John Farnham’s wife Jill has given a visceral health update on the Australian music legend, detailing the 12-hour long mouth surgery he underwent to fight cancer.
The famously private partner of the showman, 75, penned two chapters in his memoir The Voice Inside, sharing a tell-all of his harrowing cancer battle.
Jill, who has been married to Farnham for more than 50 years, set the record straight on what exactly doctors took from the chart topper’s face and whether he’ll sing again.
‘I don’t know if John will sing again. It just depends,’ she confessed in the book.
‘Because of the radiation, that whole side of his face is rock hard. The flesh, the muscle, the tendons, none of it is supple.’
Jill went on to say that surgeons are currently ‘working out how to loosen it all’, adding that Farnham is ‘disappointed’ that he ‘may not be up on stage again’.
She then added: ‘And, just for the record, they didn’t take his jaw.’
Jill explained doctors took scrapings from Farnham’s jaw bone to test if cancer had infected the bone, but later discovered it hadn’t.
John Farnham’s wife Jill (left) has given a visceral health update on the Australian music legend, 75, (right) detailing the 12-hour long mouth surgery he underwent to fight cancer
The hitmaker has ‘still got his bottom jaw, even though the radiation has messed that up a little bit’.
It comes after Farnham’s manager opened up about whether the iconic Australian singer will ever perform again following his brutal mouth cancer battle.
Farnham’s manager Gaynor Wheatley and documentary maker Poppy Stockell sat down with Waleed Aly on The Project to talk about the singer’s new memoir, The Voice Inside, and asked the question on everyone’s lips: ‘Is he going to sing publicly again?’
‘He’s a singer,’ replied Wheatley.
The famously private partner of the showman penned two chapters in his memoir The Voice Inside, sharing a tell-all of his harrowing cancer battle
‘I know when he got back in the studio doing the audiobook, he was like, “I want to get back, I want to go back.”‘
‘Whether he’ll perform again, I don’t know. But I’d certainly want to get him back in the studio.’
However, in a recently released excerpt from his book, Farnham seemed unsure about his ability to sing again.
‘My facial disfigurement from the surgery means I can’t open my mouth wide enough for a strip of spaghetti, let alone to sing,’ Farnham detailed in an extract published in the Sydney Morning Herald.
‘I can’t get the movement to make the sounds I want to make, that’s where the vibrations and my voice come from. It’s a very disconcerting thing. And trying hurts.’
Jill, who has been married to Farnham for more than 50 years, set the record straight on what exactly doctors took from the chart topper’s face and whether he’ll sing again
He said while he is still not yet able to belt out his trademark voice, he still has high hopes that he will one day be able to sing again.
‘I was given a gift and to be able to get out there and affect people in some way was special, I would like to continue doing that. Though I am not putting all my hopes into it, we’ll see,’ he shared.
Farnham also said he believes the tumour came about as a result of his long-term smoking habit, which he eventually managed to kick.
‘Cancer doesn’t discriminate, but as soon as I was told the results, I couldn’t help thinking it was my own fault, I smoked very heavily all my life,’ he said.
‘I don’t know if John will sing again. It just depends. Because of the radiation, that whole side of his face is rock hard. The flesh, the muscle, the tendons, none of it is supple,’ Jill said. John is pictured with son Rob
He said he started smoking at the age of 14 and would do so in secret after his disapproving parents once caught him.
His memoir has been co-written with Poppy Stockell and sees Farnham tell his story in his own words and with his signature humour.
The book, which released on Wednesday, documents Farnham’s early life and stardom growing up in Melbourne in the 1960s, to his comeback 1986 album Whispering Jack.
His voice was heard for the first time since the surgery earlier this month in an extract of Farnham narrating his upcoming memoir.
It comes after Farnham’s manager Gaynor Wheatley (pictured) opened up about whether the iconic Australian singer will ever perform again following his brutal mouth cancer battle
Publisher Hachette Australia released a snippet of the book, with Farnham sounding a little more gravelly than before his marathon 12-hour procedure.
‘I don’t enjoy talking about myself, I really don’t,’ he said in the teaser.
‘Don’t get me wrong, I’m an egomaniac, but dredging up the past is just not something I’ve ever really enjoyed.
‘I’ll try and share as much as I can, but that’s not easy because I’ve never really been that open. I guess there are reasons for that. Reasons for my reluctance.’
