woodsmeister’s note – Another great article from Sue Barrett, our Australian correspondent.  This article is posted with permission from Sue Barrett, and all rights are reserved to her.

By Sue Barrett

Heavy traffic, too much traffic/
In your house and on the phone/
In my mind and on the road/
And there’s no time between/
(Kym Pitman, ‘Spaces Between’)

In pursuing sporting glory, athletes build physical fitness, develop technical skills and undertake endless mental rehearsal, in a landscape pitted with injuries, bad luck and the vagaries of form.  And in pursuing artistic creativity, songwriters look to merge words and music into new songs that will withstand personal criticism and public scrutiny, in a life that can be full of “heavy traffic, too much traffic” and with “no time between”.

For some songwriters, their creations emerge year after year, using a “9 to 5” working day routine.  Other songwriters fit song writing into a touring life, writing between gigs or in precious time off the road.  A further group of songwriters has a creativity that co-exists with, and perhaps feeds upon having, another profession.

If you read The New York Times best seller lists, you may well find a novel by Jeffery Deaver – the same Jeffery Deaver who trained as a lawyer and who, as a singer-songwriter, “performed and taught music in clubs in the San Francisco Bay area and Chicago.”

If you attended a gig in Milton, New South Wales in April, you might have got to see Paul Greene – the same Paul Greene who represented Australia in track at the Atlanta Olympic Games.

And if you go to church at First Parish, Cambridge, Massachusetts, you could hear the preachings of Fred Small – the same Fred Small who worked as a lawyer for the Conservation Law Foundation, before becoming a full-time singer-songwriter, then a minister.

FolkBlog now explores the lives of five people for whom song writing is just one of the things they do, five people who are more than a songwriter…

• Emma Royle (Australia) – singer-songwriter/ carpenter
• Deborah Romeyn (Canada) – singer-songwriter/ massage therapist/ high school teacher
• Nedra Johnson (New York City, USA) – singer-songwriter/ multi-instrumentalist/ website designer
• Ana Christensen (Tennessee, USA) – singer-songwriter/ veterinary assistant/ photojournalist
• Vicki Bennett (Australia) – songwriter/ performer/ doctor

EMMA ROYLE (www.theluckywonders.com)

Singer-Songwriter/Carpenter

Australian Emma Royle was born in Canberra and lives on the far north coast of New South Wales. Since forming the roots/pop/folk band, The Lucky Wonders, with Jessie Vintila a year or so ago, Emma and Jessie have both been contributing songs, guitar, ukulele and vocals. The band’s first single ‘Happy Pill’ (2009) reached No.1 on (Australian national radio network) triple j’s Unearthed Roots Charts. Following release of their debut album, Thirteen O’Clock, in March 2010, The Lucky Wonders are currently in the middle of a four-month, forty-show tour across Australia.

What are some of your earliest memories of music?

I grew up in a shack in the bush north of Grafton. We used to drive between there and Sydney quite often to see my Mum. My Dad had one tape – it was Chris de Burgh and included ‘Lady in Red’. He’d just keep flipping it over, all nine hours of the drive. Dad would put on his best crooning for most of that time. I’m surprised I survived.

When and how did you begin writing songs/performing?

The first song I wrote was about Danny and Dina at a dance contest. I was seven or eight. It was quite a story, with a big climax. But I was embarrassed to sing it, because they kissed in the end. In my early twenties I was on an anti-nuke bicycle tour from Darwin to Broome and wrote a few activist songs with my friend, a young guy called Jesse, on guitar. After the tour I ended up working on farms up in Kununurra and I’d belt them out for twelve hours a day. Luckily there was a high turn-over of staff.

It wasn’t until later in my twenties that I started writing and performing seriously. It was never a real intention, but I received such a good response, people had big expectations. It encouraged me to put more energy into my music.

Tell us about your work as a singer-songwriter

I’m lucky to usually co-write with the fabulous Jessie Vintila. We have a great relationship, an amazing creative flow exists between us. I do most of the writing for our band The Lucky Wonders, but there’ll generally come a point where all our songs filter through Jessie and come out sounding like us. It’s amazingly cohesive.

I love songwriting. It’s an easy, natural process for me and I’m quite prolific. I’ve usually got at least a few pots on the boil, it’s more about finding the time to finish cooking them!

What led you to becoming a carpenter?

I come from a family of carpenters and engineers, I think it’s in our blood. I had to be quite determined to enter the trade, as finding a carpentry apprenticeship as a young woman was a challenge. I ended up with an apprenticeship through the Master Builders Association. It’s definitely a tough four years doing an apprenticeship, but rewarding. I was fortunate enough to walk away with about half a dozen awards, including Apprentice of the Year.

Tell us about your work as a carpenter

I do construction carpentry, meaning I build houses from set out to lock-up. I usually work in a small team up in the Northern Rivers area, so we’re nearly always working somewhere beautiful. It has its ups and downs but overall I love it. It has been a far more positive experience than most people expect. I’ve been lucky enough to work with a succession of really great guys.

How do you juggle the demands of having multiple professions?

I’ve had to decide which one comes first. For a while that was carpentry, but the tables have turned, and now it’s the music. I’m generally able to pick and choose when I want to work as a carpenter, which makes it a lot easier.

In what ways do your multiple professions (singer-songwriter/carpenter) complement each other?

Luckily I’ve already got calloused fingers from carpentry! Time management-wise they work well together. The building day’s usually over by four, most gigs don’t start until nine. It’s also great to have something to fund the musical journey. I managed to make a bit of money renovating an investment property, which has covered our recent album and tour, independently. We also have the prettiest tour bus I’m sure anyone’s ever seen. I was able to go the extra mile in the fit-out. Lovely timber benches, modern kitchen, and red polka-dot curtains.

What handyperson tips can you share with us?

It’s worth having a few, basic, quality tools. You’re really making life harder for yourself trying to put in screws with a butter knife. Either that, or have a band with a carpenter, an electrician, and someone under 25 to work all your techie gadgets.

Apart from work, what are some of the other things that fill your life?

I have an eight year old son who lives with me part-time. I also paint, this was my first love. I studied art for three years before turning to carpentry. I did the art for our album except for the dragon pictures that are courtesy of my son. I love bushwalking, I’m excited about some of the great places we get to go on our tour.

What has been happening in your world over the past year? And what is happening over the coming year?

It has been a really busy time. We recorded our debut album Thirteen O‘Clock with ARIA [Australian Recording Industry Association - Australian equivalent of The GRAMMYs] nominee Anthony Lycenko and Ben Franz from The Waifs joined us for the album on bass and lap steel. Since then we found our permanent band [Emma Royle, Jessie Vintila, Brent Calcutt, Anastassijah Scales], who are as good as family now, and booked a 40 date tour. We bought an old school bus and transformed it into Lucy the WonderBus. This year will be about sharing Thirteen O‘Clock with the world and hopefully lining up lots of festival dates for next year, maybe in the US and Canada.

DEBORAH ROMEYN (www.deborahromeyn.com)

Singer-Songwriter/Massage Therapist/High School Teacher

Deborah Romeyn was born and brought up on the Canadian prairies and lives in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Deb’s songs have been recorded by a number of other performers (including Heather Bishop and Jennifer Berezan), included in the National Film Board of Canada film ‘Sandra’s Garden’ (1990) and used in prairie photographer Courtney Milne’s slide-sound presentation ‘Prairie Celebration’. In 1992, astronaut Roberta Bondar (the first Canadian woman in space) played Deb’s song ‘Nothing like the Freedom’ on the space shuttle Discovery. Late November (2008) is Deborah Romeyn’s most recent album.

What are some of your earliest memories of music?

My earliest memory of music was my mother singing in church. She would belt out the songs with great energy and delight, her eyes sparkling and her notes deliriously off key. I remember tucking my face into her wool coat, being embarrassed that she was so loud. She would cradle my head and tell me, “It does not matter how you sing…just that you sing.” I have remembered that all my life and it has given me great comfort when I clearly miss the notes in a performance. My eyes sparkling and my notes deliriously off key…I carry on!

When and how did you begin writing songs/performing?

I began writing songs as poetry when I was very young. I had a piano teacher who always asked me to write my own songs and so began composing on the piano when I was five. I took up the guitar much later. I am a prolific writer and a reluctant performer. I began performing in the early 1980s with the encouragement of Heather Bishop. She was performing some of my material and convinced me I should be doing the work myself. I did my first performance at the Women’s Building in Winnipeg at a conference that featured Jane Rule. Jane was always very supportive of my work. I have always tried to combine music and political work so that people can “hear” a sometimes difficult message through the music.

Tell us about your work as a singer-songwriter

My work as a singer-songwriter is different than one would expect. I do a lot of performances at conferences or workshops where I might only do one or two songs. I do a lot of workshop presentations and often use my music as part of those presentations. I am often asked to write material for a video or a special theme. My most recent work in that area was to write a song for a Gala evening for Cancer Care. Their theme was “Believe” and I wrote a piece called ‘Light a Candle’. It was very well received and the video production by SHAW here in Winnipeg was spectacular. The chorus goes like this:

Light a candle for your sister/
Your neighbor and your friend/
Light a candle for the hope/
That gets you through/
Gives us a reminder what a little light can do/
It’s in our hearts/
And in our hands/
I believe/
It’s in all of you/

Part of my work also involves encouraging young people to write and perform, so I run coffee houses at the high school where I work. I also run a song writing group there and take them to the studio at the end of the year. I do a full show with my producer, Dan Donahue, about once a year.

Tell us about your work as a massage therapist and a school teacher

I became a massage therapist because I had an injury to my hip that was not getting better. A friend booked me an appointment with a massage therapist and bodyworker in Winnipeg named Walter Isaac. In the course of his treatment where he dealt with the soft tissue injury, and the rather strong psychological part of the injury, I realized it was just the mix of practical and creative work for me. Massage therapy is very creative. I work primarily with clients who have received a difficult health diagnosis and we work together to find the “wellness” in the illness. I always say that “Spirit is the Journey and Body is the bus” That is a line from an Australian group called Julaka. It is so true.

I became a teacher because school saved my life as a young person. It was safe, consistent, and gave me my love of all things athletic. I became a physical education teacher and went on to do graduate work in anatomy before taking a job in the public school system. When I retire from teaching next year I will have taught there for 30 years. I have had the good fortune to be able to teach my passion and have developed a course called East West Medicine. I am able to teach about complementary therapies and wellness within a school system structure. I also teach at the Massage Therapy College of Manitoba and have been involved in their program from the start. I see my students as my teachers and have had the opportunity to learn from all of them.

As I am finishing my teaching career in the school system I have joined a group of volunteer teachers who deliver wellness workshops to other teachers. We work on the Primary Prevention Team through The Manitoba Teachers’ Society and it is a pleasure again, to mix my passion for health, healing and wellness with my teaching life. You can bet my music shows up in those workshops.

How do you juggle the demands of having multiple professions?

I juggle the demands of multiple professions by recognizing that my inbox is never empty and it is impossible to make it empty! I try and follow the advice of an Australian definition of Sustainable Development which states: “Enough for all, forever through caring for self, others, and place”. That is such a good definition because it points out the importance of self care in order to influence the entire planet. What a great idea. All teachers know that teaching is a stressful job and in order to flourish we need to become experts at self care. Being good at it, is not enough. I am not perfect at self care, but it is the gateway to my energy for all my work. I get a tremendous energetic boost from all my professions, particularly in the reciprocal exchange of massage and bodywork. If my return on my own investment in these areas was monetary, I would be a billionaire.

In what ways do your multiple professions (singer-songwriter/massage therapist/high school teacher) complement each other?

All my professions are based in my passions and creativity. I love the creative spark that leads me to write. I hear music in my head almost all the time. I think I have hundreds of post-it notes with lines and ideas on them. I am amazed every day by the miracle that is our body and our tremendous capacity to heal. I am awed by the fact that healing does not always mean to get better, but it means an exploration of our true strengths as human beings. I find great humor and energy with my students and they create a perfect mix with my other work. I look at my life and am constantly saying “That’s a great idea for a song!”

What tips for personal wellbeing can you share with us?

In terms of personal wellbeing…self care is number one. We need to learn to be as kind and compassionate with ourselves as we often are with others.

Apart from work, what are some of the other things that fill your life?

Other things that fill my life are my partner of twenty one years (Judy), my gorgeous black labs (Cinder and Abby), our life at the lake where I intend to retire next year, and my continuing exploration of my many valued friendships. I love to do Tai Chi, work out and spend oodles of time in reflection and contemplation in nature. Perfect! A spectacular day for me is to walk the dogs to the sunrise, spend some time windsurfing, work in the garden, play a little music, walk the dogs again to the moon and make sure I’ve booked a tee time for the next day.

What has been happening in your world over the past year? And what is happening over the coming year?

Over the past year I have been recovering from an electrical accident that happened at school. It was quite serious and as a result I had to stop playing my guitar for an extended length of time. I am much better now and am able to play a little more so I am hoping to do more performing in the next year. I have learned a lot about patience and persistence during my recovery, and the importance of setting realistic limits for myself. I was honored to be nominated as a “Woman of Distinction” last year in Health and Wellness for my work with cancer patients and their families. I am hoping to continue to offer workshops that introduce touch based therapies. I hope in this year, my last as a teacher in the school system, to enjoy my students, my colleagues, and get ready for a whole new phase in my life. More music will be a huge part of that I hope. It is all good!

ANA CHRISTENSEN (www.myspace.com/anachristensen)

Singer-Songwriter/Veterinary Assistant/Photojournalist

Ana Christensen was born in the USA, grew up in Papua New Guinea and Australia and now lives in rural Tennessee. While in Australia, she released several solo albums and opened for performers such as Midnight Oil, Crosby Stills and Nash, Crowded House, Loudon Wainwright III and Janis Ian. Ana moved back to the USA in the late 1990s and relocated to Tennessee following the death of her artist/ teacher/ explorer/ photographer/ gardener mother, Rosalie Christensen. Ana is currently is working on a new album.

What are some of your earliest memories of music?

I remember someone singing folk music and playing the guitar – an aunt I think. ‘Little Boxes’ and stuff like that. Then I remember listening to the radio when I was a bit older and I thought all the people were in one place taking turns singing into the radio.

When and how did you begin writing songs/performing?

It began a long time ago! We used to make up stuff and do performances for my mum when we were little. And I started writing complete songs on the guitar when I was about 12 or 13.

Tell us about your work as a singer-songwriter

I used to do music as a career. Now I pretty much write and sing when I feel like it or if there’s something going on in my local community and I get asked to play.

[According to Mark Haldane’s review of Ana’s album, Not All Monkeys Are Right Handed, which appeared in On the Street magazine in November 1994, “Ana Christensen and her band of musical gypsies have produced one of the pleasant surprises of the year…Christensen managed to record Not All Monkeys Are Right Handed with the help of several studios around Sydney – plus the added patience and assistance of several musician friends (including Mark Moffatt and The Venetians/Once Upon A Time’s Tim Powles). The end result is an album which absolutely bursts at the seams with superb songs – and highlights what an under-rated talent Christensen is. Not only does she possess a voice which many would kill for, but she is also capable of writing excellent songs…tracks which stand out are the infectious "Come Away Clean"; the haunting folk-oriented "Shadow"; and the wonderful "Prisoner" – which manages to be both beautiful and yet foreboding…Ms Christensen and friends have produced a work of sheer bliss.”]

What led you to becoming a veterinary assistant/photojournalist?

I had worked part-time for a vet in Australia in my early twenties when I was singing in bars and doing theater. After I moved to Tennessee I got a cat and went to the nearest vet to get her vaccinations and walked out with a job.

I started taking photographs and doing my own developing when I was an artist in Australia. After I left I just took photos out of interest then started to get friends and business colleagues asking me to do specific stuff. When I started gardening and working with animals again, I started doing series and studies.

Tell us about your work as a veterinary assistant/photojournalist

Well I’m a glorified poop scooper really – I work with farm animals and domestic animals. Generally my job is as a support person – I also work on the farm dairy for the same family and look after the newborn calves ’til they’re weened. Hard work – but I love it.

How do you juggle the demands of having multiple professions?

I function better if I don’t do the same thing for too long a period. I enjoy the structure of regular work – I just don’t do the same things five days a week. I mix it up and have full-time work doing part-time jobs.

In what ways do your multiple professions (singer-songwriter/ veterinary assistant/ photojournalist) complement each other?

They’re all things I enjoy and at this point in my life I try to dedicate my time, whether it’s work or not, doing things I like and have a certain level of competency at. I just have to make a living as well.

What photography tips can you share with us?

Take pictures of things you like and know something about.

Apart from work, what are some of the other things that fill your life?

I have two horses, a donkey, two dogs and a cat. Aside from that – dark chocolate and good tea and coffee.

What is happening in your world over the coming year?

Work, work, work.

Is there anything else that you would like to share with us?

Eat your veggies.

NEDRA JOHNSON (www.nedrajohnson.com)

Singer-Songwriter/Multi-Instrumentalist/Website Designer

Nedra Johnson was born and currently resides in New York City. She comes from a musical family, with her mother (Shaen Johnson) a singer-songwriter and her father (Howard Johnson) a multi-instrumentalist jazz musician. In high school, Nedra listened to punk rock (and went to punk shows), listened to Culture Club (a lot) and listened to just about everything else, as well as playing bass in the high school orchestra and tuba in the band. She recalls once going to a punk rock show at CBGB while wearing a Culture Club shirt and then rushing over to Sweet Basil to catch the Gil Evans Orchestra. These days Nedra performs R&B/acoustic/funk (playing bass, sax, tuba, guitar) – internationally at jazz, blues, pride and women’s music festivals as a solo artist, as well as a tuba player/vocalist with her father and his group, Gravity. Following the release of Nedra Johnson’s album, Nedra, in 2005, Nedra won the Outmusic Award for Outstanding New Recording – Female and was nominated for Outmusician of the Year and Outsong of the Year (‘Any Way You Need Her’).

What are some of your earliest memories of music?

My mom was around me more so I think of her and her friends sitting around playing guitars and singing – that was mostly folk songs. I also loved The Jackson 5 and my brother loved The Supremes so we had all that in the house. And I remember going to a Sly and the Family Stone concert in a park in LA. I remember we all jumped when Sly said “Higher!”.

When and how did you begin writing songs/performing?

I started writing songs when I had regular access to a keyboard. Probably in my late teens, early 20s. I kind of played with poetry writing before that, but probably what I was writing was more lyrical than anything then too. Later, the songs that I really began performing started out with bass lines, then I figured out the rest. I often would start singing something and sort of knowing where it was going to go…then writing it down and making changes as they came.

Tell us about your work as a singer-songwriter/multi-instrumentalist

I began performing as a bassist first, getting gigs here and there. I couldn’t really play and sing at the same time very well. I’d done a little background vocal work with Helen Hooke [formerly of The Deadly Nightshade], but it was really hard work to make happen. But I had a friend that I was playing with, also a singer-songwriter, named Dorothy Scott, and she sort of pushed me to figure out some of that with my own songs. And that led to me being able to do more gigs of my own. I also started playing guitar and that made for better chord incorporation and made it easier to book acoustic gigs.

I played tuba in high school, but had not played much for a long time when my dad told me he needed me to sub for one of his varsity Gravity members on a European tour. That was in the mid ’90s. I also started singing with the band then so now I perform with them whether they need me on tuba or not. It’s a great band so I love playing with them.

What led you to becoming a website designer?

My brother David was always really up on all the latest computer stuff. He built my first website and made flyers for me. But sometimes it was hard to get him to update my calendar. And I just decided I’d figure out how to do it myself. At the time, I had an old Mac and it didn’t really have a browser that I could view websites on. So I would make changes to content, upload that code and call him to look and let me know if it was ok. Crazy way to do things, but it made me understand HTML in a very mathematical way where I wasn’t dependent on seeing what I was doing. I enjoyed it. And soon he was able to recommend me for freelance jobs he didn’t have time to do. It was something I could do even from the road. So I sort of lucked up on it.

Tell us about your work as a website designer

I’ve worked a lot for musicians and LGBT folks. Freelance work often comes by word of mouth. Also did some pretty steady freelancing for a company called Jazzcorner.com – it’s a portal for jazz musician websites. There I updated calendars and added new CDs, videos, mp3s etc. to already existing sites. Sometimes I created new sites for them. I also produced a number of podcast audio interviews for their InnerViews section. Here is one of the sites I designed: http://davidgonzalez.com.

How do you juggle the demands of having multiple professions?

That is the challenge. My work now, is no longer freelance. I found I was taking all the work I was offered because you just never know when you won’t have it. And at a certain point, I realized I’d probably have more free time if I was working 9 to 5. So I work on music in the evenings and on the weekends. Sometimes I use vacation time for festivals or gigs that require several days away. When I was working freelance, juggling work and music was easier. I didn’t have health benefits or get much sleep though.

In what ways do your multiple professions (singer-songwriter/ multi-instrumentalist/ website designer) complement each other?

Basically, web design uses code or language to create an aesthetic. It’s very mathematical. And music is similar. In web design, you are also working with graphics and that can help when it comes to making flyers, posters or CD artwork. And any work that can be done over the internet, allows one to do it from the road.

What website tips can you share with us?

You pretty much have to have a website as a performer. But these days, that is much easier to do. If you don’t have time or budget to create your own site, you should at least get your domain name and have it redirected to one of the many networking sites like MySpace, Facebook, ReverbNation. Having your domain name will make it easier for your fans to remember how to find you and it just comes off as more professional.

Apart from work, what are some of the other things that fill your life?

I spend time with my partner. We get away for the weekends when we can. But my “free time” is pretty limited. I always have music to work on.

What has been happening in your world over the past year? And what is happening over the coming year?

In April of 2009, my brother was diagnosed with cancer in his upper stomach/esophagus. I booked very few gigs during that time so that I was sure to be here when he needed me. We were hopeful for quite awhile that after chemo and radiation he would have surgery and be cancer free. However, there were complications and they were unable to do the surgery. He ended up passing in December 14. So it was a hard year for me on an emotional level. I’m just now getting back to working on music and booking gigs.

I am hoping that in the next few months I will have put together at least a preview of my next CD. Then I will focus more on a new site and bookings. I have a number of gigs already scheduled, including National Women’s Music Festival, Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival and an Olivia cruise.

One other project I hope to get back to is my podcast series focusing on women in music. You can check my first edition out at: http://bigmouthgirl.net

Is there anything else that you would like to share with us?

If I were to recommend an alternative additional career path for someone out there wanting to play music, I’d say to go for honing your skills as a booking agent. That really is a tough job for performers to do for themselves. But if you get good at it, offer to do it for others. Generally, if they are working in the same genres as you, you can use all your same contacts for them. I wish I was better at it myself. But it’s always good to make money using a skill you already have…

VICKI BENNETT (www.thestandarddeviations.com)

Songwriter/Performer/Doctor

Australian Vicki Bennett was born in Parramatta (New South Wales) and grew up in Newcastle, Sydney and Adelaide. After 12 years of “bush doctoring” (in rural/remote areas of South Australia, the Northern Territory and Western Australia), Vicki moved back to Adelaide in 1997, where she formed the group, The Standard Deviations. In 2004, Vicki won the South Australian Music Industry Award for Most Outstanding Keyboard Player. The following year, The Standard Deviations won dB magazine’s dBras (pronounced debras!) for Best Album in South Australia and Best Band in South Australia. The Songwriters, Composers and Lyricists Association’s compilation album, Another Lesson in Love (2009), includes The Standard Deviations’ song ‘Somersaults’ (which was written by Vicki).

What are some of your earliest memories of music?

Church, primarily. I remember singing hymns and singing around the fire at Christian camps. And then my family all went to a very crowded guitar class together when I was about seven. It cost twenty cents for the whole family and we all shared the one second hand guitar!

When and how did you begin writing songs/performing?

I’m one of those people for whom, as soon as I was aware of melody, it seemed logical that words could be put to it. My recollection is having to memorize things at infant school and of memorizing them by writing a tune. I remember wondering, at the time, whether learning things in this way was cheating – because it did seem that I was finding it a little bit easier to remember things than some other people were. I still do it – if I have a list of shopping, and it’s not too long, I’ll hum a little tune in my head with the words.

In high school, I woke up to the fact that there were people who wrote songs and there were people who were performers and there were people who did both. I was starting to listen to the range of things that people were able to write about – it just seemed so wonderfully audacious that you could actually have a song about being a lesbian or politics or death, or songs with jokes or long words in them. The realization that anything was ripe for writing about was a real eye-opener.

There is a kind of musicality in the way people speak and I was always very interested in listening to other people’s stories. The rhythm of a phrase would have me singing in my head – I would find myself putting a melody to something someone had said, without it being a conscious writing of a song, more as a way of storing it away, giving it a framework.

When I was going through uni [university], I played covers with a woman who is a great singer – she really just needed someone to keep her in time, play guitar and sing harmonies. I was probably in my twenties by the time I sang a song that I had written in public – it was a song about a dancer I knew who was dying. The thing that had struck me about her was that her terror of dying was primarily associated with not being able to dance again. I think I perhaps sang the song in a support group or a school setting.

Do you still perform that song?

Well…it was a song that was very literal in lyrical content. I think about some of the lines – “What’s worst for you are the gaping scars where your breasts used to be”, “You curse those bloody x-rays”, “They all know you’re dying, they act like you’re already dead” – and I think the song is probably a little literal for my current tastes, a little harsh to listen to. But maybe it will be resurrected in the future.

Tell us about your work as a songwriter/performer

For most of my young adulthood, I was fairly consumed by my day job as a doctor – it really did consume a lot of time and energy getting through medical school and the first ten years of my career, particularly rural medical work where I was on-call a lot of the time. So I was writing songs, but not tending to share them beyond my circle of friends.

When I was working as a Flying Doctor in Port Hedland (Western Australia), I visited Adelaide and went to a Women Performing gig. Rather impulsively, I played at one of their open slots and sang a song called, ‘Coming Out Blues’. I don’t know what possessed me really! The feedback was great and, although I’d never done any recording, I successfully submitted the song for a CD project [More Than a Pretty Face (1994)].

Then I asked myself what were the things I really loved doing in life and if I was spending enough time doing them. So it was a real conscious choice to put more time into my music. For me, the hardest thing, because I’m not a great singer and my idea was that I probably wanted other people to sing the songs, was finding a group of people who wanted to sing the songs and having the guts to actually sing them for other musicians. That was a big hurdle. But, as a songwriter who is less of a singer, it’s been a wonderful thing to do.

My next CD was when I was in Kakadu (Northern Territory) – If I Had A Sledgehammer – and because it was topical, it got onto ABC local radio. I think that was my first taste of walking into a building and hearing something I had written on the radio – it was overwhelming. And if I hear one my songs on the radio (community radio, ABC, international college radio) these days, I have exactly the same response!

I write songs about things that interest me, but as it happens those things are things that not a lot of people write about. Other songwriters have written beautiful break-up songs and beautiful songs about love and desire, but it’s very unusual for me to write about those. I find myself drawn to stories that are less often told – it’s not a deliberate choosing, it’s just that they’re things that interest me more.

What led you to become a doctor?

I didn’t grow up with anyone medical in the family – my father had come from a very working class background and my mother’s dad was a removalist. And I didn’t really have exposure to any health professionals in my upbringing. But a friend of my father was a doctor – he was one of those old style, not very well off doctors because he worked mainly with geriatric patients, almost exclusively in the public system and had very long consults. I had thought I might do law – I rather liked the idea of defending the unjustly accused –a sort of teenage idealism which I’ve never quite outgrown. This man actually sat me down when I was about 17 and in my last year of high school – he was never a person to give advice before – and he asked me whether I had ever thought about doing medicine – which he thought would enable me to do the things that I wanted to do, but was incredibly portable. That sort of moved me, but I put down music as my first choice [for university] when I left school. Then when I got the music prospectus, and found out that you had to do all these auditions, it sounded terrifying and I changed my preference to medicine. So it was really a fear of the self exposure that music would have required that led me to become a doctor.

Tell us about your work as a doctor

I worked very full-on for probably the first 15 years of my career – I trained to be able to work in the country; I did four years as a Flying Doctor in the Pilbara; I did rural locums in Aboriginal communities; and then I settled in Jabiru, working for the traditional owners of Kakadu – and those jobs involved a lot of on-call and a lot of after-hours. When I came back to Adelaide, I knew that I only wanted to work part-time as a doctor – I knew I couldn’t sustain that work-load and play music as well.

I think that it’s the most extraordinary privilege to participate in parts of people’s lives that are very significant for them – it can be just as moving and enriching in sadness as it can in joy. One of the things about being a country doctor is that that participation is very, very obvious – you are one of the first people at a road accident, you are there when people have had a heart attack in the home, you are essentially running the local equivalent to a hospital, you are at births, you are almost always going to be the person to diagnose serious illness. Although there is a lot of talk about vicarious traumatization and of [health care] professionals being traumatized by hearing difficult things, I find it enriching, It demands absolutely everything that I know how to do.

One of the beautiful things about having a job where you have ongoing relationships with people is that often you know people well enough so that when it comes to difficult times, you have some knowledge of each other’s ways and how best to communicate openly with each other.

How do you juggle the demands of having multiple professions?

Since I’ve come back to the city, I’ve practiced mostly as a doctor in niches of medicine (for example, working with homeless youth, working with Aboriginal people, newly arrived refugees, children under the guardianship of the [South Australian Government] Minister) and that helps make it possible to keep up [with the knowledge required by a doctor].

As far as the time for music, I’m not a particularly workmanlike songwriter. I know that it’s a luxury that I can pay my basic expenses while working part-time as a doctor. So that means I can be a bit selective about what I do musically.

I do think that the things that are sustaining as a human being span across all those different platforms of life. There are the obvious things – trying to avoid being sleep deprived, trying to avoid being hung-over, trying to avoid being completely unfit. But I think there are others things – like choosing to listen attentively to stories in one’s day job, or being really present in trying to write a song – which are, in themselves, quite sustaining choices of how to spend your time. So music provides the chance for real focus, for real mindfulness, for community and doing things together, for that incredible experience of making something that is so much bigger than you could ever make on your own and for an intimacy with other musicians that’s really a very special part of life.

In what ways do your multiple professions (songwriter/ performer/ doctor) complement each other?

The same passions are very useful for both writing songs and being a doctor – intense curiosity and a willingness and enthusiasm for listening. I think that exposure to the huge variety of human experience as a doctor has not done me any harm as a songwriter, although there seems to be a part of my brain that won’t allow me to write about clinical practice.

And I think song writing has helped me as a doctor. It’s important to understand, or to try to understand, how somebody’s managed to survive this long, particularly as most of the people I am engaged with have had a very difficult life. And, with a lot of people, asking them about music is a way into that. Much more consciously recently, I will, if I’m asking someone what’s good in their life or what sustains them, ask them what sort of music they like, or even ask them to play some for me if it’s stuff I’m not familiar with.

Until the last three or four years, I kept my day job life and my song writing life very separate. Then The Standard Deviations started being asked to play at conferences and a lot of those conferences were having themes that were relevant to the lyrical themes that we have – queer conferences, conferences about international health equity, narrative therapy conferences. People would ring and say “We’re doing a keynote session on gender issues, bisexuality and polyamory – we know you’ve got songs about all of those – can you come and do those songs as part of the presentation?”. So recently there’s been quite an overlap between health, in its broader sense, and music.

Apart from work, what are some of the other things that fill your life?

Friendship is the number one thing. I also have a beautiful dog – a rescue dog – it looks like a shrunken kelpie. And, as I have a fairly significant depressive illness, a very big part of my life is trying to live in such a way that I stay engaged with the world – so things like the casual interactions that occur while walking the dog on the beach are significant connections and are very helpful. In terms of music, The Standard Deviations have been having a break in performing for the first half of this year, and I’ve just started to record a solo record.

Finally, what health tips can you share with us?

‘The Grieving Song’ or ‘Room For Us All’ are probably my health tips!

The thing that’s closest to my consciousness at the moment is about having compassion for the self. And I think that learning to be present is probably the single most important thing that I’ve ever learnt and have ever been able to help anybody to learn. The other thing that I feel passionately about – personally and at work and in songs – is being able to see things and name things as they really are. I’m very impatient with things being glossed over – I think that life’s complex and at times it’s horrible and I don’t want to ever pretend that that’s not the case. I think that if we can acknowledge to ourselves what we really feel and really think about things and support other people in what’s authentic for them, rather than some sort of superficial “wish it and it will happen” philosophy, then life would be better. Most of us, when we are struggling, don’t want pious platitudes, we want people to understand what it is we are suffering.

In terms of healing, I think that a really powerful thing is personal absorptions that aren’t just about the self, that are more outward looking – sport and music and activism are great examples. And I think that there is extra power in a focus that’s communal. If you are engaged with other people on a common chore – not necessarily looking into each other’s heart, but struggling and rejoicing alongside each other – then that can be a place of healing.

SUE BARRETT is an Australian music writer, with a special interest in women in music. She only occasionally tries to put in screws with a butter knife.

© 2010