The Burke and Wills Festival

The support crew at Port Fairy very kindly arranged for a car to take us the 25kms to Warrnambool station, where we’d get a train into Melbourne central to meet with the bus that would ferry us to the airport where we would pick up the hire car that we’d drive to the Burke & Wills festival in Mia Mia. It was a bit more of a palaver than it should have been because it was a public holiday, but I had a nice rock and roll moment chugging through the streets of Melbourne in a bus with my instruments. Don’t ask me what it was exactly, but I’ve always wanted to see Melbourne and to be there after a great festival on the way to another one was quite a nice feeling.

The drive from Melbourne to the Burke & Wills Festival north of Melbourne was an eye-opener for me.
 
I, like most of Australia and people around the world had watched the news reports in horror and disbelief on the bushfire tragedies in Victoria. It was one thing to watch on TV, but it was quite another to be confronted with the aftermath driving through the Victorian landscape to Andrew Pattison’s winery. No-one said how dry the land is. Parched, brown, dusty grass. At times I likened it to the surface of the moon and this was even before we saw what the fire had done.
 

 
Enormous stretches of blackened trees with orange leaves. It was quite surreal. We had heard reports of a fire headed towards Andrew & Heather’s winery but thankfully the firefighters contained the blaze. Victorians have assured me that once some decent rains fall it’s astonishing how quickly things green up again, and I hope this happens quickly for them.
 
Soon after we arrived a gorgeously healthy dinner was served (by healthy I mean salad, grilled zucchini, roast potatoes & grilled chicken breast, but these were leftovers according to Andrew. It was wonderful!) and Bridget & James Fagan decided to have a photographer snap-off, eg, Bridget took a photo of James while he was taking a photo of Paul & I taking photos of ourselves. Musicians are mental, no explanations are required:
 

 
After witnessing a spectacular sunset and full moon rising simultaneously, we were onstage performing.
 

 

Look closely and you can see the full moon!
 
The only downside to this gig was that Mannie wasn’t with us as he headed back to Brisbane for work earlier that morning. Still, it went pretty well. I have noticed that when we perform my song, ‘Drink Up Me Boys’ the audience tends to become rather teary, so I have now decided that this song requires a disclaimer that tissues may be required.  As we had completely sold out at Port Fairy we unfortunately had no CDs to sell, however Bridget found a lone one buried in her suitcase and Andrew graciously offered to donate his own copy to sell, so we actually sold two. Big thanks to Martin Pearson who manned the merchandise table and sold our two CDs!
 
We then proceeded to have one of the most magical, intimate and memorable evenings I have experienced in a long time. I am giving my personal detailed opinion of each of the performers here, as a broad opinion simply would not do them justice. With glasses of wine, lovely lighting and an audience of 30 or so, I had the absolute pleasure of watching Irish folk singer Enda Kenny, who literally had us all spellbound with his achingly beautiful songs & stunning melodies. His performance was so pure and honest that I decided to buy his albums two songs into his set.
 

 
Enda was ably followed by Nancy Kerr & James Fagan, performing in their element and absolute best form. Nancy’s current songs written while staying in Australia for the past few months are the finest I’ve heard from this incredible duo thus far, and I can’t *wait* to hear the album that captures these. ‘Sweet Peace’ and ‘Queen of the Water’ are still rolling around in my head; testament to Nancy’s songwriting ability and their ability to consistently perform and deliver.
 

 
After Nancy & James was Nano Stern from Chile. There is nothing more endearing for an audience member than watching a talented performer crack jokes and charm the pants off you in your own language. Nano decided to play a softer set than usual and concentrated on beautiful South American folk songs. He may have been singing in Spanish, but we all knew exactly what he was saying. A wonderfully earthy performance by a mesmerising guitarist and singer (who also plays a mean harmonic flute!).
 

 
Martin Pearson rounded the night off by performing songs cabaret style. I had fun watching him – he truly loves to sing, and does a brilliant job. Martin was backed by Alex Legg and Chris Pain, accomplished musicians themselves on guitar and harmonica. The evening progressed into a mad drinking session and telling of odd and peculiar tour stories with more than a few sore heads at breakfast the following morning!
 
We spent the night in Killara, a huge B&B just down the road that Andrew had booked out just for the artists and hit the road the next morning back to Brisbane and the mundane world of phone calls, trash emails, junk mail and preparing for St Pats.

Huge thanks to Andrew and Heather for inviting us to play at this amazing festival, putting us up and generally looking after everyone. It was a fantastic night and we felt so privileged to be a part of it.

Listening to: 'Here & There' by Enda Kenny