Sydney
27 April 2003

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Tears as Canadians part with the World Youth Day cross

3 million live in poverty: Vinnies

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Prelates and priests bid Fr Les farewell

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Project Rachel - healing retreat or ‘just someone to talk to’

Editorial: Vanishing dream

Letters: Pack your bags

Conversation: Allan McFadden, actor, musician, composer, teacher - ‘Cheap guitar’ led to a life of theatre, music

Voice of Youth: Tolerant? Why not try forgiveness?

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Fr Michael’s life of friendship, respect

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‘Space for prayer’ in the heart of the city

Conversation: Allan McFadden, actor, musician, composer, teacher - ‘Cheap guitar’ led to a life of theatre, music

By Damir Govorcin

Allan McFadden remembers how, as a child, he was given a “cheap guitar” by his father. It ignited his passion for music.

“My father bought me a guitar, which cost around six pounds, because he didn’t want to take the risk of buying me an expensive one just in case I got sick of playing the instrument,” he says.

Allan was an only child and played music to entertain himself.

“There was always music in my house,” he says.

“My aunt loved playing the piano and my father, even though he was untrained, loved to sing.

“As I got older, a career in music became a possibility.

“It was acceptable and encouraged by my parents.”

By the age of 10, he was receiving piano lessons at the Newcastle Conservatorium.

It was to be a springboard to a career as a composer, musical director and actor, working alongside people who are household names today.

Allan, who plays five instruments (clarinet, flute, guitar, piano and trumpet), played in a rock band at high school, performing at Year 12 dances in the Newcastle area.

Music as a career went from possibility to certainty.

And it led him to acting and to the Newcastle-based and multi-talented Hunter Valley Theatre Company, which was under the artistic direction of Aarne Neeme.

Allan acted, composed the score and/or was musical director in 30 productions, including shows as varied as Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera, Ayckbourn’s Bedroom Farce and the Peter Nichols play Forget-Me-Not Lane.

He composed the music for John O’Donoghue’s Essington Lewis: I am Work (about the man who made BHP great and was in charge of munitions and aircraft production in World War II), The Star Show, Gossip from the Forest, and Fair and Tender Ladies.

“What made being a part of The Hunter Valley Theatre Company so special was the family atmosphere and that there were no star players,” said Allan.

“The repertoire of plays was unbelievable and I made so many life-long friends.”

Among them are John Doyle (aka Rampaging Roy Slaven) and Jonathan Biggins, both of whom he has worked with as an actor and as musical director.

Indeed, Allan shared a major award with them in 1985 when - after their days at the Hunter Valley Theatre Company ended - they reunited for a season at the Stables Theatre with Essington Lewis: I Am Work.

That season, which also featured Julie Hudspeth and David Wood, won them the coveted Sydney Theatre Critics Circle award.

Allan, 52, remembers the West Side Story that the company presented in Newcastle.

Biggins and Doyle had featured roles in the show, which starred Angela Ayres as Maria.

Also in the cast, as one of the Jets, was a wannabe actor who opted instead for a career as a journalist.

This was Tony Squires, now host of the ABC’s hit TV show The Fat.

Other musicals included Better Known as Bea, Get Happy, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and Tarantara, Tarantara!

There was lots of fun, too.

“Even back then, John Doyle loved a gag,” he says. “Roy Slaven was just a dream at that point.”

Most of Allan’s Hunter Valley Theatre Company ‘family’ drifted to Sydney to work.

For the first few years they staged an end-of-year season at the Stables - a trilogy of New Zealand plays one year, then the award-winning Essington Lewis: I Am Work, plus Alex Buzo’s Sting-Ray and Bob Herbert’s Last Wake at She-Oak Creek.

Allan’s home in the eastern suburbs became the venue for an annual ‘family’ Christmas party.

And it acquired a “riotous status” over the years with the likes of Doyle, Wood, Biggins, Alex Buzo and many others gathering to give each other the most tacky presents.

The rules are simple. All the presents are given a number. Then the numbers are drawn alongside a person’s name, as if in a sweep, so that no one knows who will receive the gift.

“There’s a $5 limit and the present has to be useless and in poor taste,” says Allan.

“One Christmas I was wondering why my cat was sniffing around the presents under the tree.

“It was because John Doyle had wrapped a two-day old fish.”

Apart from the fish, most of the presents have been recycled year-in and year-out.

For the past four years, Allan has been musical director at Brigidine College, Randwick.

He says his faith gives him the “self-belief to be successful at what I put my mind to”.

“My faith gives me hope and the strength to back myself whatever the circumstance,” he says. “It also gives me compassion for my fellow human beings.

“I believe in treating people how I want to be treated.”

Allan’s last acting gig was playing a “loveable rogue” on the Channel 10 soap Breakers a few years ago. He has also appeared on television in Sons and Daughters, Five Mile Creek and in the films Going Sane and Belinda.

And he hasn’t ruled out the possibility of returning to acting in the future.

“I love the excitement of performing on the stage and I hope I can get another chance to do it,” he says.

“The fear of messing up when you’re performing on stage always keeps you on your toes.

“It never gets boring playing the same character night after night. On each given night, the audience reacts differently to your performance which helps keep things interesting.”

Allan says his role as musical director at Brigidine gives him a great deal of satisfaction.

“Brigidine has a great quality of students, who are passionate about their music,” he says. “There’s a big ratio of musical kids in the school and I get a great buzz working with them.

“The school cares about its students and there’s a lot of emphasis placed on the pastoral as well asacademic sideof things.

“There’s also a strong work ethic among the girls.”

Allan has released four CDs, including music he wrote and recorded for Brigidine’s Centenary Mass celebrations at St Mary’s Cathedral in 2001.

“It took a couple of months to write the Mass, but this is what I like to do,” he says.

“I didn’t feel any pressure, despite the fact I was in charge of a 60-piece choir and 40-piece orchestra, and that it was being recorded live.

“The acoustics in the cathedral are fantastic and the church being filled to capacity made it a special occasion.”

Allan is currently writing an opera, Julius Caesar, which will be performed at Brigidine College on June 20.

Away from Brigidine, Allan is musical director, arranger and a vocalist with the swing band Cats on a Hot Tin Roof.