Tag Archives: Australia The New Year’s period is a time when we can look back over the recent past and start to make plans for the coming 12 months. As regular visitors to these pages know, I usually escape to the mountains during this time, preferring some quiet contemplation over the noisy drunken revelry that is more common in the […]  One of the many joys of the annual Easter long-weekend Byron Bay Bluesfest in coastal-eastern Australia is having talented performers from around the world brought to our doorstep. Some are musicians we have known and loved much of our lives; others are fresh young faces with edgy new material see:. Sometimes they bring with them music and […]  Easter! In Australia it is Autumn. Easter might include chocolate bilbies (marsupial rabbit-bandicoots) instead of bunnies, but there are plenty of hot-cross buns and chocolate eggs. Because Easter is a long weekend, it is also time for the Byron Bay Bluesfest. First held in 1990 as The East Coast Blues Festival, this annual celebration of music has grown over the years: encompassing music from […]  “Let’s dance! Put on your red shoes and dance the blues…” David Bowie died earlier this month (January 10, 2016). There is no denying his influence over the zeitgeist of the era I grew up in, and the news of his death stunned me like a blow to the solar-plexis. All over the world, tributes have […]  Another year draws to a close… I find that the period of “limbo” between Christmas and New Year is a good time to reflect on the past: on the trials and accomplishments of the year that is finishing. This time in 2014, I wrote: “This last year has been a turbulent one: wars, acts of terror and insanity, […] |
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