Thanks to a review by Tony Hillier in The Australian yesterday, I discovered Maffra-born singer Michael Waugh, who is about to release his first album, What We Might Be.

Michael is four years younger than me and grew up near where I lived for several years in the late 80s and early 90s.

I never came across him, but his music really resonates.

According to his website:

In 2012, Michael picked up his guitar after more than a 10 year hiatus. He wrote Heyfield Girl, about his mother’s battle with cancer, which won the Roddy Read Songwriting Award at the Maldon Folk Festival, best folk/alternative country song at Canberra Country Songwriting Awards and was a finalist in the Tamworth Songwriting Awards competition.

“My musical education was in the back seat of a Ford, driving down bumpy tracks on long country drives. My parents played car tapes – usually the greatest hits collections of American country singers – and you had no choice but to look out the window and listen to the stories. It was a case of learn to love country music, or jump out of the moving vehicle.”

He mentioned Charley Pride in Heyfield Girl, which reminded me of Dad.

Michael is a storyteller with a good voice. He writes and sings with passion.