Harry Vanda

Johannes Hendrikus Jacob van den Berg (born 22 March 1946), better known as Harry Vanda, is a Dutch-Australian singer, musician, songwriter and record producer. He is the last surviving member of the 1960s Australian rock band the Easybeats who with fellow member George Young formed the 1970s and 1980s songwriting and record production duo Vanda & Young.

van den Berg is the last surviving member of the Easybeats, as of February 2025, following the death of the band's drummer, Gordon "Snowy" Fleet.

Johannes Hendrikus Jacob van den Berg was born in Voorburg, a town in the Province of South Holland in the Netherlands in 1946. His parents were Henricus Cornelius van den Berg (born 14 September 1923), a mechanic from the Netherlands and Lisa Berg-Warsozk (born 19 September 1924), who was Polish. Harry's parents got married on 9 June 1945. From 1942 to 1945, Henricus was under forced labour under German rule during World War II. Vanda is a second cousin of Swedish ABBA singer Agnetha Fältskog.

Vanda's family migrated to Australia from the Netherlands in 1963, and settled in Sydney. In the same year, he met rhythm guitarist George Young at the Villawood migrant hostel. In 2007, Australian Musician magazine selected this meeting as the most significant event in Australian pop and rock music history.

Vanda, who had been a guitarist with the Hague-based band the Starfighters, came to fame in 1964–65 as the lead guitarist of the Easybeats.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.