Melbourne Tour October 2007 - The Last Word

Photos arrived today from Michael Reynolds, a fellow I met at the Brunswick Hotel. He is a very talented guy, can recite CJ Dennis beautifully as well as take really nice live pics.

As promised, I'm posting them. I've reduced the original resolution so they load before the next ice age!

Melbourne Tour October 2007 - Part 4

View from the rooftop of Victoria Hall

Melbourne City Library

This was one of my favourite gigs in a long time. City Library is in the heart of Melbourne (253 Flinders Lane) and every other Friday lunchtime (12:30-1:30pm) they play host to a live musician upstairs in their gallery. It's called Acoustica in the Gallery and is highly regarded as a singer/songwriters dream gig.

The atmosphere is great and I had a wonderful time sans pa, playing my originals to a very appreciative audience of library goers. Also, the staff are just wonderful - nothing was too much trouble and I felt very well cared for.

If you live in Melbourne or are just visiting, I recommend you check this out.


Collingwood Neighbourhood House Workshops

Not particularly well attended but it really didn't matter - I had an awesome time and got to hang out with two of the nicest folks I've met in the community choir movement in Victoria. Jim & Aina were there for all the right reasons and we had a very productive day.

I've since heard back from them and it seems that some of the strategies I offered were appropriate and I'm looking forward to catching up with them again when I'm back in Melbourne in January 08.

The Neighbourhood House is right at the base of one of the housing towers on Hoddle St and is a really great space. I thought Dawn (who books the space to itinerants like me) was wonderful and really easy to work with. Despite the lack of numbers, I will be using it again for sure.


The Whole Gamut Acoustic Music Society

The last gig of the tour was Sunday afternoon, the first really nice day in ages and a taste of the summer to come. It was really great fun and once again at the Brunswick Hotel.

An old friend of mine, Penelope Swales was supposed to be on the bill but was taken off to Canada while on tour in the US. In her stead, Kate Eve (who I haven't seen for almost 20 years!) was first up and her delightful set was warmly received.

Gluefoot (in solo guise of Derek, his guitar and some electronic magic) was also on the bill and I've been playing the new CD "How Bout You Calm Down"since I've been back in Hobart. I really like the whimsical nature of this gentle music with the probing lyrics and confess I've been getting any visitors to my place to listen to it.

Photos from this gig are on their way, courtesy of Michael, a WGAMS regular, who also graced us with a recitation of some CJ Dennis.

Sadly, the WGAMS is going into indefinite recess at the end of 2007 as the two Peters who run it are both busy professionals and needing a break. That means only two more monthly treats of interesting, original acoustic music - unless some enterprising soul/s take on the challenge!

Peter P kindly drove me to the airport after the gig (that's how well these people treat their artists!) and I was a little sad to be flying out but also very tired after a week of pretty frantic activity. It was a great tour and I'm already looking forward to next month in Adelaide and January back in Melbourne.

Melbourne Tour October 2007 - Part 3

An Aside About The Word "Hate"

While I was in Melbourne I was wandering up Swanston Street when my eye was taken by the Green Left mob, selling their paper and trying to get at least some dialogue happening with us passers by.

When I was much younger I used to like badges, particularly ones that were vaguely political but ambiguous and (I think like many of my generation) wore them like my mum wore brooches. I remember a particular favourite was "Social deviants against the bomb". There was a young woman next to a board of badges proclaiming "Howard Hater". Given that we're now at last into the real campaign, I thought it might be time to make a little quiet protest of my own again.

I asked if there was anything else less blatant to which this young woman turned on me and said, "but don't you hate him?"

I replied that I certainly hated what John Howard had done to the country, despise what he represents or how he has no idea what life's like for anyone on a low income - anyone like me. However, I felt that he was probably very sincere in doing what he felt was the right thing for the country. In short, I don't hate the person - I hate the politics.

Somehow, I had committed the great sin.... is the concept of "sin" applicaple to the Demorcratic Socialist Party? A question for another time I think...... in this instance, I dared to not hate the perptrator of so many of the social woes of the past decade.

I suggested that the button "Stop HoWARd" was more my statement, with the letters "stop" and "war" in blood red. I further suggested that the notion of applying a personal hatred at the feet of any individual was perpetuating the very principals that Howard and his government stand for. The very same principals of patriarchal control that have been shoved down our throats for more years than can be counted.

There's more than one song in that.

Somedays I despair of what we - Australians as a nation - have become.

Melbourne Tour October 2007 - Part 2

At Victoria Market

The Good Folk Club

This is a wonderful little weekly event, held at the Brunswick Hotel on Sydney Rd. It's organised by Alicia from The Good Booking Agency (who also organise The Good Country Club at the Edinburgh Castle Hotel). Besides feature acts, every week there's an Open Stage competition that's been attracting some very classy new performers.

I was really pleased to meet Canadian chanteuse Erika Werry, who played the opening spot. She's not only a beautiful singer and a very capable songwriter but a lovely young woman who seems really at home in Melbourne. I hope she can come to Tasmania in the months she has left in Australia, I think a lot of locals here would love what she does.

This was also a great night for me as I got to hook up with my friend and fellow former WPAM member Nick Larkins. He's about to go on the road with The Dan Rumour Band over the Australian summer to promote their new album - after he's completed his assignments for Melbourne Uni!


The Lomond Hotel

Thursday was a spot at The Lomond, an iconic pub at the end of Nicholson St. After a few idyllic warm and windy spring days, the weather broke in a big way and it was a pretty awful night to be going out. Consequently, the rain kept a few away but it was still a nice, intimate gig with Tonchi Tosh and his crew, Matt Earl & MC Jaezed supporting. Tonchi's been in the studio in recent weeks and I'm really looking forward to hearing this latest CD. This fella's got a helluva future ahead of him and is definitely and artist to watch!

Part 3 & 4 to follow and will include more of my photos.

Melbourne Tour October 2007 - Part 1

St George slaying the dragon, outside State Library, Swanston St

A Little About Melbourne

After a week on remote and windswept King Island, arriving in Melbourne is always a bit of a shock. I got to my accommodation (Victoria Hall in Russell St) about 6pm Sunday evening, and felt quite overwhelmed by the number of people wandering around the streets in the CBD. By Monday I was acclimatised and totally engaged in it!

To my eyes, this is a much more European city than Sydney. I lived in Melbourne back in the mid-80's and although it's changed in many respects since then - just as all Australian cities have - in many others it's very much the same. In amongst the steel and glass of homogenised late 20th century architecture, one can find gems like the statue of St George (above) outside the State Library building on the corner of Swanston & LaTrobe Streets, on the edge of the CBD.

The pace of life has always been quite different in Melbourne too. Unlike Sydney, which never seems to stop these days, Melburnians in my experience, work just as hard but are more inclined to stop and relax with just as much intensity. After all, despite the protestations of many interstate fans, this is the home of Australian Rules Football and an institution.

I didn't get a lot of time off while I was there but took a few pics of things that grabbed my fancy. I also managed to catch a great exhibition at the RMIT Gallery in Swanston St, "Living Elvis", celebrating 30 years since the King's earthly demise - brilliant!




The Gigs - Singers Workshop with Sweet Sassafras

Monday afternoon, I got on the Belgrave train and travelled to the end of the line, up in the beautiful Dandenong Ranges. There I was met by the wonderful Deidre, Jennie and Kerrie from Sweet Sassafras Community Choir, ready to run a singing workshop with them that evening. I felt like a princess - treated to cake and coffee beforehand at a wonderful little cafe in Belgrave and a chance to chat and get to know these amazing women a little better. Kerrie was my contact for the choir and frankly, without her the workshop wouldn't have happened - she is a powerhouse of positive energy!

The hall where the choir meet every Monday night is at Sassafras Primary School on the Mt Dandenong Tourist Road. It's big enough to accommodate everyone but small enough to be cosy and a good space to sing in. I had a hoot with these folks, some of whom were attracted by Kerrie's very organic-looking posters and not regular members of the choir. I know some of them joined the choir that night and I wish them all the best in their personal journey of song.

There's a tremendous celebration happening across Victoria at the moment, a resurgence of the power of massed voices and community singing, and many beautiful songs being performed. As a songwriter, I see another strand to this tapestry.

So many times I hear people say "I love that song, gee I wish I could do that" and when I suggest that they can, they close up and say "I can't write songs". Digging a little deeper, it's often the vulnerability that one feels, the sense of exposure that holds us back from taking the quantum leap from interpreting other people's music to composing our own. There is also a very big underlying notion that songwriting is the domain of the individual. What I set out to do with the Sassafras mob was show that it's in all of us and guide them through a very simplistic shared songwriting model.

By the end of the night (a brief two hour session) we had an original harmonised round and a lot of yellow envelopes strewn about with lyrics for future songs that came from the group. It was wonderful and I really look forward to hearing more original work from this choir in the future.

King Island October 07

What a week! I arrived on the island Sunday afternoon, a slightly bumpier intro than I've had on previous trips.

On the ground, King Island was living up to it's name as the place where "Nothing Ever Changes But The Weather". Well, not strictly true. The weather did change every five minutes or so but the kids I was working with had certainly changed. Mostly grown in stature but also in attitude and outlook. The new-found maturity of many of the kids I'd worked with previously was quite beautiful.

In between blowing a gale and being balmy and spring-like, it poured with rain and I wondered if I'd brought enough warm clothes with me! Nevertheless, I didn't have time to think about anything as mundane as being warm for the next seven days as we got into the swing of rehearsals for the KIDHS Theatre Restaurant.

Prior to my arrival the students and staff had chosen a theme for this year - sustainability - and some of the material that they wanted to sing as a choir. Big Yellow Taxi (Counting Crows version) We Are All In This Together (Ben Lee) and I suggested Saltwater (Julian Lennon). With only a week it was a bit impractical to try and develop original work as well as performance skills so we opted for doing covers. The Grade 6 class were also keen to get involved so we developed an arrangement of the Saint Saens melody If I Had Words (with lyrics by Fitzgerald & Keeley).

Everyone seemed a little tentative to start with and I recall feeling a bit panic-stricken around lunchtime Monday, but by the end of school Tuesday everyone seemed to be pulling together better and I knew we'd be ok. The outstanding efforts of staff and students got us all over the line!

It was a shame I couldn't stay for two weeks and perhaps next year we'll organise it better so I can do that, but this time round I had to go to Melbourne to fulfill long-standing engagements for gigs and workshops. In fact, when the students were giving their main performance the following Thursday night, I was playing at the Lomond Hotel in Brunswick! I left messages with staff that afternoon to wish everyone well but I admit it was difficult not being there.

Reports I've had back are that it went very, very well. The theme of sustainability is one that's very close to the hearts of these kids and they worked incredibly hard to develop theatrical and revue-style pieces that would portray what they feel, think and (in some cases) fear. I guess what most of them want is the same as any generation that's come before - a safe, clean and secure world to live in.

All power to them!

Leaving The Island Again
7th October 2007

Notes from King Island

Oh how I love being on tour!

Despite the inconveniences of not having particular books, music (and at present extra woollies!) at my fingertips, there’s something deeply satisfying about being on the road.

One thing is that there’s less decisions that need to be made about what top will I wear today, which automatically leads on to less clothes to wash!

On the down side, I have reason to believe there’s a gremlin that lives in my backpack which swells and slowly takes up more room as the days go by. Moving this morning from Parers Hotel to private accomodation in Currie on windswept King Island, I was shocked by how little space there is in my pack. Of course it has nothing to do with all the extra paperwork I’ve accumulated in four days away – not a bit! At this rate, by the time I’ve finished in Melbourne, I should’ve accumulated enough mass to fill three suitcases.

Perhaps the best part is returning to places that you know are winners and King Island is just that. Despite the wild weather and bumpy ride in on Sunday afternoon, this is one of the most welcoming places I’ve experienced on the planet. I really recommend this island for holiday makers of all ages. This is one of the best places for cheese and beef anywhere I've been in the world.

The reason I’m here of course is to continue work with music and drama students at the district high school. It started for me last year when I came over for a week to run a Writers’ in Schools project. For a very small school, isolated in the far western Bass Strait the results that came from that initial week were mind-boggling and material that came from that was presented as part of Tasmanian Living Writers Week.

As wonderful as that was, it’s been even more rewarding for me to return (this is now my third visit) and see/hear new work from existing students as well as advise new writers, performers and composers. Maintaining contact with students has been a continuing joy for me and I’ve also had a student come to Hobart and stay with me as part of her Year 10 work placement, just so she knows how hard it is to be a jobbing musician! I really look forward to seeing some of these kids in years to come and I’m sure I’ll end up going to their gigs, buting their CD's and generally cheering them on.

Meanwhile, I’m getting ready for next week’s gigs……. Even though first up is a singers’ workshop with Sweet Sassafras up in the Dandenongs. If you’re interested be at the Sassafras Primary School at 7:30pm for a couple of hours of fun and general vocal mayhem!!!

Tuesday night I’m headlining at The Good Folk Club (Brunswick Hotel) with support from Canadian singer/songwriter Erika Werry.

More gigs and workshops throughout next week but full tour dates are on MySpace - http://www.myspace.com/debramanskey

Catch you all soon!