MUSIC HAPPENS

I have lived on the Blue Mountains for thirty years. In that time I have written many songs about the area, its people and history. One of my songs, about the early attempts by Europeans to cross the mountains, was used in a television documentary in the 1980’s.

A few years ago, I was visited by Mike Leyland of The Leyland Brothers documentary fame. He was making a documentary about the early Mountain railways. He filmed me, at the back of my property, singing a song about the railway engineer John Whitton. The documentary was never finished but it was an interesting experience.

Another time, when a song of mine ended up on the cutting room floor, was during the making of a documentary on Mr Eternity, the man who spent much of his life writing the word eternity on the streets of Sydney and its suburbs. I spent the best part of a morning in Sydney being filmed singing my song Mr Eternity and being interviewed. The finished documentary has my head on screen for a few seconds. But like the Leyland documentary, I enjoyed the experience.

Over the years I have continued returning to the Binnaway area. It has been a great source of inspiration for many of my songs. On an early return visit I met up with Alan Chinn, who had a farm near Coonabarabran. As well as singing many traditional Australian songs, Alan was also writing wonderful songs about the area. Our friendship and mutual encouragement of each other’s song writing began then and continues to this day.

My songs have afforded me opportunities to meet some very interesting people. In the early 1970’s I had the good fortune to meet Rev Ted Noffs at The Wayside Chapel in Kings Cross and sing there a number of times. In 1975 Ted kindly invited me to sing a song I had written about the famous Australian aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith, when the latter’s son unveiled a plaque in honour of his father.

I started singing in restaurants in November 1975. I sang every second Friday and Saturday at a Blue Mountains restaurant at Faulconbridge. The following year I sang for a while on a Sunday night at The Brown Horse Inn at Wentworth Falls. It was at this restaurant that, a year or so later, I began singing every Friday evening for a number of years. I also later sang at Cheppys Restaurant at Blaxland on a Saturday evening. In the late 1980’s, when Cheppys changed owners and name, becoming The Mountain Gateway Restaurant, I resumed singing for a few more years until about 1989.

In 1983 I produced, with Tom Christofides, a cassette entitled Mountain Tracks. It contained five of my songs about the Blue Mountains.

In 1992, Ian Jenkins and I released Journey’s End, a cassette containing six of my songs. One of these songs, Towns on the Castlereagh, won the Grenfell Festival of Arts Song Competition that same year. The Henry Lawson Award statuette I received for Song of the Year sits proudly on a shelf in my study.

My songs have been played by Ian McNamara on his ABC radio programme Australia All Over. One song, At Bogan Gate, was included on his CD Macca On Air in 1997. In December of that year I was invited to sing at two concerts organized by Ian.

In the early 1990’s, two children’s Australian history books of mine were published by Jacaranda Press. One was about the first settlement at Sydney Cove, the other about the early crossing of the Blue Mountains by Europeans.

Over the years I have written a number of children’s songs. As well as inspiration and guidance provided by my own two daughters, working as a teacher gave me opportunities to listen to young people and adjust my songs accordingly. I have also had my song From The Days Of The Dinosaur on the ABC CDs Singalong 1998 and Sing-a-long Environmental Songs in 2002.

In 1999 I produced a collection of songs I had recorded between 1991 and 1997. They were on the CD Negatives of Glass.

One project that I love working on, and have done so for many years, has been the adaptation of Jim Harper’s poetry to music. Jim Harper lived in the far north west of New South Wales, in the later part of the nineteenth century through to the middle of last century. He wrote prose and poetry, much of which was never published. It has been a real thrill bringing Harper’s words to life again in song. I recently visited Angledool for the first time.

Another ongoing project, which I never seem to tire of, is the writing of songs and stories about the people and events that made my childhood in North Sydney so memorable.

I also continue to enjoy travelling the back roads of the Australian countryside when I can, finding new stories to present in song. I recently purchased a mini disc to record my music. One of my goals is to return to Angledool and record some of my songs in the derelict School of Arts building.