Famous Teacher
It’s quite strange how many people I have met in my adulthood that know, grew up with or went to school with someone that would be considered famous.
Until I was around 11 years old I have absolutely no recollection of knowing anyone that would be in that category. Then when I attended Ringwood Technical School (RTS) in Heathmont in 1971 I had the privilege of being taught by a teacher who was relatively well known, although I did not know it at the time.
In the years I spent at RTS I regularly attended music classes. One teacher was the (unknown to me) famous Australian opera singer Harold Blair.
I enjoyed music of all types and Mr Blair introduced me to the sounds of opera. Most of the students hated this music and some went over my head, however some of the melodies were hauntingly beautiful. We did recognise some of the songs and music as they were used in television commercials and I remember Mr Blair was horrified as we all sang the B&D Roll-A-Door advertisement when he played us Bizet’s Toreador’s Song from the opera Carmen.
The opera style was very new to a group of lower-middle class boys. Mr Blair ran some music appreciation sessions at lunchtimes for those who were interested. I attended quite a few of these and it opened my ears to a completely different music style.
To this day I enjoy many different styles of music and the love of classical music and opera was definitely influenced by what I learnt from Mr Blair. He taught us how to listen to much more than just the melody (like a pop song) but to the background structure, bass lines and counter melodies, other instruments playing harmony notes to the main melody and, of course, the actual musical abilities of classically trained musicians.
Mr Blair was Aboriginal and was born at the Cherbourg Aboriginal Reserve not far from Murgon in QLD in September 1924. Later he was working as a tractor driver and was soon recognised as possessing a fine operatic voice. He had many years of formal training in Australia and eventually attended the Juilliard School in New York. He performed regularly throughout the world and was also known for his activism for Aboriginal rights.
I heard his magnificent voice on a couple of occasions. I remember one morning he told us how he heard a song popular on the AM radio at the time called “Band of Gold”. He thought it was a terribly written song. We all disagreed with him and he insisted that our ears and minds “would be ruined forever if we continued to listen to this kind of music”. He then spread his arms wide and blasted out an opera aria.
We were shocked, never hearing such a voice at close range; it was deafening. The way he managed to get so much power and volume from his voice was astonishing.
We heard him again sometime later when he and another teacher performed a duet at the school concert. His voice “boomed” through the gymnasium hall with no microphones or speakers.
I was shocked to hear of Mr Blair’s early death in 1976 less than one year after I left school. I read his obituary in The Sun News-Pictorial and learnt more about him and his early years from it. It’s fair to say it was quite remarkable to consider where he started and where his career took him.
Some people consider themselves extremely lucky if they went to school with AFL footballers or State or Australian Cricketers. Some people may have known (or know) actors or comedians or leaders of business, however I consider myself to be even more lucky than those people having met and being taught by someone like Mr Harold Blair.