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Festival FL 31690 (mono only). Produced 1965. Main Artists: The Green Hill Singers (Chris Bonett, John
McMillan, Brian Godden, Alex McMillan). Producer: Hal
Saunders. SIDE 1: In Time; Abilene; Julia; All My Trials; Long
Long Road*; Pay Me My Money Down. SIDE 2: Man Is a Dreamer**; Day Into Night; If Love Isn’t
There; Keep My Grave Green; Bon Soir; Up On the Mountain. * Dave Guard (anonymously) on 12-string guitar ** Dave Guard (anonymously) on five-string banjo The Green Hill Singers, originally from
Melbourne, were signed to a 13-week contract on Dave
Guard’s first Australian TV show, Jazz
Meets Folk. The group’s original bassist, Chris
Bonett, left in 1965 to become a member of Dave
Guard’s group on Dave’s Place and
was replaced by Brian Godden,
although both Chris and Brian appear
on this album. Years later, Chris appeared
with Dave in some of his solo performances
in the US. The Greenies’ album was
produced in 1965 after they won the Everybody's
Magazine "Big New Sound" competition in 1964
based on a song that Chris wrote, The
Big Land. This song b/w Twenty Long
Years was their only single for EMI.
They were the first winners of the contest and collected a prize
of £250 ($500) and a contract with Festival Records.
Dave Guard said in a 1964 interview that the Greenies
were “a good group with a good sound” and “could
go a long way now that folk music was rising in popularity”.
This record turned out, however, to be the group’s first and
only album. The Green Hill Singers'
style of polished tight harmonies might be compared to Peter,
Paul and Mary or The Brothers Four. Note the discrepancies between the front and rear of the
jacket in both the album title and group name. The titles
on the front cover are the correct versions. Dave
Guard offered to back the Greenies
on two of the album tracks but was insistent that his appearance
be kept anonymous. This is one of the records where his
performances are relegated more to the background than were his
earlier Australian recordings with Lionel Long.
The five-string banjo is classic Dave Guard,
a little like his Whiskeyhill work on Railroad
Bill, but his piece with the Gibson J200
12-string guitar was not one of his best performances.
RCA 101547 (mono only). Produced 1965. Main Artists: The Tolmen (Gordon Tolman, Geoffrey Turner,
Lewis Jones). Producer: John Devlin. SIDE 1: Don’t Book Me, Officer* SIDE 2: Moonie** * Dave Guard (anonymously) on electric guitar ** Dave Guard (anonymously) on five-string banjo The Tolmen were a Sydney-based
folk group with an affinity for topical local subjects and songs
by Australian writers. A lot of these songs were included
in their repertoire. Musician and friend of
Tolmen were a Sydney-based
folk group with an affinity for topical local subjects and songs
by Australian writers. A lot of these songs were included
in their repertoire. Musician and friend of Dave
Guard, Les Miller,
brought this 45RPM single to attention. Don’t
Book Me, Officer is a satirical MTA-type song about
the introduction of parking meters in Sydney and problems
encountered by a man who gets a ticket for illegal parking.
Moonie, written by the group itself,
celebrates the discovery of oil in the Moonie area of South-West
Queensland in the mid-1960s. Another anonymous recording by
Dave Guard on
electric guitar and Gibson banjo, supported by Les
Miller on Vega long neck banjo and acoustic guitar.
The producer of the record and writer of the “A” side
was former New Zealand/Australian rocker Johnny
Devlin, who toured Australia a year earlier as a
support act for the Beatles and later
worked as A & R Man for RCA Australia.
RCA 20321 (mono only). Produced 1965. Main Artists: The Tolmen (Gordon Tolman, Geoffrey Turner,
Lewis Jones). Producer: John Devlin. SIDE 1: The Sandy Hollow Line*: The Golden
Vanity**. SIDE 2: The Bonny Lass of Fyvie*; The
Voyager's Gallant Men**. * Dave Guard (anonymously) on
five-string banjo ** Dave Guard (anonymously) on 12-string
guitar Like the previous record, Pieces of Folk
came from Les Miller, who again
performed on it anonymously with Dave Guard.
This one was a 45RPM EP of both Australian and traditional folk
songs which followed an Arts Council-sponsored state wide schools
tour of New South Wales by Les and the
group. The choice of Pieces of Folk
came from Les Miller, who again
performed on it anonymously with Dave Guard.
This one was a 45RPM EP of both Australian and traditional folk
songs which followed an Arts Council-sponsored state wide schools
tour of New South Wales by Les and the
group. The choice of The Tolmen
for this tour was surrounded by some controversy. They are
mentioned in Charles Higham's article "The Folk People"
(Bulletin, 14th November, 1964). Higham
notes that The Tolmen, like Lionel
Long, had "enjoyed considerable success outside
the coffee shops" and as a consequence had been generally
attacked by purists as "commercial”. Higham said
that the group was asked not to sing its song 'Eureka Stockade' (about
a famous Victorian gold miners’ rebellion in December 1854)
on the schools tour because of the supposed association of the
name 'Eureka' with the communist youth movement. Geoff
Turner, spokesman for The Tolmen,
stated: "We're not political, whatever they say about the
Eureka song, and we're not bearers of culture, we're entertainers.
It's no good expecting folksingers to be philosophers. It's
like asking Elvis to conduct a chamber orchestra". Critics
claimed that The Tolmen had apparently
been chosen by the Arts Council because of their resemblance to The
Kingston Trio. In fact, its sound was more
akin to that of the early satirical style of the Chad
Mitchell Trio. The group had made one earlier
EP, Namatjira ( Chad
Mitchell Trio. The group had made one earlier
EP, Namatjira ( Chad
Mitchell Trio. The group had made one earlier
EP, Namatjira (RCA 20312). Les Miller played acoustic 6 string guitar
and open back long-necked Vega five-string banjo, while Dave
played closed-back Gibson RB250 Mastertone banjo and Gibson J200
12-string guitar. It is interesting to spot the different banjo
styles of the two backing players on the opening track, where Dave
Guard’s contribution is reminiscent of his
banjo work on the Kingston Trio’s Blue Eyed Gal.
RCA SL101676 (stereo) L101676 (mono). Produced 1965. Main Artist: Tina Date, with Ed Gaston, Edgar McGregor,
Francis Lehman, Herbie Marks and “Dynamite” Finkelstein.
Musical arrangements by Tina Date and Andy Sundstrom. Producer:
Ron Wills. SIDE 1: The Spinning Wheel; It's Hard On a Lass To Be
Lonely; The Old Maid’s Song; L'ariette; Polly Garter's Song;
A Single Girl*. SIDE 2: The Raggle Taggle Gypsies*; The First Time
Ever; The Butcher Boy; How Should I My True Love Know and
Tomorrow Is St. Valentine's Day (from Shakespeare's Hamlet); It
Fell On a Summer's Day; Tomorrow Is a Long Time. * “Dynamite” Finkelstein on five-string banjo Tina Date grew up in
Melbourne and originally studied piano music at the
Conservatorium. Her first notable folk singing appearances were
at the Emerald Hill Folk and Jazz Concerts
in the early 1960s. She moved to Sydney and became a
regular performer at the Troubadour, Folk Terrace, Last
Straw and Copperfield folk clubs.
She appeared on TV and at the Newport (Sydney)
Folk Festival, and in a stage presentation Bill
Meets Bob with Sydney folk notables Danny
Spooner and Sean and Sonja. This
show combined Dylan songs with Shakespearean songs. Date
made the cover of the Bulletin magazine in
November 1964 and in 1970s took up a job with the United Nations
in New York, where she now lives. She played a couple of
notable gigs at Gerde's Folk City and the
Gaslight. It has been suggested that Tina
Date was the inspiration for the Phil Ochs
song “Changes”. This was
Tina Date’s
only LP. She chose a series of songs which revolved around
the album’s central theme of “a single girl’.
A 7” 45 record, A Single Girl/Spinning Wheel
(RCA 101700) was later released from the album. A heavy-sounding blues-influenced banjo
is used behind the title song by
“Dynamite”
Finkelstein, making for interesting comparison with
the earlier Mary Travers version. The
banjo is again unusually and effectively combined with the
balalaika, played by Danish musical notable Andy
Sundstrom, on The Raggle Taggle Gypsies.
Andy appeared under the alias Edgar
McGregor, a combination of the names of two Australian
arts critics of the time, Edgar Waters and Craig McGregor. Before
he left Australia for Copenhagen later in 1965 Andy
visited Dave Guard at Whale Beach and after
a day-long conversation talking about music, guitar technique,
the Lydian scale and his plans for colour guitar, promised to
keep in touch and persuaded Dave to accept
his spare balalaika for his “vast collection of musical
instruments”.
RCA Camden CAMS-127 (stereo) CAM-127 (mono). Produced
1966. Main Artists: The Twiliters (Gregg
Ferris, Kerry White, Jim Maguire), with Ed Gaston (bass). Producer:
Ron Wills. SIDE 1: Mary, Don’t You Weep;
Boy Child; The Wagoner’s Lad; Bethlehem; Thanks for the Hand
to Hold; Whisky in the Jar*. SIDE 2: Go Where You Want to Go; The
Wanderer; Kentucky*; Hurry Sundown; Great Day; Green Green. * Dave Guard (anonymously) on five-string
banjo One listen to the impressive banjo work
on Merle Travis’ Kentucky (more familiar as Kentucky Means
Paradise) leaves little doubt about who is playing. The
picking on this track is one of the best Dave Guard breaks found
in the course of the project. It shows that Dave was
capable of much more than was evident on his previous American
recordings, a point made by musicians who worked with him in
Australia. Dave’s backing for Whisky in the Jar was
relaxed but unexceptional. The Twiliters (referred-to by fans as
the “Twits”) were based in Sydney but the members came
from South Australia, Tasmania and Ireland. Using 12-string
and six-string guitars, the Twiliters made two appearances on Dave’s
Place in 1965 and recorded two albums in 1966, the first being
the Twiliters in Concert (RCA Camden CAM/S 117), recorded at the
University of Sydney and the University of New South Wales.
The second was this studio album, which had a lot more production
behind it. The album’s title song was also the theme
from Dave’s Place. On both albums the group was backed
on double bass by long-standing ex-patriate American jazzman Ed
Gaston. The Twiliters entertained troops
serving in Vietnam and, like the Tolmen in the year before them,
made an Arts Council sponsored schools tour of New South Wales.
This album featured the popular John Phillips song that the Twiliters
gave the ‘grammatically correct’ title of Go Where You
Want to Go, symbolically linking the music of the folk era and
the sixties pop culture. The Twiliters later had their own TV
show, Good Grief, It’s the
Twiliters, and recorded two more
EPs and a few singles based on Australiana and topical issues.
Gregg Ferris suffered an early death from natural causes and Kerry
White passed away, also from natural causes, only a few years ago.
The remaining member, Irish-born Jim Maguire, completed his
medical studies and is now a consultant psychiatrist in Sydney.
RCA 101688 (mono
only). Produced 1966. Main Artists: The
Twiliters (Gregg Ferris, Kerry White, Jim Maguire) * Dave Guard (anonymously)
on 5-string banjo ** Dave Guard (anonymously)
on tambourine Information from
surviving Twiliter Jim Maguire
is that the group rehearsed these songs at Dave’s
Whale Beach home prior to the studio session and were quite
bemused that the “great Dave Guard”
was tapping a tambourine on their record.
Dave
played fast-paced 5-string banjo on the “A” side of the
single, rounded off by a few notes of “Yankee Doodle”,
and simply hit a tambourine in the background on the “B”
side. The existence of
Dave’s
minor contribution to the “B” side of this single
provides a clue that may partly explain the discrepancy between
the number of confirmed Dave Guard
Australian recordings and the figure mentioned by him 20 years
later.
Dismal Currency
satirically celebrates the introduction of decimal currency to
Australia on 14th February 1966 and was
released to coincide with that historic event. The old
system of pounds, shillings and pence disappeared and was
replaced by dollars and cents and an adventurous series of
banknotes in various striking colours and designs that were
sometimes jokingly referred-to as “monopoly money”.
Creamsleeves was originally recorded on the Twiliters’
first live album but this was a later studio version. It is
another satire, this time about the popular Greensleeves-playing
Mr. Whippy mobile ice cream vans of the 1960’s and suggests
removing them from the country to use as tanks in the jungles of
Vietnam. |
  
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ACKNOWLEGEMENTS AND COPYRIGHT NOTICE Researcher of Dave Guard’s Australian musical work,
Ken Bradshaw, prepared this original article between
July, 2000 and March, 2001 from personal knowledge, library
research and contact with people who knew and worked with Dave
Guard in Australia. Very special thanks is due
to Les Miller, Malcolm Turnbull, Doug Ashdown, Chris
Bonett, John McMillan, Andy Sundstrom, Ron Wills, Jim Maguire,
Gary Shearston and Gretchen Ballard Guard for
their help. Appreciation is expressed also to
Dave
Baxter and Bill Robertson (formerly
of EMI Australia), Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Archives and Screensound Australia.
The recordings that Dave Guard made
in Australia in the 1960s which are listed on this page are
preserved in the National Screen and Sound Archive
(Screensound) http://www.screensound.gov.au/index.html
at Canberra Dave Guard made
in Australia in the 1960s which are listed on this page are
preserved in the National Screen and Sound Archive
(Screensound) http://www.screensound.gov.au/index.html
at Canberra. Arrangements can usually be made with Screensound
to audition the recordings it holds either at Canberra or through
access centres at most Australian State capital cities. The text is the property of Ken
Bradshaw and excerpts may be used only for
non-commercial purposes with appropriate acknowledgment of the
source. Ken
Bradshaw and excerpts may be used only for
non-commercial purposes with appropriate acknowledgment of the
source. Copyright ownership of the record jacket images in the article lies with the respective companies. The image of the Harbor Singers is the property of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and is subject to ABC copyright conditions. |
THE
FOLK SOUND OF THE GREEN HILL SINGERS
PIECES
OF FOLK
A SINGLE
GIRL
DISMAL
CURRENCY* / CREAMSLEEVES**