Portrait of Ottie Pfeiffer, Trungley Hall, New South Wales [picture].
1985
1 photograph : gelatin silver, sepia toned ; 18.5 x 23.5 cm.
A pioneer collector of Australian folk music and song, John Meredith was born in Holbrook, NSW, to Bert and Ellen Meredith. His father played the button (bush) accordion, often playing dance tunes for his family after dinner. Bert Meredith worked as a drover along the Darling and Murrumbidgee rivers in NSW and died when Meredith was nine. Like his father, Meredith took up the button accordion and at the age of thirteen, developed an interest in Australian bush songs when he bought a copy of Banjo Paterson's Old Bush Songs. At the same time, he discovered photography. These three discoveries, music, bush songs and photographs were to become Meredith's lifetime passions.
Meredith attended school until the age of fourteen but continued to develop his skills as a photographer and musician whilst working in Holbrook at a pharmacy. In 1944 Meredith moved to Melbourne and three years later decided to travel the east coast of Australia on his pushbike, picking up work where he could. During this time, Meredith travelled from Melbourne to Cairns and eventually settled in Sydney.
In Sydney, Meredith joined the Eureka Youth League, the Communist Party, and the People's Choir. It was at this time that he began to seek out traditional Australian songs to include in the choir's repertoire. In 1952 he was introduced to Jack Lee, an old man known as "Hoopiron". "Hoopiron" knew many of the old bush songs Meredith had been trying to find and Meredith started to record them. He soon discovered that he had uncovered an entire network of old singers and musicians who knew material that was assumed to have been lost from Australian culture. Meredith's long career as a folklore collector began.
In the early 1950s Meredith formed Australia's first bush band The Bushwhackers. The band received much attention after performing in the very successful Sydney New Theatre production of the musical Reedy River, by Dick Diamond. In 1954 Meredith became the secretary of the newly formed Australian Folklore Society and also assisted in the formation of the Bush Music Club in Sydney. During this time he spent every available weekend travelling throughout NSW collecting songs and dance tunes from some of Australia's finest traditional singers.
In 1960 Meredith was the recipient of an Australian Literature Fund Grant for 500 pounds to publish a book based on his field work and recordings. He suffered a heart attack at this time and the book, Folk Songs of Australia, co-written by Hugh Anderson, did not appear until 1967. For the next ten years, Meredith continued to write about his work and published many more books about folk life in Australia.
In 1981 Meredith re-discovered his love for collecting and photographing Australian bush singers and musicians, which he continued to do until his health failed him. The Meredith Collection is housed at the National Library of Australia and contains nearly 8,000 catalogued items including photos and material collected from over 700 performers.
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