THE LARRIKINS

The first tour to the Northern mining towns was with LIORA CLAFF, STEVE ELLIS, a WA fiddler named ROGER FISKIN and TONY SUTTOR. GORDON McINTYRE, that fine Scottish-born singer and guitarist, and KATE MALONEY, also a fine singer, joined LIORA CLAFF and TONY SUTTOR and myself for a regional tour and became regular members.

JACK KEVANS, or 'JACKO', as he was usually known, joined the band at it's most important stage. Here was a performer who shared my passion for the old music and knew a lot about it. Jack, probably more than any other musician, helped develop the overall sound of the music. He was particularly skilful in interpreting the dance music and patiently taught the other musicians the main elements of passion and pace. We always shied away from playing anything, songs or tunes, at a fast pace. This set us a step or two away from the cliché bush band image. The dance music the band produced during this period was truly beautiful. Jacko played a piano accordion and the Anglo German concertina. He was a masterful singer and not bad at spruiking poetry. He did a terrific version of Santa Claus In The Bush including an effective musical arrangement.

I remember one West Australian tour we did where we ended up in Roeburn, a sad town if ever there was one. We were playing at the Roeburn Country Golf Club and staying at the local town pub. The town had a large Aboriginal population and, being Larrikins, we decided to meet some of the locals by playing a few tunes in the front bar of the hotel. We were quickly told that the front bar was for Aborigines and we white people had to drink in the back bar. All hell broke loose when we decided to ignore this racist policy. We sensed a dark cloud over the town.

In the afternoon I went to the local Aboriginal housing settlement to record some old singers and was welcomed enthusiastically because of our stance. That night we arrived at the golf club for our performance, which, thankfully, had been pre-sold. Not one black face. We did our set and I guess we must have made some remark about Indigenous rights etc because interval came and we all went out for a breath of fresh air when we saw a line of white eyes, about half the town's sizeable Aboriginal population, lined up along the barbed wire fence of the gold club. This gave us a certain amount of confidence to face the second half but we were glad when the night was over. Next day we heard from Arts Council's boss, Peter Sara that the town's people had complained – and that he supported us 100%.

On that same trip we played a mining town on the edge of a desert. It was stinking hot especially since the locals had set up the stage on the local supermarket loading dock and arranged arc lights everywhere. Every crawling insect in the desert turned out to see The Larrikins (maybe they thought we were the Beatles?). As we tapped our toes we could hear crunch, crunch, crunch, squish and as we tried to sing (all the blokes had beards) the little mites tried valiantly to get into our mouths. They were down our shirts and up our legs. We must have looked a strange sight to the locals who kept our spirits high by singing along and clapping every move.

BOB McINNES, one of my all-time favourite 'Larrikins' also joined the band as fiddler and mandolin player and, with my encouragement, as a singer. CATHIE O'SULLIVAN nee SUMMERHAYES also joined the group around this time bringing her steel-strung Celtic harp, tin whistle and wonderful voice. Cathie had also started to write songs and arrange some Australian poetry for the band. Her 'Cameron Quarterman' and interpretations of Shaw-Neilson were really inspiring and we loved playing them. Cathie went on to release several solo albums on the Larrikin label.

ANDY SAUNDERS performed with the group on and off for a year bringing his repertoire and multi instrument skills. Andy also returned to the group around a decade later for some radio programs and performances.

MAGGIE BLINCO, the well-known actress, became an irregular member of the band when we were developing the Curios of Sydney concert for the Sydney Festival (also broadcast on ABC Sunday Folk). Maggie was best known as the cheeky barmaid in the Paul Hogan feature films. She brought in a fruity approach that ideally suited some of the Sydney-centric songs, especially the music hall songs like 'The Bird On Nelly's Hat' and 'Take Me Up The Harbour'. If we count some of these one-off Larrikin performers I would also need to count in 'temporary Larrikins' JUSTIN MURPHY and PHYL LOBL.

JOHN MORRIS taught guitar and other folk instruments at Folkways for over 15 years and, for his sins, he also appeared as a Larrikin on several concerts including the Festival of Folklife Concert at the Regent Theatre, Sydney.