"I don't think I've ever worked so hard in all my life as I have done over the last 42 years," quips Elkie Brooks from her home in Devon.

Few would argue with her. In her long and illustrious career, the singer has produced some 20 studio albums (with more reaching the top 75 than any other British female artist), sold out the Royal Albert Hall and flogged millions and millions of records.

"You've got to keep going, you've got to keep mobile," says the 67-year-old. And she really means it.

Elkie comes to the Wyllyotts Theatre later this month where she will perform all her favourite hits like Lilac Wine , Sunshine After The Rain , Fool (If You Think It's Over) and Pearl's A Singer .

As well as the 100 or so dates she performs every year, the straight-talking mother-of-two has nearly completed her autobiography, Finding My Voice , has just started a fruit farm ("Just basics at the moment, apples and pears, plums, blueberries, blackberries, very, very English sort of stuff") and can often be spotted paragliding.

Then there's the Aikido, a type of martial art, that Elkie has practised for the last 20 years.

"It's a very devastating martial art if done properly," says Elkie, who, after getting her first dan at the age of 50 and training consistently since then, is now a black belt first dan. "It's about controlling the opposition." I told you few would argue with her.

"The touring is still as gruelling," she says, "you have to have a very high fitness level to be able to go out and sing for two hours. It’s not easy, night after night after night, I have to train for it. But it’s what I do. I sing nearly every day."

Finding My Voice will be a must-read for every Elkie fan.

"I've just basically laid out my emotional, musical journey," she explains - and it’s been quite some journey.

Elkie found her biggest success as a solo artist in the late 1970s and 1980s, after going pro at the age of 15. Her debut was a cover of Etta James's Something's Got a Hold On Me , released on Decca in 1964, and she supported The Beatles at their London Christmas show in the early 1960s, and toured with the likes of the Small Faces and The Animals before forming Vinegar Joe with Pete Gage and Robert Palmer and then going solo in the early 1970s.

She has done a tour almost every year of her solo career and the Guinness Book of Records states Elkie Brooks is the "Best Selling Female Album Artist in the U.K in the Last 30 years".

"I've had to work really really hard, and still am working hard, to get on in this world," she says, "I've been through hell and back but I'm still here!"

  • Elkie Brooks is at Wyllyotts Theatre, Wyllyotts Place, Darkes Lane, Potters Bar on Saturday, September 22 at 8pm. Details: 01707 645005, www.wyllyottstheatre.co.uk