Claire Moore (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Before I start, I would just like to put on record how deeply moved I have been listening to the condolence comments in the chamber this afternoon. They have been particularly moving and give great dignity to the people about whom they were created.

I want to talk about one of the icons of Australian entertainment, and that is Margret Roadknight. I want to stress at this point that her name is Margret, as she says when she gives her unique performances: M-a-r-g-r-e-t Roadknight. Last Saturday evening I was very privileged be able to attend a concert in Brisbane which was sponsored by the Brisbane Labour History Association with the help of the wonderful Woodford Folk Festival people and also sponsored by the Queensland Council of Unions. That particular concert was put on to celebrate songs of protest. It went by the astounding name of Rekindle the Flames of Discontent. Who better to be one of the headline acts at that particular function than Margret Roadknight?

During 2007 Ms Roadknight celebrated 44 years of performance across the world. Not just in Australia, but most particularly representing Australia across the world. You can see by looking at her performance history that she has worked on all continents. She has brought her unique style and also her passion for community, her passion for social justice and, most importantly, her passion for engaging the community with her skill. She has brought that to people across the globe, and done us proud as Australians as she has been there, so often, representing Australia.

I will quote from one of Margret Roadknight’s many reviews, and I do encourage people who may be listening to follow up some of the reviews that Margret has received in the last 44 years of performance. Margret has travelled to America many times because of the linkages with the folk and the music scene there. This was quoted in the Oakland Tribune in San Francisco:

... as much as for her impressive voice and choice of songs, Roadknight is delightful because she sheds so much fresh light on the nature of the world and its people.

This is her gift. She enjoys the world, she learns from her community and then she takes her special gift, her craft, her musicality and her wonderful voice to engage all of us.

Margret has been known most commonly for her love of social justice. When you look at her biography, you see that she has taken song to engage all of us in so many issues of social justice. While she is performing, she consistently tells stories to the audience—not just in her performance, but in anecdotes, sharing over those many years of performance and over 35 recordings. She laughingly says that her career spans the history of recording. She holds up LPs and then looks at video disks and DVDs. That shows that she has gone through most of the recent years of seeing how this industry developed.

In that time, she has taken her gift to look at what has been happening in our world. When performing, she often talks about one of her favourite experiences—one which we can share, because it is about the issue of peace. She has been a genuine peace activist for all of her life, not just in her recording period. She talks with great pride and humour about when she was privileged to play at a United Nations event in 1982 talking about nuclear war and disarmament. That is a continuing argument that we have in our world. Margret talks about performing in front of the world audience and doing her particular interpretation of that wonderful song, Imagine. Anyone who has been privileged to hear Margret Roadknight perform Imagine will not forget that experience.

As Margret performs, she engages with the audience and encourages all of us to use our voices because she says that voice is our tool; voice is communication. She says with authority that, towards the end of her performance before this massive audience, the electronic digital machinery around the top of the area began, without warning, to pick up the words of Imagine. So as her voice was ringing across the square, with thousands of people there and an international audience, as she was singing about peace, imagining a world with peace and crying for a world where we can make peace, across the area which shows the international news and also the Wall Street figures, the words of Imagine were being printed. She stood alone with her guitar and her voice and the world heard this message. She states that the world must continue to hear this message because we still have not attained peace. But Margret Roadknight will continue in the battle to ensure that we can.

Ms Roadknight also has the gift of engaging and teaching all of us to use our voices, because she is committed to see that the world can sing. Over these many years, she has always had voice workshops where she challenges all of us to use our own voices and she says quite rightly, ‘When you are happy sing; when you are sad sing louder.’ She says that is the way to perform and to make our lives better.

I am particularly keen to talk about Margret in this place tonight because over 20 years ago when this building was being created Margret was actually part of the Deep Bells Ring touring program, which she helped to develop, in which she and others travelled around work sites and talked to workers and people who were gathered around work sites and engaged them with the power of voice and the power of linking voice with getting across your message. I was speaking with Senator Lundy the other day and she was at the Parliament House work site when Deep Bells Ring headlined by Margret Roadknight was performed. I ask all of you who are here to think about how that message—with the workers gathered, talking about the songs of workers, the songs of construction—took a moment in the creation of this building. Now we are, more than 20 years later, talking about a major celebration of this wonderful building. I hope that, when we are actually celebrating 20 years of our Parliament House, we will be able to have Margret Roadknight’s voice again in this area, speaking about how with our voices we can share and make a difference to our world.

Margret speaks often about her travels and about the wonderful experience you can have travelling through other lands, learning their instruments, learning their music and sharing. For those of us who know Margret, she says that she ‘does not blend in easily’. She is a woman who I think claims a height of six foot five or more and she talks about travelling through China in the 1970s and 1980s. That image brings to mind a particular, classic image of a very tall and impressive European woman working with many of the Chinese people. She did stand out, but she was welcomed and loved and she still in performances today recounts some experiences and some of the beautiful melodies that she learnt from the Chinese people which she integrates into performance now. Margret learns from other communities. She engages with and enjoys their music. She then gives that the Roadknight touch, and that splendid voice, which is distinctive and extremely impressive, gives us the chance to learn so much about so many other cultures and ways of performing.

Margret is not a songwriter; she consistently says that she does not write songs. She gathers songs from other people and then presents them in her own way. It can be Chinese folk music, Israeli dance music, or the magical rhythms of South America or South Africa. I think some of my favourites of hers are from Australian songwriters. As a young woman, I remember going to folk festivals and hearing her particular version of Girls in Our Town and its message stays in my mind about the hope and the hopelessness of young women growing up in country towns. I also think she has a particular relationship with the music of Ted Egan. Some of her music celebrating women as pioneers have become anthems for women in our country and others. I want to give great praise to Margret Roadknight for her skill, for her passion, for her social activism and for all the entertainment and enjoyment she has given me and so many others. We remember her message: ‘When you are happy sing; when you are sad sing louder.’