The $1,000 Monster Meeting Song Award first prize has been taken out by Martin McKenna with his song “Thirty Shillings a Month”.

The judges’ decision was a popular one. “He really nailed the political situation of the time,” was a sentiment expressed by many in the 200 strong audience that had packed the Theatre Royal for the concert of finalists.

Martin McKenna on stage with his railway spikes courtesy Eliza Tree.

Thirty eight songs had been entered, far exceeding the expectations of the organisers. The judging panel shortlisted fourteen of the songs and these were performed in a concert MCed by ABC Centralvic’s Jonathan Ridnell. From Bannit’s explosive opening performance of Bill McAuley’s “Our Rights Democratic” through to Rod Willaton’s “Eighteen Fifty One” performed by Crosswind a wide cross section of musical genres entertained the crowd.

The diversity of musical styles and approaches that have developed from a single starting point was amazing,” said Jan Wositzky, one of the judges. “The challenge was to write the best song about, or based upon, the 1851 Monster Meeting of diggers at Forest Creek. The resulting diversity and concert showcased many, many talented songwriters and musicians.”

Martin McKenna - no time for celebrations.

In his role as patron of the Award noted singer-songwriter Shane Howard performed several of his compositions. Shane also spoke of the challenges of writing historical songs, and offered words of praise and encouragement to the performers who had presented such a wonderful concert.

The winner, Martin McKenna was obviously thrilled with his win. He is a full time farmer and occasional song writer with an interest in the colonial history of Australia. He sometimes sings, usually unaccompanied, at a monthly session at the Trentham Hotel, and other places (if allowed). His great grandfather arrived from Kilkenny, Ireland in the colony of Victoria in September 1854 and headed for the diggings, including Forest Creek, before settling in Kyneton where he had a brewing and malting business. When the land acts were passed in the 1860s he took up land in the Baynton district where Martin and his wife Christine still live and farm.

Second prize went to Northcote’s Frank Jones and Christy Wositzky-Jones for “Father Dear”, and third prize to Eaglehawk’s Jamie Roberts with “The Cards that Fell”. In presenting the winners their cheques, Parks Victoria’s Kate Millar congratulated not only the prize winners, but all the entrants.

The Monster Meeting Song Award gave us a memorable night, one where history was well and truly made!

Footnotes:
Martin McKenna will be performing “Thirty Shillings a Month” at the 2010 Monster Meeting Celebration in Chewton on Wednesday 15 December, along with Frank and Christy’s 2nd prize-winning “Father Dear” and fellow finalist Doug Owen’s “Three Quid for the Privilege”.

Martin McKenna can be heard at the Trentham Hotel on the last Friday of each month (resuming after the Christmas break).
The photos are of Martin on stage, and back at work in the shearing shed.

Monster Meeting Concert this Sunday 5pm at the Theatre Royal

JAN ‘YARN’ WOSITZKY

is a storyteller/musician whose work ranges across the stage, radio, publishing, television documentary, theatre and in schools.  Arriving in 1956 with his Czech-Scots family, Jan has spent a lifetime exploring the ‘new country’, only to find it’s full of very old stories and songs.  In 1971 he bombed out of uni to become a founder of famous Bushwackers Band, and has since roamed far and wide, scripting award-winning documentaries Buwarrala Akarriya- Journey East and Aeroplance Dance; making best-selling books with the likes of Phar Lap’s best friend, Tommy Woodcock, and with Wardaman genius yarn-spinner, Yidumduma Bill Harney; writing songs and theatre, including his solo show Buckley; and producing a series of audio tours, Living Stories of the Goldfields.  Jan has now lived in Castlemaine for thirteen years.  If he doesn’t watch out he’ll be buried here, with his banjo.

DAVID THRUSSELL

is Australian electronic music’s quietest over-achiever.  His band SNOG has an international cult reputation for innovation in electronic/cinematic/sound-scapes, with numerous releases and tours that have invaded the electronic/alternative scene in the Germany, France and the U.S.A.  David has also written scores for six feature films, including ANGST which won the 2000 IF award for best score, has DJ’d at clubs from Castlemaine to New York, and his new short film THE ZIMMER GANG won best short film at the 2010 Melbourne Underground Film Festival.  David lives in Yapeen, from where he runs a record company, OMNI, releasing lost classics of Americana, and indulging his passion for the songwriting of Australian country music grotesquery, Chad Morgan.

CHARLES AFFLECK

is a classically trained pianist and self-taught blues and ragtime guitarist.  Originally from the USA, Charles has been living in the Castlemaine area for most of the last 25 years, playing a significant role in many local productions and bands, including with jazz luminary Steve Murphy and the truly legendary Alan Watson Jazz Band; in theatre as musical director for Jan ‘Yarn’ Wositzky’s Lest We Forget and most recently the wildly popular The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. Charles is also an accompanist and piano teacher, with his own practice (Pentagram Music) and in schools.  In fact, if you hear a kid around town tickling the ivories, there’s a good chance that he or she learnt their chops from Charles.

Shortlisted for the Concert of Finalists:

Doug Owen: Three Quid for the Privilege

Martin McKenna: Thirty Shillings a Month

Colin Fraser: Our Road to Democracy

Jamie Roberts: The Cards That Fell

Mickey Levis & Annie Morabito: More In Our Hearts Than Gold

Patrick Killeen: The Ballad of Forest Creek

Pete Kenyon: Fool’s Gold

Dave Maxwell: Stand Behind The Flag

Rod Willaton: Eighteen Fifty-One

Bill McAuley: Our Rights Democratic

Daniel Keohan: Letter to Bessie

Richard Lewis: We are starting something here

Kimberley Clemens: Me and the Boys

Frank Jones & Christy Wositzky-Jones: Father Dear

Monster Meeting Song Award

Sunday 12 December

&

Monster Meeting Day

Wednesday 15 December

Fie upon pusillanimity!

In 1851, three years before Eureka, on the goldfields at Castlemaine, 15,000 diggers faced down the Victorian Government’s gold license. It was a tax on a digger before he earned a penny. And united under their digger’s flag, the diggers won.

It was called the Monster Meeting of Diggers, and this year the celebrations of this first blow for Australian democracy will be bigger and better than ever, with two great Monster Meeting events in Castlemaine and nearby Chewton.

The Monster Meeting Song Award

Patron & special guest: Shane Howard

Presented by Chewton Domain Society in association with Parks Victoria, the Theatre Royal, Maldon & District Community Bank and ABC Central Victoria..

This song-writing award, for the best songs about or based upon the Monster Meeting of 1851, attracted thirty-eight entries from across Victoria. Now fourteen finalists will compete at the Theatre Royal, Castlemaine, with prizes of $1000, $500 and $250.

We promise a great show. The entries were of a very high standard, many very moving, from professional and amateur songwriters. They range from rock and roll to country, electronic music, folk and contemporary ballads.

The MC will be ABC Central Victoria’s Jonathan Ridnell.

The evening will feature esteemed Australian songwriter, Shane Howard (Goanna Band, Solid Rock and much more), whom we are proud to welcome as Patron of the Monster Meeting Song Award.

Shane’s great-grandfather was arrested at the Eureka Stockade, and he will be singing and talking about the diggers and their fight for the rights we enjoy today.

Details Monster Meeting Song Award

5-8 pm, Sunday 12 December, 2010

Theatre Royal, Castlemaine

$7.50 entry

Bookings: 5472 1196

Monster Meeting Day

Presented by the Chewton Domain Society

Each year a commemoration and celebration of the Monster Meeting takes place on the original site in Chewton, but this year is to be exceptional, with storyteller/ musician Jan ‘Yarn’ Wositzky wrangling an all-star local cast to tell the story of the Monster meeting of 1851.

And, we are proud to report, the event is to be screened internationally on the History Channel, with presenter Tony Robinson (Time Team, Worst Jobs in History, Black Adder) coming to film the day.

So the invitation is extended to everyone to come and ‘be a digger in the throng’. Come dressed period or as you are, to sing, heckle and chant, and to fie against pusillanimity!

The day will have two parts:

The March

We begin with a march from the Red Hill Hotel at Chewton to the Monster Meeting site on Golden Point Rd – a distance of 1.5 kilometres. Bring a replica of the 1851 diggers flag or a banner of your own making. (Get information and ideas at www.monstermeeting.net.)

The Meeting

Then at the site, from a dray, various actors (names to come) will perform splendiferous speeches taken from the 1851 Monster Meeting, the winners of the Song Award will sing, along with men’s choir, the Accafellas and the Maldon Brass Band. Tony Robinson will read an excerpt from Raffaello Carboni’s book The Eureka Stockade. There will be plenty of participation for the crowd.

Politically the Monster Meeting is not a right or left wing issue. It’s about standing up to tyranny and injustice, and for democracy, so we’re expecting people to roll up from ‘all ends of town’, to boo or cheer, wave your flag, chant, sing and celebrate one of Australia’s great historical events that took place in our own back yard.

Details Monster Meeting Day – Wednesday 15 December, 2010

2.30 pm           March from Red Hill Hotel, Chewton

3.45- 4.45 pm         Gathering at Monster Meeting Site

Golden Point Rd, Chewton

Background

The Monster Meeting of 1851

It’s September, 1851. The Argus published a letter from a precocious shepherd, with directions to where gold can be found near the present town of Castlemaine – and so began the world’s greatest alluvial gold rush.

With people deserting their jobs, the Victorian Government instituted a Gold License, a tax, of 30 shillings a month on each digger – whether they found any gold or not. (Imagine how the big mining companies would react to that!)

But the Gold License didn’t work. By December 25,000 diggers were panning the creeks around Castlemaine. In Melbourne, Governor La Trobe can’t find anyone to chop his wood. There’s only two policemen left in Melbourne. So the government moves to double the Gold License.

In defiance, 15,000 diggers meet by Forest Creek, in what is now Chewton, on 15 December. They fly the Diggers Flag, which bears the scales of justice, a pick and a shovel, a kangaroo and emu, and a bundle of sticks.

As one the 15,000 diggers swear that A single twig may be bent or broken, but a bundle together yields not, nor breaks.

It’s called the Monster Meeting of Diggers, based on an old British practice of meeting to monster the government. The diggers send a delegation to Melbourne. The papers report the meeting. Governor La Trobe backs down.

This was three years before Eureka in 1854, and was the first gathering that set a course for democracy in Australia: when ordinary people who didn’t have a vote demanded a say in the laws that governed them.

* * *

Now in 2010 the people of Castlemaine and the Mt Alexander Shire, and especially the people of Chewton, are celebrating and commemorating the Monster Meeting of Diggers with two big events, three days apart.

Media Enquiries

Jan ‘Yarn’ Wositzky (Event producer)

0417 332065

jan@storytellersguide.com.au

John Ellis (Chewton Domain Society)

5472 2892

goldenpoint@aanet.com.au

Thinking of entering the Monster Meeting Song Award but don’t have recording facilities? Click the image for further information.

The Monster Meeting Song Award (MMSA) is a competition for the best songs about or based upon the Monster Meeting at Forest Creek diggings (Chewton, Castlemaine), on 15 December 1851. Click here to download the entry form.

Play MP3: ABC Central Vic Monster Meeting

Prizes are:

1st $1000
2nd $500
3rd $250