Misheard lyrics and a sentimental playlist

Last Sunday, as we performed my only country song, Crossroads of Love, I allowed myself a sly inward chuckle at the misheard lyric (well, I mishear it): “So I look for directions in the stars high above’’. It’s the kind of misheard line you’d expect of a 70-year-old bloke, but I’m not about to elaborate. This is a family show. My songwriter friend Kelly Cork likes the song; he thinks it is a sin of…

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Tom, Dick, Harry and Paul

Brisbane songwriter Sue Wighton has a zany song about the daft names people give their children, with a droll chorus that starts: ‘Whatever happened to Tom, Dick and Harry?’ It’s a good question. It would never have occurred to me as a song subject, but Sue is an ex-school teacher, so that explains a lot. She will have seen her share of exotic baby names like Joaquin, Griffin, Phoenix, Jasper, Peregrine and Fox. I’m only…

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The FOMM alt-Christmas playlist

The first thing you’ll notice about my carefully curated alt-Christmas playlist is the absence of Six White Boomers and The 12 Days of Christmas. I’ll walk out of the room if someone starts on that tedious epic. I was intending to write a Grinch-like piece this week, but instead decided to share my eclectic view of the world through an alt-Christmas playlist. What set me off on this tangent, dear reader, was making visits to…

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The autoharp, recorders and other rites of spring

As today is ostensibly the first day of Spring, I am cleaning up the music room, starting with a dusty old autoharp. Honestly, I don’t remember where I got it from, I can’t tune it and don’t know how to play the autoharp in the first place. Yet it sits in the bottom of the cupboard, gathering cobwebs. Occasional bursts of enthusiasm about learning to play the instrument have all faded away. Like morning dew,…

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