He was a pivotal figure in what is now termed "sunshine pop", working with the Association, the Millennium, Sagittarius, Paul Revere and the Raiders, Tommy Roe, Bobby Jameson, Elton John, Gene Clark, Emitt Rhodes, Tandyn Almer, the Beach Boys, and others.

... As it stands, Boettcher — a pop-music producer whose heyday was the late '60s — now survives in rock history mostly as a liner-note credit.

[2] Boettcher entered the University of Minnesota in fall 1962, where in 1963 he formed the folk quartet The GoldeBriars with the Holmberg sisters, Dotti and Sheri, and Ron Neilsson.

Under the guidance of recording producer Bob Morgan, the vocals were mixed upfront and enriched by double-tracking to sound like six voices.

According to music historian Joseph Lanza, the GoldeBriars' material tended to follow the standard folk formula of songs such as "Shenandoah", but "acoustically, their style blended the homespun and the sugarspun.

Morgan, quoted in Lanza's Vanilla Pop, said that Boettcher's childhood as a navy brat influenced songs like "Haiku" on the album Straight Ahead!.

[3] Bobb Goldsteinn, an accomplished songwriter (who wrote the 1963 folk-dixie hit "Washington Square" for the Village Stompers), became "Boettcher's manager [and] confidant[e]", as well as lyricist for some GoldeBriars songs.

[6] Following the demise of The GoldeBriars, Boettcher moved into production and songwriting work for others, including Lee Mallory and The Association.

"[9] As a result of this dispute, despite his valuable contributions to the debut album's commercial breakthrough, Boettcher was prevented from continuing as the band's producer.

The quartet recorded an album's worth of material, but other than two songs on a 1967 Warner Bros. 45 rpm single, the sessions remained unreleased until 2001.

Usher in later years insisted that Boettcher influenced Brian Wilson during the development of the Beach Boys' perennial album Pet Sounds (1966), leading him to "abandon surfing music.

"[13] Usher's statements are contradicted by session date logs and contemporary publications, wherein band members suggested to news publishers that they were looking beyond the confinements of surf rock as early as November 1964.

In 1967 he enlisted Boettcher to collaborate on a personal project, a studio band called Sagittarius, under whose name he had produced a single, "My World Fell Down", which became a minor hit.

(It was sung by Glen Campbell, who at the time was working as a session musician in Los Angeles, with Bruce Johnston of the Beach Boys on backing vocals.)

A second single, "Hotel Indiscreet", recorded with Boettcher (and featuring a comedic non sequitur by the Firesign Theater), was released, but it failed to chart.

In 1967 he assembled a group of musicians and songwriters with whom he had previously worked or personally knew (including Sandy Salisbury, Lee Mallory, Joey Stec, and Michael Fennelly), as well as some top Los Angeles session musicians, and started recording an album under the group moniker The Millennium.

The group staged a few live performances in Los Angeles, but the difficulty of replicating the album in concert posed a large enough challenge to dissuade Boettcher from sustaining the band.

Among other Boettcher productions remaining unreleased are sessions for Twice Nicely, guitarist Waddy Wachtel and singer Judy Pulver (co-writers of "Malachi Star", a song on Boettcher's 1973 solo album), a single for (My Three Sons actor) Don Grady of the band Yellow Balloon, and sessions produced with Gary Usher of a guitar duo called Tom and Dick.

It was a continuation of the direction that the Millennium had taken with their unreleased post-Begin recordings, being a collection of songs with country, sunshine pop, arena rock, and folk stylings.

He also contributed backing vocals to recordings by Tanya Tucker, Helen Reddy,[19] Eric Carmen[20] and Dennis Wilson.

[10] He also produced their 1983 version of "Walk Away Renee," which was included on a Radio Shack promotional album by Mike Love and Dean Torrence entitled Rock & Roll City.

His former wife claimed that a blood vessel was clipped in his lung during a biopsy, and the medical staff, fearful of his HIV-positive status, avoided Boettcher while he bled out.

[23] Shortly before his death, he set up the Valley Center Studios with musician Mark Antaky and engineer Dave Jenkins.

Sorrentino's recording of "You Know I've Found a Way" (co-written by Boettcher and Lee Mallory) was used as the soundtrack for the trailer of Rik Cordero's film Starla.