2020 Tamworth Country Music Festival

Late every January, Tamworth holds Australia's biggest Country Music Festival. We love going to Tamworth, especially when the festival is on as we get to catch up with my sister and brother-in-law. January temperatures in Tamworth can be in the high 30's, in fact the first year we came to Tamworth for the festival the tempreture reached a high of 43 degrees one day. We have stayed at Chaffey Dam, but it is a little too far out of town, and we have stayed at the Riverside Park that is open for campers only when the festival is on. This year, we stayed at Paradise Tourist Park mainly because the fees were very reasonable at $40 per night, power and water. Other tourist parks wanted double that, so we were very happy to stay at Paradise.

We had a good site right next to the Peel River, not flowing too well due to the long time drought.

The park had a pool, and we had intended to use the pool, but with so many venues air-conditioned we never got around to it. Another good feature of the park was that it was close to the main central area of the festival.

We chose a cooler day - low 30's 😉 - to walk along Peel Street and watch the many buskers and visited some of the pubs. There are plaques along one side of Peel Street that record the Golden Guitars winners for each year and bronze statues of golden oldies. Here, Slim Dusty and Joy McKean stand proudly by the pedestrian crossing.

...And we always visit Smokey. The metal seat was very very hot!

After walking along Peel Street and Peter visiting the Toyota car area, we headed back to the van park via the Bicentennial Park. In this park are many bronze busts that seems to grow every few years. There are also sandstone statues.....

..... and wooden sculptures. Bicentennial Park is where the free evening concerts are held.

All these, and many more, can be seen any time of the year. The festival is all about the music. There are many free events and many paid for events - at very reasonable prices. We start the day with Writers in the Round at The Services Club Tamworth and a cup of tea, and sometimes a toastie. We have seen and been introduced to the music of many artists at the Services Club. Each morning, from 9am to 11.30am, three artists take turns in performing their own songs, and often tell the story behind the song. This is where we were introduced to 8 Ball Aitken.

.. and the wonderful Michael Waugh - his music travels everywhere with us on our travels (even on our cruises). We tried to get to all of Michael's performances.

This year my favourite newbie (new to me) was Della Harris - check out her song Must Have Been the Wine.

Della Harris, 8 Ball Aitken, Karin Page.

Michael Waugh, Brad Butcher, Col Finlay.

We stayed after the Writers in the Round a couple of days to see the artists performing from 12 noon to 3pm, Col Finlay one day, and Luella Widt on two days. We love Luella.

Her shows are always entertaining.

This year we went to two venues we hadn't been to before, and we will be back at both again next year. Moonshiners Honky Tonk Bar at the Family Pub was a paid show to see Michael Waugh.

We were lucky to get front row seats.

We didn't do a lot of paid shows this year, and other than Michael Waugh at the Honky Tonk, didn't venture too far from the centre of town. Would have liked to go out to the Longyard to see Mick Lindsay, but didn't venue out that far. We did go to another new bar, The Press, not far from the Services Club, to see Michael Waugh. We got there an hour early and saw another two artists before Michael came on, and it was lovely to sit and enjoy the ambience. 'The Press' is located in the basement of a building where the Northern Daily Leader Newspaper was once published. 'The Press' is located 179 Marius St, in The Leader Building. It was built in 1924/25 and the basement was where the printing presses were located. Tamworth's first Newspaper was the Tamworth Weekly Times in 1873.

The Press is designed as as 1920's Speakeasy and has a wall of scotch - I'm in heaven!

All that scotch ...... and I had a chocolate martini 😇 I just really like cocktails!

Anyway we watched the place fill up, and we were pleased we got there early to get good seats.

We also stayed after Michael to watch Dwayne Picklegun.

We had a great time in Tamworth, and will probably be there again next year - especially if my lovely sister is going to be there.

Head Bobbing, Toe Tapping Tamworth

Tamworth Country Music Festival 2017

We first came to Tamworth Music Festival some years ago, and love it. We have never been able to spend more than a few days at the start, due to work commitments, but this year we arrived the first Monday of the festival and stayed until the end. My sister and her husband come most years and it is lovely to catch up with them.

This time we camped (I love saying we go camping, when we have a virtual home on wheels - not really camping shhhhh!), at Riverside Camp Grounds, which is only a campground during the festival.

This is the 45th Country Music Festival, and is the largest festival in the Southern Hemisphere. The festival over the years has launched many famous country music singers, including: Lee Kernaghan, James Blundell, Keith Urban, Gina Jefferys, Beccy Cole, Tanya Self, Travis Collins, Bob Corbett, and Kaylee Bell.

The festival runs over 10 days and many of the venues are free. There is an official guide that can be purchased for $10, and includes a CD of country music. Many of the Tamworth clubs also offer temporary membership for the duration of the festival, which allows the member to get discounts on food and drinks.

 Most of the performances are free, either in clubs or stages around the town.

My sister shouted us to Songhouse at the Services Club on the day we arrived. Great performances by Kevin Bennett, Imogen Clark, Harry Hooney, and Fanny Lumsden.

Kevin Bennett was nominated 5 Golden Guitar Awards, and Fanny Lumsden was nominated for 3.

 We started each day at the Services Club to see Writers in the Round. We had breakfast there.

Tuesday we saw Phil and Lana Doublet, 8 Ball Aitken, and Mick Lindsay. All were different and all were good, especially considering it started at 9am.

 Wednesday was Col Finlay (reminded me of Jimmy Barnes), Allan Caswell, and Michael Waugh. Allan Caswell was nominated for 3 awards.

Michael Waugh was nominated for QANTASLink New Talent of the Year.

Thursday morning we saw Billy Bridge, Rebecca Lee Nye and Bobkatz, - so good that I forgot a group photo!

Friday morning, and the last morning, we saw Brad Butcher, Roger Corbett from the Bushwackers, and Emily Joy with Luke Gallagher.

Some days we spent the whole day in the Services Club - had breakfast and lunch there, as well as drinkies 😆🍹.

My sister had said how good Luella was, and boy was she right. Over the week we actually saw three of Luella's shows. She has just so much energy, and the way she sang 'Hallelujah' was so powerful - and that is a song I have never liked, but the way Luella Wildt sang it - WOW!

We also stayed for Col Finlay's band performance after seeing him in the Writers in the Round.

Col had other performers, mostly newcomers, perform during his show. The Dennis Sisters, from Queensland (we saw a lot of Queensland performers) were really good. We actually went to Hungry Jack's to see them perform on Saturday, but they didn't turn up - they were winning the Coca-Cola Batttle of the Bands. Knew they were good.

Another good performer that we saw a lot of was Michael Bryers. He also had Phil Doublet playing in the band the day we saw him at the Services Club.

We did venture to Peel Street and got the obligatory free photos 📷. There were not as many buskers as the last time we came, but still a few good ones and some not so good. Peter had a drive in a Landcruiser Sahara around the Toyota 4WD circuit - I went shopping! It was too hot to stand and watch performers at some of the outside stages, so we mostly opted for inside and air-conditioning.

Saturday night was the Golden Guitar Awards, which sadly is not shown on free to air TV channels - it really should be, with the networks having so many channels each. I opted to watch it live streaming, not ideal as it kept freezing and I had to keep re-loading it.

We had a great time in Tamworth with my sister and brother-in-law, and we caught up with some good friends we hadn't seen for a while. We are now on an adventure with them.