Tin Shed Rattlers

Noel Raynes

My First Paid Gig...by Noel Raynes

It was 1946 in Auckland, the war had just ended and my Mum had given me a shilling to walk up to the Surrey Crescent shops to have an eight penny haircut…”And don’t spend the change”!!

The walk itself was fairly forgettable but just on the edge of the shopping centre (as it wasn’t called in those days) there was a lovely old place called the S. Columbia Hall….and there was something going on inside; something an inquisitive seven year old boy ought to know about.

And so I spent sixpence of my haircut money to gain admission and join all the other kids sitting around on the floor listening and watching all the action on the stage.  It was a sort of a one man vaudeville show for kids and about half way through the proceedings the man asked for a volunteer to come up and sing a song. Having had a first rate education in the art of singing songs, courtesy of me Dad and his mates during the course of boozy parties we used to have where everybody sang or played ukuleles, mouth organs or guitars and also by listening to the glorious singing on the “Drunk’s tram” after 6 o’clock closing on a Saturday Night, I shot my dook up into the air and was immediately selected to perform. 

For my debut, I chose a tender rendition of “The Bubbles in my Beer” followed closely by the then popular…”Show Me the Way to Go Home”.  Most of the kids there knew the choruses and all joined in and so made the performance quite successful; so much that...the man gave me a shiny two shilling coin.  Two bob! And it was all mine.

Unfortunately, by the time the show had finished, the local shops, including the barber’s shop, had closed.  So I went home with long hair and copped a hiding for not getting my hair cut. 

Born during the first half of the last century….in Auckland, New Zealand (Born an Aquarian on Australia day 1939).  Began singing at age 4 years; first gig, aged 7 years.  First band during the fifties...As skiffle group called the Scorpions”. Settled in Sydney in the mid sixties as a singer/entrepreneur in the Sydney  traditional folk scene.  Moved to Wagga Wagga around 1970; Fostered a folk music club and organised several folk concerts and inaugurated the first Wagga Wagga Folk music festival...still running as the Uranquinty Festival.  Around the same time we started the Downside Bush Band….now the Tin Shed Rattlers...still going.