Dive For Your Memory

This blog was written by 2024 John Oxley Library Fellow, John WIllsteed as part of his fellowship project, Dive For Your Memory – Queensland music stories.

I went into the process of interviewing Queensland musicians with a couple of “rules”:

1.      Don’t do too much (or any!) research

2.      Don’t put too much of yourself in it

3.      Don’t make it too much about the music “business”

The proposal to State Library was to interview, on camera, 10-12 Queensland musicians, and talk about what music means to them. Of course, it’s such a broad question. Silly, really.

So, here we are, a year later.

I have interviewed 23 people so far, with another half dozen to go. Around 30 hours of footage to drift through at the moment and probably 8 hours more once we are done. I am slowly editing the footage, to remove my ramblings. I find it hard to step back in the moment, to be in the shadow, but I’m learning. I have relied on the relationships I already have with these people to underpin the direction of the chats. People have told me remarkable things, as well as lots of stuff that has been shared before. This is the nature of public life, that you are constantly re-hashing “who you are” and “why you do what you do”.

In March, at State Library's Research Reveals event, I hope to have edited some small stories from all this. To have discovered, through viewing and editing, the common threads in these people’s lives, in their relationship to music, sound, and the word.

Here is the list so far. If you don’t know them, look them up. You may find music that will speak to you!

Charlie Owen, David Pyle, Graeme Connors, Helen Russell, Irena Luckus, Ivor Hay, John Busby, Kev Carmody, Leah Cotterell, Mick Medew, Patience Hodgson, Peter Oxley, Ralph Tyrell, Robert Davidson, Roger Norris, Sam Cromack, Tex Perkins, Tony Mockeridge, Tim Gaze, Brad Shepherd, Kristin Black and Kellie Lloyd.

And coming up: Roger Knox, Jackie Marshall, Brett Myers, David McCormack, Robert Forster and Ed Kuepper. I’m sure there will be a few more . . .

John Willsteed
2024 John Oxley Library Fellow