine, The Loser Gets To Win. But marriage?
Bernie Taupin (Elton John’s lyricist) : It was unexpected, but it wasn't in the least out of character. I always knew that if Elton suddenly got a bee in his bonnet about wanting a family, it was likely to happen pretty suddenly.
Dee Murray : The jeans and t-shirts we'd always seen Renate in suddenly just went. Suddenly, each time you saw her, it was in another nifty little designer number.
Patti Mostyn : Elton’s PA, Bob Halley, and myself now had just four days to get the whole thing together, but it went amazingly well. We had some unusual problems, like the fact that there simply wasn’t enough Cristal champagne in Sydney for a wedding of that size, so we had to have supplies flown in specially. And we had to get the bride and bridesmaids’ dresses made up over the weekend by a designer in Brisbane. The whole thing ran to about £50,000 in the end.