- 1. SPIRIT OF THE LAND
 (JC Munro)
- I wrote this song as part of the "Eureka Suite"- a celebration of Australia's recent history. I've tried to recognise the place of the original Australians in what we are today as well as the contribution of later migrants. This is a spiritual land and one with a limitless future if we can beep the politicians under control and be inclusive of all our parts. I think we can !!
- 2. THE BALLAD OF CHARLES DEVONPORT (JC Munro)
- Charles was a real person. Like thousands of single mothers towards the end of World War Ellen Walsh was convinced her child would be better served if she gave him up to a "better life". Charles was placed elsewhere and eventually told he had no living parents. He was sent to Canada and worked as a child slave until something in him made him seek out his origins. Eventually he discovered he had a mother alive and living in Derby, England and he began to correspond with her. They arranged to meet but in the interim she died and when he finally reached his birthplace there was only her gravestone to visit.
Her headstone reads - "Here lies Ellen Walsh, loving mother of Charles Devonport." The things we do to children !!
- 3. JOURNEYMAN (JC Munro and PCH Titchener)
- Peter Titchener came up with the concept and the chorus for this song and I wrote the words and melody for the verses. My birth certificate shows my dad's occupa
tion as Journeyman Bricklayer" and I was always fascinated by the term. I like the idea that when you master something you immediately become it's servant. The rights that come with exper¬tise are balanced by the responsibility of refining and passing it on.
- 4. THE BORDER (JC Munro)
- Scotland by birth -Australia by choice. Not a bad combination. As much as I love the land in which I've chosen to live the greater part of my life and raise my family I can't forget the place that made me.
- 5. THUNDER ON (JC Munro)
- I'd like to think that most of us wouldn't be deliberately disrespectful of others politics, religion, gender etc but I don't know that we have to prescribe how we interact with each other to the point that we stultify human spontaneity. Political correctness just sometimes gets a bit much for me. Oh well...
- 6. SHE WAITS FOR ME (JC Munro)
- For Alana, the wife of a travelling musician – for all the things she says and does; ,,,and all the things she doesn't
- 7. WHAT WILL IT TAKE (JC Munro)
- When you think about it - there's only one place where the answer
to all our problems resides - it's in all of us - where else could it be?
- 8. THE OUTLAW (JC Munro)
- This instrumental was written as part of a collection of pieces I wrote on the life and times of Australian bushranger Ned Kelly. It tries in part to convey the loneliness he must have felt and the growing resignation that things would end badly for him, his brother Dan and his friends Joe Byrne and Steve Hart. They did.
- 9. REFLECTIONS (JC Munro and EJ Luker)
- Emma gave me a challenge by presenting me with this melody so I took the opportunity to try the "heavy thumb" style of guitar playing. The lyrics explore the ways in which reflection, in all it's forms, impinges on our lives.
- 10. SISTERS (JC Munro)
- Laden and Lelah Bijana, conjoined twins from Iran, studied to be a lawyer and a journalist respectively. They shared not only their classes and all their relationships
but every aspect of their lives. No wonder then that at 29 years old they decided the time had come to seek separate futures. Their great wish was to be able to look into each others eyes one day and so it was that, against all medical advice, they insisted on an operation to separate. The operation failed.
- 11. WHILE I AM HERE (JC Munro)
- If you decided to contract with the world as to how you'd try to live your life what would you say? I guess it would change from day to day but this is what I thought at onc moment in time.
- 12. WILD MOUNTAIN THYME (Adapted from Robert Tannahill, arranged by JC Munro)
- I've always loved this song – especially the second verse which loving sentiment which I think conveys a truly loving sentiment. I've heard it sung live and recorded many times but I’ve always wanted to hear it with a big arrangement. Thanks to Kat and Emma I have my wish
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