Warrnambool Standard 4th June 1998 - ©Copyright Warrnambool Standard 1998. All rights reserved.
Like a wandering minstrel, musician and performer Dennis O'Keeffe will lead a band of followers on a journey through Port Fairy's historical and cultural heritage. With Port Fairy's cultural attractions as the central theme of this year's Rhapsody in June festival, Dennis O'Keeffe's performance is a blending of theatre and music to showcase the town's rich heritage. The performance will take the audience on a wander along Port Fairy's wharf and the Moyne River with presentations by various people on the town's past, its settlement days and its people. Mr. O'Keeffe describes the tour as a musical history event and said it followed on from a successful tour developed for the Geelong Waterfront Festival. For that performance, a waterfront theme and a folk culture were combined with music, dance and craftsmen demonstrating maritime skills including boatmaking to tying knots. The Port Fairy event will follow the same format drawing in aspects of the local heritage including whaling, the mahogany ship, mutton birds and the early port. Aboriginal dancers will also perform tying in indigenous local history. Mr. O'Keeffe, who has just completed a post graduate degree in Australian Folklore Studies at Monash, said the performance was a different way of presenting our past. "It was about our own folk culture", he said.
Songs off to school
by Mark Alexander. Warrnambool Standard December 3rd 1997 - ©Copyright Warrnambool Standard 1997. All rights reserved
Dennis O'KeeffeThe thought provoking ballads of Warrnambool song-writer Dennis O'Keeffe will be used in the classroom to teach young students about Australian history. The renowned artist has developed an innovative education pack called Waltzing Down the Years, designed to stimulate interest in Australian history through folk songs. Four years in the making, it includes a compact disc featuring six of Mr. O'Keeffe's songs and an accompanying text and exercises written by the Australian History Teachers Association of Victoria. He is hailing the package, released at a gathering of 260 Victorian history teachers in Melbourne last month, as a precedent. "It's the first time Australian ballads have been used as a teaching tool", he said. "The songs are historically accurate and thoroughly researched. It's significant to do something and be the first person to do it". Mr. O'Keeffe, who spends countless hours researching his songs on historical topics such as the Mahogany Ship and the Victorian goldrush, said music provided an alternative medium for young Australians to learn about the history of their country. "It's important for everybody to gain a perception and empathy with history", he said. "For some of these kids, they will never forget some of the words of these songs". Waltzing down the years will be released nationally early next year.
Folk singer's papers stolen
Warrnambool Standard December 3rd 1997 - ©Copyright Warrnambool Standard 1997. All rights reserved
Dennis O'KeeffeWarrnambool songwriter Dennis O'Keeffe is realing from the theft of irreplaceable research papers used as references for his Australian ballads. On the same day he launched his educational package in Melbourne his car containing volumes of research material was stolen from Melbourne University where the launch was held on Friday, October 24. Mr. O'Keeffe said hours of painstaking and irreplaceable research had disappeared inside his 1987 Ford Fairlane. He holds little hope of the items being recovered - "Not now", he said. Amon the items stolen were interview notes, cassettes, books and papers containing accurate information on the historic topics his songs deal with. Sound equipment valued at $2000 was also in the car when it was taken. He said the theft of the car and research materials on the day his education package was launched put a dampener on an otherwise enjoyable occasion.
O'Keeffe makes a comeback
Warrnambool Standard Jan. 15 2000 - ©Copyright Warrnambool Standard 2000. All rights reserved
WARRNAMBOOL'S civic green Australia Day concert will mark a return to the stage for Australian folk music afficionado Dennis O'Keeffe after he had a brain tumor removed last. The January 26 performance will be a special one for the 43-year-old singer-folk writer, who believed he would never sing again following his operation."I thought I would never return (to music) and there was a stage when I didn't want to," the doyen of Australian folklore said. "It was just basically the combination of the operation and the facial paralysis that left me so "But now I'm seeing it as a reason to get better because I'm seeing the value more of just doing it for fun and enjoyment and that, in a sense, I had probably taken it a little bit for granted before." The tumor was removed at Melbourne's St Vincent's hospital last August after it was detected at the end of July."I had been losing the hearing in my right ear and slight balance problems and I was under a lot of stress," Mr O'Keeffe said. He has partial but improving facial paralysis and permanent deafness in the right ear: "I've lost the stereo effect and I've got to learn to cope with that." The performance at the civic green will be a special one for more reasons than one with Mr O'Keeffe accompanied on stage by his wife, Anne, on bodhran and vocals, brother Colin on tin whistle and vocals and son, Joel, 17, on guitar. The band, which will follow its civic green contribution with another gig at The Seanchai hotel, will also feature fiddle-player Dennis Taberner. The night will be a break for Mr O'Keeffe from the rigors of pre-production work on what is tipped to become a major movie. "It is called Waltzing Matilda and it focuses on the ability of Australians to sort out many social problems without conflict through the 1890s during the shearers' wars (a time of industrial turmoil)," he said. The movie is tipped to gain some significant international exposure for Warrnambool with four to five scenes to represent early Warrnambool while some big names are expected to fill on and off-screen roles. The movie is expected to be released overseas as well as in Australia. It will replicate the 1890s Warrnambool racecourse, which was significant in the formation of what was to become that best-known of Australian folk songs, Waltzing Matilda. His performance at the 6pm civic green concert will feature a variety of music.
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