Various Artists, Folk Traditions In Australia (Folk Alliance Australia, 2002)
"Here I am, in New South Wales, Shearing sheep as big as whales" -- Alan Musgrave "Shearing, Shearing, Shearing"
This 2 CD sampler has such a wealth and variety of material on its 41 tracks! Australia, like Canada and America, is an amalgam of cultures, but I suppose I've always thought of Australian folk music as songs about sheep shearing! There are some of these, for instance the great traditional song quoted above. But there are also many really choice pieces with very cosmopolitan roots. Few of these performers are known outside Australia, perhaps the Balkan band Mara! or the veteran concertina player and singer Dave De Hugard.
Mara! are by no means the only euro-musicians here; in all there are eleven with Euro/Balkan origins. La Voce Della Luna, an Italian woman's choir, offers a rich, tambourine-heavy, danceable song called "Tammuriata Nera." Barb Dwers' Macedonian song "Dimna Juda/Rada Pere" is a gurdy-junkie's delight, a little more French than was perhaps intended! Harder to separate from the Anglo-Australian traditions are four Celtic tunes, including an song in Cornish ("Delkiow Syvy") by Carrl Myriad, with dulcimer and interesting male vocals. Even closer geographically is a pretty and very oriental Vietnamese zither tune by Dang-Thao Nguyen.
Several tracks will delight people interested in traditional Australian music. The Gay Charmers Dance band play a bouncy, up-tempo dance tune called Backblock Shearer, and Growling Dogs play a contra-friendly "The Clogs" from Cape Barren Island. Gary Shearston throws a modern, bluesy twist onto the arrangement of "Streets Of Forbes." Ruth Hazelton & Kate Burke sing a lovely a capella duo on "Lovely Nancy." To top it off, Warren Fahey sings about sheep in "The Limejuice Tub"! There are also a few tradition-oriented originals as well. These include a sad song about a girl's horse drafted into World War I, called "Old Nuggett" sung by Penny Davies and Roger Ilott.
These were the highlights for me, but all of the tracks are good and it was hard to choose. Unlike many official samplers, Folk Traditions In Australia is actually for sale. You can find out about it here. It would be a great guide to traditional music in Australia! If you're interested in a different view of "folk" music, the 2000 sampler is entitled Australian Folk 2000 and features original compositions.
