A bit about the Roaring Forties
The Roaring Forties about a bitt (nautical joke)
The Roaring Forties have three CDs to their credit, Hazard, Hardship and Damned Little Pay - a 23 track recording of traditional sea songs and shanties, Shore Leave which has 17 tracks (reflecting a brief departure from the subject of the sea) ranging from the bitter-sweet Lady of Autumn to the sombre Shallow Brown; from pagan ritual in The Magpie to political satire, They're Taking it Away; from the industrial weight of Cleveland Steel to the whimsical Waltzing With Bears. Their latest album, Life of Brine is a collection of 23 sea shanties - 11 of which are Australian or have an Australian connection.
The Forties have performed frequently at the Australian National Maritime Museum, the National Folk Festival, Majors Creek Music Festival, the Loaded Dog Folk Club; and have also appeared at Wollombi, Woodford, Port Fairy, Jamberoo Folk Festivals, the Melbourne Acappella Festival and elsewhere.
Enquiries re albums and bookings: Email: The Roaring Forties.
Current embers of the group:
Don Brian: - a singer of traditional Australian songs, a one time member of the Tin Shed Rattlers when he lived in Wagga Wagga, and now a valued member of the Roaring Forties. He is also in a duo with Margaret called Southern Cross Trawlers. www.southerncrosstrawlers.com
Robin Connaughton: resident wit and devilish writer of satirical songs that can make a politician spontaneously combust. Robin Connaughton worked for many years in the NSW steel industry at Newcastle and Wollongong and he and John Warner are currently working on a series of songs about the experience. As expected in the writings of John and Robin - folklore, danger, mischief and ratbaggery are brought into stark contrast with a deeply compassionate look at the industry's impact on its workers and the indigenous inhabitants of the region. When John and Robin perform as a duo they call themselves "Who Shot the Sheriff?" singing tunes, traditional and self-penned songs - mostly with an industrial bent.
Tom Hanson: a great source of songs and the first to put the Roar in the 'Forties - and he's had some real sailing experience - on the Endeavour and the Duyfken.
John Warner: highly regarded for his song writing, with a powerful voice and an inspired way with harmonies. Members of the Roaring Forties have also been involved in performances of Yarri of Wiradjuri, a song and verse cycle written by John Warner concerning the 1852 flood that destroyed the original township of Gundagai . Yarri and other Wiradjuri were instrumental in saving the lives of 49 Europeans, and John's words draw out some implications for reconciliation in the present day. (The full cast involved additional musicians and indigenous singers and dancers). Yarri Of Wiradjuri has now been recorded on CD.
Margaret Walters: a warm, passionate voice, edged with iron, a huge repertoire, a presenter of workshops on topics such as convicts, peace, feisty damsels. Margaret and John have performed and recorded as a duo [Walters & Warner] and have a following in England having performed at folk clubs and festivals there in 1994 and 1998. Margaret is the only member not to sport a beard. She could probably manage after half a dozen face lifts, but it would only be a goatee.
For those with a taste for history:
The Roaring Forties were singing unaccompanied songs when the New Age acappella group members were still in the cradle, having its nucleus in an ad hoc team in the early '80s. They used to assemble a couple of times every year to sing sea shanties, and for a time they laboured under the name The Ensemble of Fat Bearded Shantymen. The Roaring Forties appellation came about in 1988 when they were doing some gigs in the Australian bicentenary year and decided to put out an album of shanties - a cassette called "Hazard, Hardship and Damned Little Pay" - now available on CD. Their more recent recording (1997), Shore Leave is also available on CD.
Past members of the group:
Len Neary, Tony Cochrane, Brian Grayson and Jennifer Lees.
INTRODUCING THE ROARING FORTIES SONG
by Walters and Warner
We're called the Roaring Forties, but we aren't just puff and blow, sir
We sing great songs with choruses, join in them if you know, sir
We've been together, man and girl, for manys the long year, sir
And how we tell each from the rest, you're very soon to hear, sir
Chorus:
And we sing songs of maritime and mayhem, maidens fair and sporty
Old hymns and worksongs and the like, we are the Roaring Forties
A studious fellow, we present, by name Robin Connaughton
Crude, ribald songs of politics, from him we're never short on
On Guinness and his own home brew, he keeps his brains alive, sir
He's never voted Liberal so some neurons still survive, sir
Tom Hanson don't drink Demon Rum, he thinks it wicked stuff, sir,
He just sings lusty sailor songs, all raw and red and rough, sir.
His voice is deeper than a cave, he's vertical and thin, sir,
Observe he has no hair on top, it's all beneath his chin, sir.
This here is Margaret Walters , she's nowt like Margaret Thatcher,
For melody and harmony there's not a one to match her.
Her voice has been compared by some to foaming Guinness ale, sir,
And when she swears her voice would turn a bullock driver pale, sir.
Don Brian joined us recently - a modest, quiet achiever
He whistles up a goodly tune and gives us all a breather
He stirs his coffee with his thumb, ships' logs are common fodder
His wife's a slushy and lots more, and loves her logger lover
And finally, John Warner here, he's cuddly in his socks, sir,
He cobbles up some useful songs, his voice would shatter rocks, sir
Creative inspirations range from Bach to Rudyard Kipling
He plays on instruments large and small, tho' he's not, himself, a stripling
For twenty years we've been around, in one form or another
Singing great songs, some of which you'd not sing to your mother
But lineups change and members go and are no longer
Forty
They still sing, and alas like us, maybe just a little portly
For many years a Forty was a man called Tony Cochrane
A tall, gaunt man with hair aflame, as red as any cockscomb
For looking like a sailor bold, or a pirate of the meanest
Our Tony was the man for sure, the baldest and the leanest
A man of stature and revered round Redfern is Len Neary
For many years a Forty – may his life be long and cheery
We've learned a heap of songs from him – who can forget "Hey Rain!", sir
For chorus songs he is renowned, please join in the refrain, sir
And once there was a fair young maid, her name was Jenny Lees , sir
She barely made the Forties 'cause her bust was 33, sir
Her voice would launch a thousand ships, her figure none surpasses
But keep your head down, for her voice still breaks your crystal glasses
Now in Melbourne is Victoria Railway's Brian Grayson,
He's quite a well proportioned lad, depends which way he's facin'
He sings such sonorous, solemn songs with luscious, languid lyrics,
And him and Robin trading puns reduce us to hysterics.
And now you've met the company, we hope you'll all enjoy us,
We love our songs and want you to join in with every chorus.
And if you wish to take us home, it won't cost you a lot, sir,
We've tapes and CD's you can snuggle up with in your cot, sir.
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