Summary: Australia has a long tradition of country music, which has developed a style quite distinct from its US counterpart, influenced by English, Irish and Scottish folk ballads and by the traditions of Australian bush balladeers like Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson.
BIOGRAPHICAL DETAILS
Description: Australian bush balladeers, as well as by popular American country music.
Known For: A part of the music of Australia.
Music Styles: Country
Location: Australia
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BIOGRAPHICAL PROFILE
Australian country music
Australian country music is a part of the music of Australia.
There is a broad range of styles, from bluegrass, to yodelling to folk to the more popular.
The genre has been influenced by Celtic and English folk music, by the traditions of Australian bush balladeers, as well as by popular American country music.
Themes include: outback life, the lives of stockmen, truckers and outlaws, songs of romance and of political protest; and songs about the “beauty and the terror” of the Australian bush.
Notable musicians include: Slim Dusty, Joy McKean, Olivia Newton-John, John Williamson, Keith Urban, Lee Kernaghan and Kasey Chambers. Others influenced by the genre include Nick Cave and Paul Kelly.
Popular songs include:
Waltzing Matilda (1895)
Pub With No Beer (1957)
Lights on the Hill (1973)
I Honestly Love You (1974)
True Blue (1981)
Not Pretty Enough (2002)
Australia has a long tradition of country music, which has developed a style quite distinct from its US counterpart, influenced by English, Irish and Scottish folk ballads and by the traditions of Australian bush balladeers like Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson. Country instruments, including the guitar, banjo, fiddle and harmonica create the distinctive sound of country music in Australia and accompany songs with strong storyline and memorable chorus and lyrics.
Exemplars of the traditional bush ballad style include Slim Dusty’s “When the Rain Tumbles Down in July” or “Leave Him in the Long yard” which have strong narrative in verses plus choruses set to a Pick n’ Strum beat.
Contemporary bush ballads may employ finger picking and strumming rock styles as in Lee Kernaghan’s later version of Leave Him in the Longyard, or in Keith Urban reworking of the Slim Dusty/Joy McKean classic “Lights on the Hill”.
Early Bush Music:
The distinctive themes and origins of Australia’s bush music can be traced to the songs sung by the convicts who were sent to Australia during the early period of the British colonisation, beginning in 1788.
Early Australian ballads sing of the harsh ways of life of the epoch and of such people and events as bushrangers, swagmen, drovers, stockmen and shearers. Convict and bushranger verses often railed against government tyranny.
Classic bush songs on such themes include: The Wild Colonial Boy, Click Go The Shears, The Eumeralla Shore, The Drover’s Dream, The Queensland Drover, The Dying Stockman and Moreton Bay.
Pioneers of a more Americanised popular country music in Australia included Tex Morton (known as The Father of Australian Country Music) in the 1930s and other early stars like Buddy Williams, Shirley Thoms and Smoky Dawson. In 1952, Dawson began a radio show, and went on to national stardom as a singing cowboy of radio, tv and film.
Slim Dusty (1927–2003) was known as the King of Australian Country Music, and helped to popularise the Australian bush ballad.
His successful career spanned almost six decades and his 1957 hit “A Pub With No Beer” was the biggest-selling record by an Australian to that time, the first Australian single to go gold, and the first and only 78 rpm record to be awarded a gold disc.
Dusty remains Australia’s most successful and prolific performer, and won more Gold and Platinum albums than any other Australian artist.
The Tamworth Country Music Festival began in 1973 and now attracts up to a 100,000 visitors annually.
In 1974, Olivia Newton-John received the Country Music Association’s Top Female Vocalist award in the USA, despite protest from American country purists. Her popular hits have included I Honestly Love You and Tenterfield Saddler by Australian singer-songwriter Peter Allen.
Country music has been particularly popular among the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
In the United States, Australian country music stars including Sherrié Austin and Keith Urban have attained great success.
In 1991, Urban released a self-titled debut album Keith Urban and charted four singles in Australia before moving to the United States in 1992 going on to chart more than fifteen singles on the U.S. country charts, including ten Number Ones.
Recording artists, entertainers and musicians:
Paul Costa
8 Ball Aitken
Johnny Ashcroft
Sherrie Austin
James Blundell
Adam Brand
Catherine Britt
Kev Carmody
Kelly Cooper
Troy Cassar-Daley
Kasey Chambers
Graeme Connors
Tracy Coster
Smoky Dawson
Shea Fisher
Steve Forde
Adam Harvey
Wayne Horsburgh
Jedd Hughes
Gina Jeffries
Gay Kayler
Lee Kernaghan
Anne Kirkpatrick
The Legarde Twins
Reg Lindsay
Jimmy Little
Joy McKean
Chad Morgan
Olivia Newton-John
Shane Nicholson
Jamie O’Neal
Jasmine Rae
Archie Roach
Mary Schneider
Slim Dusty
Sara Storer
Keith Urban
John Williamson
Musical groups:
The Bushwackers (band)
Carter & Carter
The Distance
The Donovans
The Flood
The McClymonts
The Robertson Brothers
The Sunny Cowgirls
Women in Docs
Caroline
Karma County
Redgum
Deep Creek
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