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Award-winning songwriter Karen Law and her son Murray Law join The Goodwills Trio for concerts in Stanthorpe and Warwick on November 23 and 24.

These concerts were inspired when the two duos travelled to Canberra at Easter for a special concert. Karen and Bob are both winners of the Alistair Hulett Songs for Social Justice award. Nine previous winners lined up for a tribute concert at the National Folk Festival (photo taken backstage)

In August Karen launched her latest CD, Lifeline, in her home town of Nambour. Her son Murray, a Conservatorium graduate, played guitar and sang on the album, which was produced by Michael Fix.

Lifeline is receiving airplay on regional community radio stations throughout Australia.  Karen’s songs have also been aired on Ian McNamara’s Sunday morning radio show.

The Goodwills (Bob and Laurel Wilson) are well known to listeners of Australia all Over with Bob’s original songs often played on the Sunday morning radio show. Expect to hear some old favourites (Big Country Town, Courting the Net) and some newer repertoire from Bob’s extensive catalogue. They are accompanied at both concerts by Brisbane-based fiddle player and harmony singer Helen Rowe.

The first concert is at Eukey Hall, near Stanthorpe, at 7pm on Saturday November 24. Tickets are $15 with children under 16 free. Sunday’s concert is at St Mark’s Anglican Church, Grafton Street Warwick at 2pm.

Tickets for both shows are available at trybooking.com or at the door.

https://www.trybooking.com/events/landing/1302953 Eukey

https://www.trybooking.com/events/landing/1302964 Warwick

We’re launching our 2024 series of Goodwills in the Garden videos with this tribute to Morris dancers, on this important day.

Our latest song is a fairly accurate description of contemporary life in Australia and its moral dilemmas. Bob was inspired to write this after finding an old black and white photo of his grandfather (a stonemason in Bob’s Scottish hometown). The Highland Clearances are mentioned here in the context of the plight of First Australians, homeless people and refugees.

We entered this in the 2024 Alistair Hulett Songs for Social Justice Award, the last time this award will be offered. Bob’s song, When Whitlam Took his Turn at the Wheel, was awarded the prize in 2022.

This year’s awardee is Paddy McHugh for an as-yet unreleased song about Lismore and its disastrous floods (A Hatchet in the Roof). Award coordinator Bob Fagan told the audience at a special National Folk Festival concert on March 30 that 200 songs for social justice had been written and offered to the judges in the 14 years the award has been held. After the concert (when eight of the awardees performed their songs), some audience members commented that some or all of these songs ought to be on a CD (or a download). We second that!

The 2024 concert in the Budawang included songs by Fred Smith, Penelope Swales, Snez, Miguele Heatmole, Tony Eardley, Tripple Effect, Karen Law and The Goodwills. There was also a rousing all-in version of Alistair’s famous song, “The Swaggies”, led by Murray Law and Fred Smith’s band.

To listen to and/or download, follow this link

At our age, you take the chances when they come and that is why we are heading, by invitation, to the National Folk Festival at Easter.

As one of the Alistair Hulett Songs for Social Justice awardees, we have been invited to perform Bob’s song When Whitlam Took His Turn At The Wheel at this year’s festival. The song took out the award in 2022, coinciding with the 50^th anniversary of the Whitlam government’s election.

A special concert is being presented at the National Folk festival as a tribute to the late Alistair Hulett, whose family set up the award. Sadly, it is now coming to an end, with the announcement of the 2024 awardee on Easter Monday.

The Singing for Social Justice Concert will be staged at the Budawang on Saturday March 30 from 10am to 11.20am. Concert organiser John Sutton has eight awardees lined up to perform their winning songs.

Previous winners of the Alistair Hulett songwriting award include Snez, Paddy McHugh, Karen Law, Penelope Swales and Fred Smith.

Alistair Hulett, who died in 2010 aged 58, was a Scottish-born singer-songwriter. He moved with his family to New Zealand and then subsequently to Australia, where he became known as the front man for the folk punk band Roaring Jack.

His best-known songs include He Fades Away (about an asbestos miner), Song of a Drinking Man’s Wife, and a powerful ballad known as The Swaggies. His songs have won awards and been recorded by  well-known folk performers including Roy Bailey, Nancy Kerr and James Fagan, Andy Irvine and June Tabor.

We are quite likely to pop up at open mikes or sessions, so if you are at the National in Canberra this year, come and say g’day.

We launched this song on September 30 and Bob made a slideshow at the weekend. We think it’s an important issue so please, have a listen and a look and share. Bob and Laurel

I decided to write a song about the referendum and had the idea of asking the question: what if we’d had citizens’ referenda about really controversial issues like Iraq and Vietnam? Did we get asked? Eventually the song gets round to talking about Yes23, which ought to be a fait accompli but probably not. The link will take you to Should we say Yes, which is published on our Bandcamp page. You can listen to it a few times before it will ask you for money!

Bob Wilson

We’d no sooner finished our opening set for Fred Smith at Nambour on June 18 when along came an email inviting us to perform at The BUg in July. The Goodwills Trio is the original Goodwills (Bob and Laurel Wilson, original songs, guitar and vocals) plus Helen Rowe on fiddle and vocals.

The New Farm Bowls Club is one of our favourite venues for folk-flavoured music. There’s a good stage, a great sound man, you can order meals and if you want to natter to your mates you can go into the other bar. Perfect arrangement.

The BUg (Brisbane Unplugged Gigs) has been operating under that banner at this venue every Tuesday for many years. All styles of music have had their turn up on that stage, from the full-on Irish song and dance band, Murphy’s Pigs, to solo singer-songwriters.

We (The Goodwills Trio) will perform a set of Bob’s original songs and perhaps a surprise cover (or two). Fiddler and singer Helen Rowe complements and sometimes re-invents our arrangements worked out as a duo over many years. Laurel usually takes lead and if not, then it will be Bob’s ‘wonderful reedy tenor,’ as a reviewer once put it. Bob’s songs such as ‘When Whitlam took his turn at the Wheel’ and the two songs about New Zealand are almost certain to get an airing. Since Giardinetto’s is still down in the Valley, it seems the right place to sing ‘Big Country Town’. And, as Bob rashly promised (on social media), he will be doing a solo spot with his quirky song about a red shirt and a girl in a black dress (‘Dead Man’s Shirt’).

If you are interested, this song was covered by country singer Kalesti Butler on her album Airborne.

The Jar, a high-energy four-piece led by John Logan, will be quite a contrast to our folksy harmonies. As described in the Folk Rag, The Jar play traditional and contemporary Irish, Scottish and Australian music with the occasional pop classic thrown in.

Doors open at 7.00 pm. The music starts with three blackboard acts, followed by The Goodwills (8:15pm), and then The Jar. Admission is $10. New Farm Bowls Club, Brunswick Street opposite New Farm Park.